REVIEW: BET Awards 2011

*SPOILER ALERT* This review covers all of the 2011 BET Awards!

Morning everyone! So last night was the 2011 BET Awards, the occasion of the year for the network. So of course, I had to do a review. I've been doing them since I started the blog in 2009, now that I think about it. Even though that was only two short years ago, it's become tradition for me to do these reviews. I'll probably throw in some of my favorite moments of the award show a bit later, along with fashion wins and SEVERAL EPIC LOSSES of the night haha!

Now the review is long, longer than usual I think (SO much to say!), so I've put things in bold, trying help out with navigation a bit if you want to skip around. 

Read the full review after the jump!

As always, the show was preceded by a pre-show hosted by 106 & Park's Terrence and Rocsi. It opened up with a hot performance by Swizz Beatz and Eve of their song "Everyday (Coolin')". The opening event featured performances by Mindless Behavior with Tyga and Lil Twist, as well as Diggy Simmons (LOVE HIM!) and Lloyd, among others. Also, we saw the world premiere of the video DJ Khaled's "I'm on One," featuring Drake, Lil Wayne, and Rick Ross. It was honestly nothing special, so I didn't pay much attention honestly. Terrence and Rocsi were joined by correspondents Nick Cannon and that other woman whose name I'm blanking on right now (tell me who it was in the comments haha). We saw NY royalty Carmelo Anthony and LaLa looking absolutely beautiful, as well as Ne-Yo, Laz Alonso, Kelly Rowland, Wiz Khalifa, and so many more hitting the red carpet.

Now let me get into my issues. My #1 issue with the pre-show? KARMIN. Who I thought was just the girl, and not the name of the group. Never heard of them til tonight. I've been in Australia for four months, forgive me. Apparently they have been tearing up YouTube and World Star Hip Hop with their covers, and BET decided to have them grace the screen every 20 minutes or so at the pre-show. And I'm like, "Why?!" I was not impressed. My sister came to me and said, "Oh, you just don't like her because she's white." I said, "No, I don't like her because she's wack." Everytime they came on, I got angry. No more of that BET. One of my other main issues that I will just NOT let go, because she was just that messy, is Miss Laurie Ann Gibson. With that long sleeved see through shirt, and the strapless black bra, and the messy hair piece thinking she was cute. And the shameless plugs of her show, when she was asked why her black was beautiful. I just shook my head. Side Note: I will be watching. I still admire her choreography). However I was extremely disappointed with her outfit tonight. Haha I was stuck on that all night. I wanted Kevin Hart to go in on her! (We'll talk about the No-Man later!) While we're on fashion, Rocsi's dress wasn't all that either. It fit her well, but the design wasn't hitting. There were also a lot of awkward moments with timing with Terrence, Rocsi, Nick, and the other woman (swear I'm trying to find her name as I write up this post, failing miserably). Either celebrities were late or inside, or people just weren't on their jobs.

Anywho, overall the pre-show is how it always is. Just something to bide time, get you a little excited for the real show to come. Congrats to Miss Marsha Ambrosius, by the way, for winning the first award of the night on the carpet, the Centric Award. If yall don't have Late Nights and Early Mornings, YOU ARE MISSING OUT!

The BET Awards opened with Mary J. Blige hitting the stage with some of her classic hits, later joining up with legend Anita Baker for "Caught Up In The Rapture." Don't know what made BET go in this direction, but I loved it!

And then the man of the hour, the host, comedian Kevin Hart graced the stage. Performing with kid steppers/dancers, his opener was hot. And he started going in on EVERYBODY!!!! This is where the "No-Man" comes into play. Kevin told the audience that everybody has a yes-man now a days, people who never want to tell you the truth about yourself, just those who want to make sure you stay happy. Kevin invented the "No-Man," the one who will tell the truth! Proceeded to tell Fab to take those shades off inside, Trey Songz to keep his shirt on because he looks like a beige greyhound, getting on Neyo about that receding hairline haha! And what can I say about the Real Husbands of Hollywood!!! A direct parody of Basketball Wives, the Real Housewives of Atlanta, and all of the other wives reality shows, the skits featured Kevin, Jermaine Dupri, Nelly, Bobby Brown, and Nick Cannon. I just...I can't even describe how funny that was to me! For those who didn't see it, I will post videos of the skits later today, or YouTube it now and see if it's up.

The show started off right with Chris Brown winning the Male R&B Artist Award!!! Now the new YoungStars Award was a mess. Of course, Willow and Jaden Smith were nominated, Willow for her music, Jaden for his acting. Cute that brother and sister were up against each other. Not cute that BET had them both win. I hate ties. If I had to give it to just one, it would've been Jaden because of The Karate Kid. Props to Willow for being 10 and having a platinum single that I hear consistently in the clubs, but The Karate Kid grossed over $350 million!

And the Female Hip Hop Award. Ugh. Again a fluke to pull in favor of Nicki Minaj, just like last year. This year Nicki was up against Diamond (ain't seen her personally since the "My Chick Bad" remix), Lola Monroe (Unwritten and widely unknown rule of BET Awards: award nominations are based on ALBUM releases; all she's released so far are mixtapes), and some little girl named Cymphonique (Romeo's little sister). So of course, it was no surprise that Nicki won. Oh, well she was "surprised." "I can't believe I won." STOPPP! She couldn't even recover from that. BET needs to stop with that. I say, if there are no other real competitors for ANY award, that award needs to be cut. They cut the Female Hip Hop Award once upon a time because no female was really out doing anything. We all know Nicki is successful. Let her bask in that success, not with an award that she won by putting people who are not really relevant in the nomination basket.

How awesome was Jill Scott's performance featuring that fine piece of British chocolate Idris Elba?!! Jill looked absolutely amazing in that red dress, and the jazz club concept was perfect! Speaking of Idris, he won Best Actor, while Best Actress went to Taraji P. Henson. (Notice that a good number of awards weren't actually given out. Best Movie went to For Colored Girls, also.

After a performance from the Five Heartbeats and After 7, celebrating the 20th Anniversary of the film, the Best Group award went to Diddy Dirty Money. Which I guess is the full name of the group. Glad BET cleared that up for me.

One of my most anticpated performances was Chris Brown, because he always kills. Wasn't necessarily feeling those pants he had on at the beginning or that onesie underneath haha, but he did well. Starting out with "She Ain't You," Chris Breezy's choreography was on point as always. And tell me Busta didn't kill when he came out for "Look At Me Now!" Finishing up with "Paper, Scissors, Rock, Breezy kept on killing in song and dance, and ended with a perfect backflip off the stage and into the crowd. He was mad winded as he stepped up to receive his award for Best Collaboration for "Look at Me Now," with Busta and Lil Wayne.

As half of the awards were given through captions, saw that Michael Vick and Serena Williams won for Sportsman and Sportswoman of the Year. Congrats to them! Random side note that nobody probably cares about, did yall see Orlando Brown in the audience?! Where in the world has he been?! Haha it was good to see him.

Alicia Keys stepped out with her performance of "Typewriter," her classic hit, "A Woman's Worth," singing and jamming with Bruno Mars, as well as "Fallin,'" celebrating the 10 year anniversary re-release of her first album Songs in A Minor. As much as I love Alicia, that weave was NAP. PY. Several people just need to fire their stylists tonight.

The Barbz and Beliebers showdown was funny, with Nicki and Justin Bieber leading their packs. You know, Justin is really growing up. And trying to get at Nicki! And a few hours later the #justincanhandlecurves trending topic was created on Twitter haha! Get it boy!

The Male Hip Hop Award went to Kanye West. Deserved. Since I'm on Male Hip Hop, can I just say that I was really, REALLY hoping that with this signing onto Mayback Music, Wale could finally be seen! He couldn't get Best Collab for "No Hands?" Well no, I figured as much, but I mean, come on, a small little cameo on the stage with Rick Ross? A spot on the Red Carpet? Geez. When Big Sean came on later with Chris Brown, I was feeling like man, am I EVER going to get to see Wale grace the stage?! He better after this sophomore album! Sorry, personal spiel for my love haha.

Best New Artist went to Wiz Khalifa. No shock there. We then saw the long anticipated performances from Trey Songz and Kelly Rowland. Well anticipated for most. I like Trey, but he wasn't my top person to see. Take off your shirt, do a sex song, I know what to expect from him. Then Kelly hit the stage performing "Motivation." I can't lie, she did an absolutely AMAZING job! I like Kelly too. She's beautiful and she has a voice on her, and I think it's great that she's taking her game up some notches, trying to get from out of Beyoncé's shadow. Go her! HOWEVER, people need to stop acting like this ONE hit song makes her the top artist of all time. Twitter has just been blowing up, "Kelly's so much better than Beyoncé, Kelly's taking overblah blah blah." I'm not even writing from a fan point of view when I say this; it's just the truth. Check tour sales. Check record sales. Check awards. Kelly got A WHOLE LOT to do before she even reaches B's kneecaps. PERIOD. But she's on her way. Ok moving forward :-)

The Humanitarian Award was given to Steve Harvey for his work in the communities over the years. People may not like him as a comedian, or judge him for whatever, but I think he's a good dude. He stated a great quote that I tweeted. "I am who I am because God is who He is." Which is truth. Shoutout to him retweeting me tonight, and getting so many mentions/retweets to my phone! Thought it would never stop lol (I was pressed though!) Another side note on fashion: Debra Lee, you are the CEO for BET! I am SURE that you can afford to hire the best stylist you can find to finally get you a hot outfit for the show! She NEVER gets it right. Had this old maternity brown curtain looking umbrella dress on. She could do soooo much better.

After the Humanitarian Award, BET took it gospel, which is always weird because they place the gospel portion of the show right after they do the sexiest song imaginable. Not that Christians don't get down haha, but it just always feels awkward to me. However, I was blessed to hear the late gospel great Walter Hawkins' classic "Thank You," performed by Donnie McClurkin, Mary Mary, and Deitrick Haddon. Mary Mary won for Best Gospel Album, as well. Love those ladies. Amazing voices, and their fashion and hair is always impeccable!


Miss Patti Labelle, honored by Gladys Knight won the Lifetime Achievement Award. The tribute was absolutely amazing! Cee-Lo stepped out as Patti herself with a full on spiky wig complete with hairspray singing, "Somebody Loves You." Marsha Ambrosius, the amazing vocalist that she is, killed with her rendition of "If Only You Knew." Pastor Shirley Caesar. Because she is a gospel legend, and my late grandmother would kill me if I spoke ill of Pastor Shirley in her presence, I will not discuss that dress. Pastor Caesar hit the stage with "You Are My Friend," singing directly to Patti. Miss Patti herself brought the house down with two of her hits, "Love, Need and Want You," and "Lady Marmalade."   SHE SLAUGHTERED! This was the best performance of the night in my opinion. Sorry "Motivation" lovers.

Then commenced tributes to M-Bone of Cali Swag District, Clarence Clemons, Nate Dogg, Gil Scott-Heron and Teena Marie, all stars that we have lost over the past year. It's crazy how many celebrities we have been losing lately. There was a performance by DJ Khaled, Drake, Rick Ross, and Lil Wayne, assuming it to be that "I'm On One" song. Again, not really paying attention until I noticed Wayne skipping in those Fourth of July shorts. Wow.

The end of the show came from an earlier performance from my girl Beyoncé from the Glastonbury Music Festival in England. Shouting out BET, Beyoncé performed "Best Thing I Ever Had" as well as "End of Time," for her British audience earlier today, and the audience at the BET Awards watched on the teleprompter in the auditorium. Now I have to say that that's disappointing to have all those people watching a top performer on a screen instead of live. HOWEVER, it only shows how big B is that even though she wasn't going to be there (2nd year in a row by the way; unfortunately, I think she's over BET), BET still wanted a performance from her. Don't think they would do that for Kelendria, I'm just saying haha. I still got love for her though.

Now I'm going to talk about it. I saved it right for the end. I know that this review is long enough, but AIN'T NO WAY I'M NOT GONNA TALK ABOUT IT. That awkward, and downright FOUL presentation of a Viewers Choice Award. Now the two biggest nominations for the award were Chris Brown's "Look At Me Now," and Rihanna's "What's My Name?" featuring Drake. Figured that either one of them would win it. Terrence and Rocsi, per usual, came out with a winner from some obscure contest that I wouldn't know about since I don't watch BET all that much anymore. And of course, the girl, whose name is Tiffany Greene (you'll hear it over this coming week for sure), got to present the award. The girl tapped the tablet they were using to announce the winners, and announced Chris as the winner. HOWEVER, the teleprompter had it confused saying that Rihanna won, and Terrence proceeded to announce that "What's My Name?" was the real winner. Had Tiffany looking all confused, and had people thinking the girl didn't know how to read or something.

I knew the truth though. The truth being that someone being shady over at BET was still trying to perpetuate mess between Chris and Rihanna, and get the crowd thinking about the whole controversy when Chris had just gotten over that mistake. The girl OBVIOUSLY tapped the tablet like she was supposed to and read the winner that it said. Somebody set that girl up, and had her as one of the top TTs WORLDWIDE, poor girl! She even tweeted she was bawling backstage from embarassment. People have pictures of her face when the awards were switched up and everything (see left smh). Come to find out that Chris really did win, as Kevin announced at the end of the show on his mall cop Segway scooter. Not even getting started on the whole issue of Chris and Rihanna, but to do that to that girl, who was only there FOR ONE NIGHT, probably excited as ever, playing her like that was foul! Somebody over at BET needs to be fired for that one. Tiffany took to Twitter to go off herself! Good came out of it, though. She now has almost 23,000 followers haha!

All in all, pretty good Award Show! BET's doing pretty well. Definitely a good job picking Kevin Hart as host! He was INCREDIBLE as a host! Can yall keep him? Please! Oh, and can Real Husbands of Hollywood be a real show, for my entertainment? Haha I quite enjoyed myself, tweeting the whole time, and taking notes and whatnot. Of course, it wasn't perfect, but without the imperfections I wouldn't have be able to pull my WTF face, and go in like I do haha. One day, I will have my press pass. ONE DAY! For those who missed the show tonight, an encore presentation will be on at 8 p.m. ET on BET. For those who watched, what did yall think of the BET Awards this year?

PEACE.