American Music Awards 2009 – Performance Videos

By On 11/23/2009 · 318 Comments · In American Idol

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After the jump, check out performances from Daughtry, Kelly Clarkson, Carrie Underwood and Adam Lambert. Plus, Kris Allen and Demi Lovato present the Best Female R&B Artist to Beyonce.

Idol Performance of the night goes to Kelly Clarkson’s moving and powerful “Already Gone”. Carrie Underwood and Daughtry had solid performances.

Set aside the S&M overtones, or that Adam Lambert kissed a boy, and simulated a blow job on stage. That didn’t phase me. Unfortunately, Adam did not deliver a good performance. He overcooked his vocals, like he did on Idol a few times. He seemed nervous from the get go. And after he tripped, he never caught his bearings again.

There was too much hype and too much expectation around this performance–a lot of pressure to place on the shoulders of a young, new artist, I think.

Update: From Rolling Stone, “Rolling Stone has learned that producers weren’t informed about the guy-on-guy kiss in advance, and after the show, Lambert told RS the musician he kissed is a straight man.”

2nd Update: The simulated blow job was cut out of the West Coast feed…

3rd Update. Check out Perez Hilton HERE.

Videos after the JUMP…

Adam Lambert – “For Your Entertainment”

Carrie Underwood – “Cowboy Casanova”

Kris Allen and Demi Lovato

Kelly Clarkson – “Already Gone”

Daughtry – “Life After You”

 
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  • Miss Chaos

    He seemed to be pissed during the whole performance, and it just snowballed, I just sat here with my hand on my mouth not believing what he was doing, so wanted an awsome performance. But in him trying to top everyone else, he kinda lost his cool I think, he wanted to shock everyone and went farther than he expected to do in the moment, I think half the stuff he did wasnt planned. Anyhow, has anyone listed to Down the Rabbit Hole? Its different for sure. Ahh, feeling a little down today, but I guess I am still going to KMart to buy the CD, And is he still performing on the GMA concert series, I read different stories about this. Hard to keep up cause couldnt get on the site much of the nite and morning.

  • JoviQueen

    I thought it was a trainwreck and didn’t live up to the hype. Sorry and I like Adam.

    I have never liked Carrie. She needs to go back and watch who should have won Season 4 to learn how to handle a microphone stand. She has a good voice but her performances are always so stiff.

    Kelly rocked! She had such an awesome performance. Truly THE American Idol.

  • Lulu2

    I thought Adam looked and sounded sick and as if he hadn’t slept in awhile. He looked 10 years older than he usually does. And then he tripped and it sure looked like he was in physical pain to me. Maybe he was disturbed by falling, but I don’t think that pained expression was part of the performance. Because he looked ill to me, it occurred to me that Adam couldn’t sustain a long show business career with overtly gay tones; he have to switch it up at some point. On screen, straight men totter into their 80′s wining and dining 20 year old women. Women and gay men can’t do that. Adam should not listen to Perez Hilton or Out.

  • ggdoorsfan

    Adam isn’t someone who just came up from nothing. He’s been working at this for YEARS, decades even, so it’s not like they plucked him off the street and wanted him to be brilliant on day one.

    That said, I thought he was definitely nervous last night, completely understandable. The vocals were not perfect, but then he messed up on tour and idol too, as has everyone at some point or another, and the nerves definitely contributed to that.

    I was definitely not offended by anything, but that’s ok if you were, or if you didn’t like it, or whatever. He was trying to put more in then he needed to, and I think the thinking from his camp was that they wanted him to really really stand out, to be outrageous and really crazy, hence putting in SO many OTT sexual moments. I was ok with it.

    i wasn’t offended by the performance from a moral standpoint – on the real, i was taken aback by the amateurish nature of the performance by someone who has had years of theater and stage experience, more than the average idol contestant, so him being able to play the big stage was something i figured he would have under control. and he didn’t. and i was surprised at what i perceived to be his lack of forward thinking in just how what he was planning to do was going to play across america. fans can cry ”you don’t get it” all they want, adam can cry ”i must not be for you then” all he wants… if this is the case, why would he choose american idol, the bastion of ”middle america” music sensibilities, as the conduit to launch himself into the mainstream… if he wanted to be a niche act, and has no use for certain ”middle america” sensibilities and dollars, then it makes no sense to try and alienate, so early in your career, the very audience that helped propel you along in the first place. not the smartest thing to do in my book, but ymmv.

  • Reflections On Life

    my reactions during AMA

    daughtry – good but o so boring. time for a potty break…

    carrie – watch her brain: “now put your hand up & flick your wrist… now put your other hand on your hip & wiggle a little… and now make a sexy face…”.

    kelly – keeping it real, nice balance of polish & passion. weight gain suits you, but pls just keep it healthy – we want you around a while.

    kris – looking at demi instead of the audience/camera looks amateurish. wish he were singing (brand new album, hello?) instead of announcing.

    jordin – miss thang was the only chart-topping idol missing from the stage. with rihanna & alicia & mjb already performing, was it too much female pop r&b already? or did she cancel due to appendectomy?

    and ADAM – imagine JEDWARD 10 years later – it was that bad. trying way too f**ing hard… and singing was abs atrocious.

    no problem w/ the sexuality – i even told my friends b4hand “he’s not the male gaga because he’s totally predictable, he’ll just have a bunch of s&m stuff and push the envelope a bit to shock you.”

    i was surprised at how bad the singing was. cuz it was always always excellent on AI. and cuz he’s been doing live theater and low cabaret for so long, so he shud be able to handle live singing + choreo w/ease.

  • seattle_girl

    Getting past the let down of the vocals, two main thoughts keep coming to mind about Adam’s performance:
    1) He’s going to really limit his audience is this is the route he wants to go. The coolness edging on dangerous is a good target spot for him, but the blatantly overt sexual images will cause some folks (and parents who still buy their kids music and concert tickets) to rethink spending money on Adam.
    2) Am I the only one to wonder if the dancers/musicians working were pissed off to be objectified at Adam’s whim? Sure they signed on to perform, but did they know that meant Adam was free to manhandle them to his heart’s content? Can’t help but wonder how the keyboardist and the woman who got her crotch fondled while dangling on that bar above Adam feel about (unwillingly?) being made part of the spectacle.

  • wand3rful

    kelly clarkson is the best AI has ever produced. last night just re-affirmed this. she was stellar. RS mag needs a wake up call if they think Adam is the best idol contestant ever…sorry, in terms of media frenzy yes. But in terms of quality, that girl just blows me away.

  • http://MJO judes

    I find it amusing that some artists feel they need to “shock” [ or try to- as I find it "try hard"] their audience to get attention!! Kelly proved last night that less is sometimes more !! It really was a stark contrast!!
    You know – in movies – romantic subtle movies are selling well world wide whereas gratuous ‘sexpot” movies are going down in sales!! The same could be said for music – highly sexualised songs & images limit the artist’s audience & if that’s what Adam wants then so be it but I highly doubt it!!
    Maybe he should have a think about who he is alienating [ a lot of the fans that voted him in to 2nd spot ]!! He is also alienating many gay men who feel this sort of sexualisation puts their cause for “normality” back years!!
    I hope he can get back to what he does well – concentrate on the singing & lose the “I’ll show you” attitude!! Its not pretty!!

  • SharB

    I thinks it’s sad that the actual winner of AIS8 was relegated to announce an award winner, and all the hype went to the runner-up. It seems like they are slowly and steadily trying to push Kris under the bus. Shame, shame, shame on 19E & RCA.

    I was totally offended by Adam’s performance and if he’s trying to establish himself outside the AI box, he surely missed the boat. Terrible performance and horrible displays of whatever-the-hell-that-was.

  • skylight1219

    I don’t think Adam was nervous at all. His over-inflated ego kicked in. He has received such high accolades that he thought he could get away with anything. He’s disgusting!

  • artbigred

    I won’t be letting my family watch the AMA show ever again. I am not against gays,at all. But you let this idiot (not idol) do things on Tv that young children should not be seeing. I can’t for the life of me fiurer out how anyone would call him an idol. I think he personally set gay men back about 100 years. I can honestly say that I don’ t know any gay man or woman who feels that they have to make themself look this disgusting. As for spending one cent on any of his music. I guess you know my answer to that. I am really disapointed in the AMA show for letting this be aired. This is not freedom to express. It is low life smut that needs to be kept in the bedroom not on an awards show. artbigred

  • Lulu2

    Well, I didn’t like the choreography and something was off, the sound, the voice, whatever. But I agree with Adam that stirring things up is part of art. The execution just needed to be better. When things shock, they make you think more deeply about your reaction. No disrespect intended, but I keep coming back to this thread because the outrage from some posters here make me laugh. But what I most disliked about the performance was how old Adam looked and his expression at the end. (I gather the cameras managed to edit out the finger in the moment, but those stills show the whole picture.)

  • Starr

    jersey
    11/23/2009 at 9:15 am
    Too late to edit my last post. I just had to add that Green Day also fell into the ‘did not suck’  category.

    LOL did we watch the same show last night? Billie Joe Armstrong (attempted to) hit that high note and I swear to god, everyone on my couch winced. 21 Guns is a boring song. Catchy, but without the falsetto it’s just meh.

    ck2
    11/23/2009 at 10:33 am
    why are so many people up in arms? are you really all that surprised by this performance? this is exactly what I expected’ ¦ raunch with cabaret vocals that screech way off key. why be asked to do the finale of a huge music show and then choose to end on a more contemplative note with stellar vocal skills that he has shown the crowd in the past? he wants to be talked about just as we are all doing now.

    You mean you were expecting a bad performance? Sorry if everyone else was expecting something classy out of Adam. Also, if the point was to be talked about, I’m getting sick of this excuse. He used this same excuse for his album cover, saying that he appreciated being talked about anyway by those who didn’t like it. If that’s the way he wants to take his career, then by all means. Clearly he’s not in it for the music if all he cares about is being talked about.

  • julesb2183

    I think this is funny. Everybody now discovering that Adam can’t sing when he sounded the exact same way on Idol. All the cheering from the judges covered that little fact up for most people.

  • cookcricket

    Gotta weigh in, of course, with my 2 cents, which is all it’s worth. ;)

    I only watched Kelly and Adam. Didn’t watch the AMAs on TV.

    Kelly was simply phenomenal! End of story! Wow! I don’t own any of her music either. Just amazing!

    Adam. After reading some of the feedback from last night, I have admit it wasn’t *quite* the trainwreck I was expecting. And here’s why, when he performs live he demands the stage and is pretty amazing to watch. I only watched on this small vid posted here, but I’m not completely convinced that the stumble/roll was not pre-planned.

    Having said that here’s what my thoughts (analysis?) are(is) of the overall performance. First, I’m glad I didn’t have to watch this on my big screen because I could focus more on Adam than on everything surrounding him. At the beginning my first thought was that he sounded theatrical. It sounded like a solo in a bigger production. Next, his vocals didn’t come across as they could have. (And I’m not so sure many are saying they did.) But when he did that run at the end I saw Adam. (A good thing, imho.) I, personally, think he was nervous and so that had something to do with him reverting back (yes, that’s what I said) to what he knew pre-idol. His ‘in the heat of the moment’ *to me unnecessary*, kiss etc. were things that were encouraged by the audience in his Zodiac performances, yes? no? I believe human nature causes one to do what’s known when one is nervous. If I’m wrong on this I’m okay with that, but of course no one sells Adam better than Adam so I don’t believe he would admit this post performance.

    Also, he has a point about the whole discrimination thing, imo. But I didn’t find enjoyment from the Brittany/Madonna kiss myself. Why? I don’t mind watching PDA when it represents *love*, but don’t like when it represents *lust*. Shoot me, I’m an old-fashioned romantic in that way.

    I’m interested to see where things fall from here. I hope well. Imho, you can’t help but like the guy. I’m looking forward to watching Letterman Wednesday.

    Also, watched Kris’s presentation and thought he did great with what he had to work with. But then, I’m a fan! ;)

    ETA: Sorry for the long post.

  • matkojapan

    OMG! Train wreck of epic proportions!!

    It’s obvious that Adam’s ego has gotten the better of him!!

    totally hilariously bad!!

  • matkojapan

    This reminds me of the Epic Britney fail!

    But at least she had drugs as an excuse!!

  • JB1

    Danny Gokey is laughing out loud today… if there is any question who the best singer from Idol was last year, Lambert made it clear.

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