DAVID ROMAN | ASST. INSCAPE EDITOR
As any awards show fan can tell you, the totem of award shows starts with illustrious The Oscars and ends with the Teen Choice Awards.
But where would you put something as radical and new as the YouTube Music Awards?
Known for revolutionizing online video streaming, YouTube conquered and early-on monopolized the streaming-service industry.
However YouTube apparently wants to revamp its image among the entertainment world by changing the way people view the video-streaming service.
In an unprecedented move YouTube execs decided to put on the first ever YouTube Music Awards, made to honor the very best in the music-video medium.
Normally seen as a simple streaming tool, YouTube has been wanting to extend its capabilities within the unexplored frontier of the online entertainment world.
A frontier that is currently being expanded upon by media power-houses like Netflix, HBO GO and the elusive online torrenting sites that offer viewers the latest episodic chapters of any show holding their attention.
Being their largest jump in that direction to date, the YTMA presented one of the first completely live award shows voted entirely on by the fans.
Directing the nearly 80-minute long webcast which aired was the well respected Spike Jonze known for putting together the very popular and critically acclaimed Arcade Fire video accompany to “The Suburbs” the album that basically stole the 2011 Grammy’s.
Co-hosting the comedy-filled event was comedian Jason Schwartzman (“Bored to Death.”)
Among the live performances that awards shows have come to be known for, almost exclusively so, were chart-topping artists like Lady Gaga who performed a dark-themes “Dope” off her latest album “Artpop” played on her shadowy piano.
Eminem also performed one of his upcoming singles, “Rap God” and Arcade Fire opened the show by playing “Afterlife” no doubt being asked to perform by their former collaborator Jonze.
A live comedy sketch (one of many) was written by Lena Dunham of the hilariously awkward “Girls” on HBO, featured a heart-broken guy at a rave getting help from a stranger to overcome seeing his ex-girlfriend at the rave with the disk jockey, ending in a fan-chosen tragic outcome for the two.
The night of entertainment featured a fresh improv feel similar to that of a “Rocky Horror” performance which kept it funny and held my attention a lot longer then the typical music awards show.
