What are Ne-Yo and Beyonce up to? And will the girls be trounced by the boys again this season on American Idol? The answers to these questions and more in today’s Last Lap.
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VOTE: What Video Will Reign Supreme On Saturday’s Top 20 Year End Countdown?
On this week’s episode of the VH1 Top 20 Countdown, we’re rolling out the Top 20 videos of the year from Herald Square, New York City. That’s right, all the videos that have led the countdown throughout the different seasons of the year will now battle it out for Top 20 supremacy. But before the show airs on Saturday at 9am EST, you can still cast your vote for the video you think should take the crown for 2012. Who will it be? You’ll have to tune-in and check back with us on Saturday to find out!
Aspiring Songwriters Enter The NSAI Song Contest Presented By CMT For A Chance To Win A Mentoring Session With Lionel Richie
Aspiring songwriters: listen up! NSAI Song Contest presented by CMT is offering novice songwriters the chance to submit your work, win awesome prizes and advance your career. This year’s winner will receive a 60-minute session with legendary songwriter and artist Lionel Richie. Other prizes range from your song pitched to music industry executives to a three day trip to Nashville to a private tour of the CMT studios. CMT encourages contestants to enter songs of all genres of music. Read more…
Watch This Sneak Peek Of Behind The Music: NE-YO
This Sunday at 9/8c on VH1, Behind The Music is will put the spotlight on R&B heartthrob NE-YO. Tune-in at 9/8c to get the story behind the song he penned for Beyoncé, the time he performed with the King of Pop himself and all the rest of his thick catalog of hits. But before then, catch a sneak peek at the show’s first act above!
NE-YO is feeling lucky these days, with his fifth studio album on the way and his name already attached to some of the biggest R&B hits of recent times. He was not always the sweet crooning heartthrob he is today, and so this first segment finds the star looking back to his childhood with parents who loved music but where always fighting, and to his early days on stage — some of which were not so pretty. “Every dream I have has been realized,” he says. “How many people can say that? Not very many.”
Be sure to tune-in when Behind The Music: NE-YO premiers on Sunday, September 23 at 9/8c on VH1!
Rihanna, No Doubt, Lil Wayne, and Aerosmith to Rock the iHeartRadio Music Festival: VH1′s Got You Covered
Last night Tuner had a dream. A dream where Rihanna, P!NK, Usher, and Green Day shared a stage. There were flashing lights, thousands of people and … Ryan Seacrest? Wait, this can’t be a dream, it must be time for the second annual iHeartRadio Music Festival!
The aforementioned artists, as well as Mary J. Blige, No Doubt, Calvin Harris, Bon Jovi, Lil Wayne and VH1 Behind The Music subject Ne-Yo are among the 20 superstars set to hit the stage over two nights at the MGM Grand Garden Arena in Las Vegas. And luckily for you, dear readers, VH1 will have insider access to the entire event. If Taylor Swift makes a surprise appearance during Green Day’s set (hey, crazier things have happened), we’ll be there with a first-hand report. Trust us, it’ll almost be as good as being there!
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Behind The Song: Ne-Yo On Writing “Irreplaceable” For Beyonce
Are you on a mobile device? Click here to watch Behind The Song: Ne-Yo, “Irreplaceable.”
This Sunday, VH1′s Behind The Music delves into sweet crooning singer-songwriter Ne-Yo‘s story. Before we get into that, though, we’d like to set the scene by first going Behind The Song with Ne-Yo’s “Irreplaceable,” the chart-topping smash he wrote for Beyoncé.
“There’s a multitude of points throughout my career that re-inspired,” says Ne-Yo, counting as one of them “Irreplaceable,” the country-tinged hip-hop hit he penned for none-less-than Beyoncé to perform. A shining performer in his own right, the song proved Ne-Yo a talented songwriter as well, able to worm his way into the hearts and souls of others with his writing. “Everybody will start telling you that this will never work, that will never work, probably don’t want to experiment, give people what they don’t know, don’t go too far outside of the box,” he says. “We experimented with something and it worked.” And as for that killer “to the left, to the left” line? He got that from his aunt.
Be sure to tune-in when Behind The Music: Ne-Yo premieres on Sunday, September 23 at 9/8c on VH1.
Tuned In: Justin Bieber, Big Sean and Ne-Yo Show Battle Lasers On America’s Got Talent Finale
This season of America’s Got Talent went out with a great big and certainly talented bang last night, with Canadian Justin Bieber and Big Sean hitting the stage for a monstrous performance of their “As Long As You Love Me” and Ne-Yo battling lasers to show us why he should “Let Me Love You.”
Justin’s stage set looked like O-Town’s “Liquid Dreams” set (or maybe a little like a Bose iPod doc), and — lasers, an army of dancers, and metallic galore — the performance was a real event. Justin has been performing “As Long As You Love Me” since Believe‘s release back in June, and at last he seems comfortable nailing the dance moves and hitting the high notes at the same time. They also let him have a moment with one of the female dancers. #stillkidrauhl, maybe, but Kid Rauhl’s growing up. Read more…
Artists As Executives: Young Jeezy Joins The Atlantic Records Staff
Over the last few weeks, Executive Vice President of A&R at Atlantic Records Mike Caren has been making noise about a new Director position open in his department. While news of the Urban/Rhythmic-focused gig spread through re-tweets and industry word-of-mouth, it appears a different role in Atlantic’s A&R department was also up for grabs: Senior Vice President.
Late last night, Atlanta DJ Greg Street of V103 announced over the air that Jeezy was joining forces with Atlantic Records; not added to their artist roster, the Snow Man would instead be considered an addition to their staff, lending his expertise to Mike Caren’s A&R group by landing the role of Senior VP.
Tuned In: Estelle Says An Elegant “Thank You” On Letterman
Estelle gave an elegant performance of her track “Thank You” on The Late Show With David Letterman last night. Promoting her new album, All Of Me, which dropped yesterday, Estelle looked stunning with a simple slicked back hair-do and long white halterneck gown. With little aside from her stunning get-up in showmanship, Estelle’s performance was beautifully measured and displayed her strong vocal capabilities. As one of our favorite DIVAS, we love listening to Estelle’s flawless, captivating vocal every time she takes to the stage.
Katy Perry’s “Last Friday Night (T.G.I.F.)” Is The 2011 VH1 Song Of The Summer
For the last 14 weeks, we’ve been tracking the race to see which track would become this year’s Song Of The Summer. Since people consume music in so many different ways these days, our goal was to put together a democratic formula that compared how a group of over 70 songs performed across five of the primary channels that people frequently use to listen to their favorite jams: the Billboard Hot 100 (radio play & sales), the iTunes charts (pure sales), Last.fm scrobbles (listening on computer and mobile devices), the YouTube music charts (streams) and, of course, our VH1 Top 20 Video Countdown. Each week, we tracked how our group of competitors fared in each of these different platforms, and then added up the results.
So, without any further ado, we are psyched to announce that Katy Perry has taken home the first place prize in VH1′s first annual Song Of The Summer competition! When the summer began, it looked like Adele‘s “Rolling In The Deep” was going to be an unstoppable force, but as soon as Katy dropped her 80s-tastic “Last Friday Night (T.G.I.F.)” video during the week of June 27th, she dominated the countdown from there on out. Katy was gracious enough to film an quick speech for us while she accepted our totally awesome Song Of The Summer trophy, which we’ve got for you above.
For you completists, here is our final Song Of The Summer countdown chart (that is, until Memorial Day 2012 rolls around!). And you’re on Spotify, you can subscribe to our VH1 Song Of The Summer 2011 playlist and re-live the summer whenever you want.
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