Gossip blogger helped unveil Gaga statue at Madame Tussauds in L.A.
By Jocelyn Vena, with reporting by James Lacsina
Perez Hilton unveils Lady Gaga's wax figure at Madame Tussauds Hollywood on Thursday
Photo: David Livingston/ Getty Images
Is there ever too much Lady Gaga? Well, Madame Tussauds doesn't seem to think so. On Thursday the wax museum unveiled eight Gaga likenesses all over the world. The singer's pal, gossip blogger Perez Hilton, was on hand to help unveil the Los Angeles statue.
That version of the statue has Lady Gaga donning the outfit she wore for her performance at the Brit Awards in February, which was dedicated to her friend the late Alexander McQueen. The look included a white lace bodysuit, lace mask and over-the-top bouffant wig, and Perez seemed to approve of that pick.
"There have been eight that have been revealed all over the world and I think they saved the best for last," he told MTV News, moments after unveiling the statue. "It's such a monumental day because each one of these figures takes months to make, it costs $300,000 to do just one and it's so amazing and lifelike. It's creepy ... that it is so real. I kept waiting for her to blink, but she didn't. It's very accurate. I know that Gaga would be very honored."
So how does Gaga feel about eight versions of herself living around the world? "I know that Gaga is super-excited and happy about it," Hilton said. "And I'm sure that when she has a chance she'll go and check one of them out!"
Gaga statues are now living in wax museums all over the world. MTV News was also on hand when her New York statue went on display. Gaga appears in a sheer black dress paired with a wide-brim hat made of hair, a look she wore to the Consumer Electronics Show back in January.
In Berlin, Gaga wears a blazer, leotard and hair bow; in London, the figure dons a Philip Treacy telephone hat and sparkly navy Armani suit; in Amsterdam, she's in a nude bodysuit, a white blazer and a towering purple beehive. Her skintight black harlequin outfit is featured in Hong Kong, and her wire "wing" dress is on display in Shanghai.
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Rihanna, Eminem, Usher, B.o.B, Alicia Keys among winners at event celebrating 40th anniversary of classic music show.
By Joel Hanek and Gil Kaufman
Anita Baker at the 2010 Soul Train Awards
Photo: Moses Robinson/ Getty Images
Only at the Soul Train Awards could you have a tribute to R&B icons such as Anita Baker and Ronald Isley alongside a segment in which rap legend Doug E. Fresh attempts to teach CNN anchor Wolf Blitzer how to do the Dougie.
It was that kind of night at the 2010 Soul Train Awards, as rookies, veterans and legends came together in Atlanta for the second annual event — which was taped November 10 and aired Sunday night on BET. The show, hosted once again by Terrence Howard and Taraji P. Henson, featured a night of performances from some of the biggest names in soul and R&B.
Host Howard told MTV News that the show is meant to be an extension of the long-running and legendary '70s TV series that brought soul, disco, R&B and rap stars into viewers' living rooms. "It reminds me of the advancement black people have made over the years because 'Soul Train' really was the beginning of that Black Power movement when we could actually see ourselves — and to have an awards show based upon that 'Soul Train' — it's headed somewhere," Howard said. "We have a black president now. The country seems to be more tolerant towards the diversity inside of it so it seems like the train is moving well down the tracks."
The awards show marked the 40th anniversary of the classic music showcase hosted by Don Cornelius, and celebrated the careers of Baker and Isley, while handing out trophies to such contemporary stars as B.o.B (Song of the Year for "Nothing on You"), Melanie Fiona (Best New Artist), Eminem and Rihanna (Best Hip-Hop Song of the Year for "Love the Way You Lie"), Usher (Album of the Year for Raymond vs. Raymond) and Alicia Keys (Record of the Year for "Unthinkable [I'm Ready]" and Best Female R&B Soul Artist).
Though top winners such as Trey Songz, Usher, Ciara, Eminem and Rihanna were not in the house, Blitzer graciously agreed to accept Slim Shady's award for him, joking, "Who better to accept this award on behalf of Eminem ... I know he's thrilled."
Weaving through a series of skits involving magic tricks and jovial bickering by the hosts, the performance-heavy program delivered on talent. R. Kelly opened by teasing the crowd with his classic "Bump n' Grind," then diving into his new single "When a Woman Loves" — transforming the song from a slow jam into an all-out '50s rock-and-roll epic. Ne-Yo kept the show moving with a showcase of his singles from this year, including "Champagne Life" and "One in a Million."
The tribute to Baker featured an all-star cast, with artists like Chrisette Michele, Goapele, Lalah Hathaway, Dionne Farris, Kem, Tamia, Faith Evans and El DeBarge covering a medley of the singer's greatest hits. Baker told the crowd that the biggest honor of the night for her was that real musicians were performing live with an actual band. "It's amazing because you've got children behind you singing 'Rapture' — it's lovely," she said, adding, "Let's do it again!"
Ronald Isley, co-founder and lead singer of the Isley Brothers, also received a special homage that featured Jeffrey Osborne, Freddy Jackson, DeBarge, Tank, Eric Benet, Bilal and Peabo Bryson. Isley also came out to perform his own medley of hits and was joined onstage by Chanté Moore and R. Kelly for a rendition of "Contagious," their 2002 single that featured the Isleys. In addition, Cee Lo Green closed the show with a duet on the Isleys' classic 1959 hit, "Shout."
Among the event's other highlights was Cee Lo's performance of his smash "Forget You," which took place on a golden stage that resembled a cross between Kanye's Egyptian fusion and an OK Go video, and found the singer gliding down conveyor belts while belting his number.
Erykah Badu delivered a stripped-down version of her 2010 breakout "Window Seat" that featured the singer perched on the floor over a web of lights while appearing to orchestrate the vibrations of light flickers with her hands.
Soul singer Eric Benet performed "Sometimes a Cry" — a song that Lil Wayne cited as one of his favorites while in prison — bringing down the house with a soaring falsetto that bested his studio rendition of the track.
The evening's other performers included Bruno Mars, who sang his new hit "Grenade," and Jazmine Sullivan, who did a medley of "10 Seconds" and "Holding You Down (Goin' in Circles)."
Did you watch the 2010 Soul Train Awards? Tell us about your favorite highlights in the comments.
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Club smash, featuring will.i.am, tops our list of the Top 25 Songs of the year.
By James Montgomery
MTV News' Top 25 Songs of 2010 has reached an end. We've already counted down the rest, and now it's time to get to the best: Usher's "OMG," the song that perfectly sums up the past 12 months of popular music — and makes you wanna move until you can't move no more.
If 2010 proved anything, it's that a DJ really can save your life ... or at least get you to #1 on the Hot 100. After years of staring at each other from across the room, hip-hop, pop and R&B all decided to finally get in bed with dance music, and the results weren't always pretty, but they were certainly successful. To date, only 17 songs have made it to the top spot of Billboard's singles chart in 2010, and nearly two-thirds of them — from Ke$ha's "Tik Tok" to Far East Movement's "Like a G6" — were, in some way, dance songs.
In that regard, no song better sums up 2010 pop music quite like Usher's "OMG," the dance song to end all dance songs. Sure, it may not have matched the swagger of Kanye West's "Power," the snarl of Rick Ross' "B.M.F. (Blowin' Money Fast)" or the inbox-clogging spread of Cee Lo's "F--- You," but it didn't have to. None of those songs went to #1, after all. "OMG" did. Twice.
Even among songs that managed to snag that top spot — Eminem and Rihanna's "Love the Way You Lie," Katy Perry's "California Gurls," B.o.B and Bruno Mars' "Nothin' on You" — "OMG" stood out from the pack, mostly because of its pedigree. It's not a stretch to say that any of those tracks could've (and probably would've) been #1 in any other year; "OMG" could only have done it in 2010, because it was crafted to do nothing else. No other song this year was as of the moment, as singular and shiny and downright undeniable. There's a reason it was named on more ballots than any other song on our countdown and justly takes the title of MTV News' #1 Song of 2010.
And while all that is important, it's largely beside the point. "OMG" is the kind of song that truly defies deep inspection, because it's not exactly headphone music. Rather, it was made for the clubs, designed to envelop you on the dance floor and not let go until the final "oh-ohh-oh-ooh-oh." And in that regard, it succeeds in spades. It is a masterful melding of R&B, and Euro dance, all icy synths and handclaps, starbursts and stutters and sing-along chants. It ebbs and flows, stops and starts, pumps and preens. Simply put, you cannot listen to it without moving in some way. (MTV's Dee Caligiuri, who voted on our countdown, probably put it best one night when she declared: "There are so many dances you can do to it!") And if that's not the definition of a success, well, then I don't know what is.
A large portion of the credit for "OMG" has to go to will.i.am, who not only produced the track (I know!), but was smart enough to see this whole dance thing coming when he teamed up with producer David Guetta last year. Those songs — "Boom Boom Pow" and "I Gotta Feeling" — were, of course, massive, but neither of them are as good as this. Given full control, Will goes off the deep end, cramming the song with every dance trick in the book — and probably some new ones he just invented on the spot. And Usher, whose career, truth be told, was sort of in need of a shot in the arm, is the beneficiary. He floats and gloats above the mix, suave and cocksure, knowing that he is exactly the right man at the right time. That time, of course, had to be 2010.
Because in a year when so many big-name acts embraced the DJ, he flat-out did it better than any of them. "OMG" represents the peak of the dance-pop era in which we live, a song as undeniable as it is of the moment. We can only speculate as to what next year will bring, but there's really no denying that, as 2010 comes to a close, Usher stands above all else, reinvigorated and ready for more. It's enough to make you say "Oh My God," really.
How does Usher's "OMG" rank among the year's best songs? Let us know in the comments!
MTV News' Top 25 Songs of 2010 have all been counted down. But the fun isn't over yet: We still want to see your picks in the comments below!
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Kadir Nelson only spoke to Jackson once before the singer's death.
By Gil Kaufman
When it came to putting together Michael, the first posthumous album of material from late King of Pop Michael Jackson, everyone was working with half a playbook. The producers of the singer's first studio album since 2001 had to figure out what the notoriously detail-oriented Jackson would want them to do with the grab bag of songs he was working on at the time of his death.
Even the artist behind the album's iconic cover, a Renaissance-painting-like mash-up of iconic images from throughout Jackson's career, was forced to go on his understanding of what Michael would have approved of.
That artist, Kadir Nelson, sat down with MTV News last week to walk us through the thicket of images on the cover and explain how he came to create the visual summary of the pop icon's solo career.
Nelson said the ball started rolling in 2003, when Michael was working on songs for his Number Ones collection at Marvin's Room, the legendary Los Angeles recording studio founded by R&B great Marvin Gaye in 1975. Jackson saw a pair of paintings Nelson had made chronicling Gaye's life and fell in love with the images.
"As a result of seeing it, he called me one afternoon and he said, 'I really like your Marvin Gaye painting ... I want one, about me ... but I want it bigger.' Because Michael liked things to be big," Nelson said. But, as with so many projects begun by Jackson, after Nelson followed the singer's advice and read the autobiography "Moonwalker" and did some research on the painting that was to hang in Michael's home, other things came up and the project fell through the cracks.
Then, following Jackson's death in June 2009, his longtime friend and now estate co-executor John McClain rang Nelson up and said the gig was back on. "[He said], 'It's time for you to do that painting that Michael wanted you to do,' " Nelson recalled. " 'Don't ask any questions, just do the painting and we'll figure out what to do with it later.' "
The resulting image plays into Jackson's lifelong belief that bigger is better, with a regal Michael staring out in the central image while wearing a prince's Victorian blouse with a high, ruffled collar, a silver-gloved hand placed over his heart and a jewel-encrusted crown hovering over his head. Around that central image are painted nods to everything from such classic videos as "Beat It" and "Thriller" and a spaceship from one of his favorite movies, "E.T." and MTV's Moonman, a reference to the fact that Jackson's videos helped make the channel the force it is today.
The sadness of Jackson's death made Nelson a bit hesitant at first, but he said he realized he was getting a rare second chance to follow through on the abandoned project, so he was quick to say yes. "I did it because I felt that it would be a very important document ... and a tribute to Michael's life," he said of the finished work, titled "The King of Pop."
He described it as a "panoramic celebration of Michael's life, music and career" and said he strode to make it as perfect as possible to match the level of perfection Jackson insisted on in his music and art. "I felt that I owed it to him, to his family, to his fans, to do the best job possible."
Though Nelson only spoke to Jackson that one time in 2003 over the phone, he worked with the singer's brother, Jackie Jackson, on the image over a five month period at the studio where the Michael album was being completed and said that Jackie gave some insight into his sibling's thoughts. When the final image was produced, MJ's brothers Jackie and Marlon Jackson and McClain gave it a thumbs-up and said he did a good job.
Like the video for the first single, the Mark Pellington-directed "Hold My Hand," it's an artistic leap that attempts to tap into Jackson's elusive magic, but Nelson feels like he succeeded.
He considers the final product — his biggest-ever canvas at more than 9 feet wide by 4.5 feet tall — his Sistine Chapel. And like Michelangelo's signature work, Nelson labored long and hard on the painting, putting hours in from August 2009 until January 2010 and then again on and off until October.
What do you think of the finished product? Share your reviews in the comments!
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MTV News' Sway joins rap mogul, teen idol and manager Scooter Braun as Bieber records song he wrote himself.
By Kelley L. Carter
Diddy, Justin Bieber and MTV's Sway Calloway
Photo: Bad Boy
On Tuesday (December 14), RapFix and MTV News' Sway tagged along with Diddy as the rap mogul went on a whirlwind promotional tour through New York in support of Diddy-Dirty Money's just-released Last Train to Paris.
There were many stops along the way — New York radio station Hot 97, a scorching-hot performance of "Coming Home" on "The View" — but the part of the day that's sure to make the girls scream is when Diddy linked up with Justin Bieber.
A little before 7:30 p.m., Diddy hung out with Justin at a recording studio. They were there because the Grammy-nominated teen idol had an idea for a song and needed to "get it off of his chest," according to Bieber's manager, Scooter Braun. Apparently, this studio is like a second home for the 16-year-old pop star.
But it wasn't all laying down tracks. Braun recalled the first time Bieber met the rap impresario (on the 2009 VMA red carpet), and Diddy gifted Bieber with a Diddy-Dirty Money jacket, declaring him an honorary group member! But that gift probably can't top the 16th-birthday present the Diddy-Dirty frontman gave the Biebs this year.
His big-deal birthday present? A $200,000 Lamborghini Gallardo Spyder.
Before we parted ways, Scooter also dished about Bieber's upcoming 3-D movie, "Never Say Never," calling the MTV Films release "incredible."
Diddy and his Dirty Money ladies, Dawn Richard and Kalenna, are celebrating the release of their Last Train to Paris on Tuesday night with a Ustream party.
Are you excited to hear Diddy and Justin were in the studio together? Tell us in the comments!
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