|
 West, who famously stormed the stage and snatched the
microphone from Swift in 2009 during her acceptance speech, was
given the Michael Jackson Video Vanguard award on Sunday by
Swift, in a VMA moment that came full circle.
"Everyone in the world knew about our infamous encounter at the
VMAs, but something you may not know is Kanye West's album
'College Dropout' is the very first album I bought on iTunes,"
Swift said.
She added, in a parody of West's 2009 speech when he hijacked
her award, "to all the other winners tonight, I'm really happy
for you and Imma let you finish, but Kanye West has one of the
greatest careers of all time."
After a standing ovation, West rehashed the 2009 incident along
with many other musings on the authenticity of artistry, at one
point criticizing awards shows and MTV for replaying the Swift
incident over and over for "more ratings."
"If I had a daughter at that time when I went on stage and
grabbed the mic from someone else ... after that night, the
stage was gone, but the effect it had on people remain," he
said. He ended his speech by declaring, "I have decided in 2020
to run for president," quickly riling up social media.
Swift won video of the year, the night's top award, for the
star-studded music video of her revenge song "Bad Blood," which
is reportedly about her feud with singer Katy Perry
"I know there's been a lot of discussion about what this video
means but I'm just happy that in 2015 we live in a world where
boys can play princesses and girls can play soldiers," the
25-year-old singer said.
[to top of second column] |
 Perry did not attend this year's awards show.
Viacom Inc-owned MTV's annual VMA hands out Moonman statuettes
to the year's top achievements in music videos, but is better
known for delivering irreverent and unexpected moments.
Sunday's show was all about the shock factor as a scantily clad
Miley Cyrus, 22, cursed her way through her hosting duties, flashed
her bare breast accidentally and performed a new song about smoking
marijuana.
Singer Justin Bieber returned to the VMA stage after a two-year
break to perform two new tracks, tearing up at the end of his
performance.
Swift led the winners with four Moonmans including best female video
and best pop vide for "Blank Space."
New Jersey rapper Fetty Wap was named artist to watch, Bruno Mars
and Mark Ronson's summer hit "Uptown Funk!" was named best male
video and Nicki Minaj's "Anaconda" won best hip hop video.
(Reporting by Piya Sinha-Roy; Editing by Leslie Adler, Robert Birsel)
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