Honoring a legend.
In case you missed it, the annual MTV Video Music Awards took place last night, and I’ll be honest I didn’t watch a second of them but the whole thing seemed like a trainwreck.
When I was growing up the VMAs were must-watch TV. The show gave us huge cultural moments and memorable performances, and winning a VMA was a major accomplishment for an artist. But these days, like with many award shows, it seems like they’re struggling for relevance and viewers – especially as music videos have pretty much become obsolete. (I mean, does MTV even show music videos anymore? Bring back TRL).
But anyway, the VMAs made a major grasp for viewers this year by having Taylor Swift at the awards show to premiere the video for “Patient Zero,” one of four songs released last week as part of an extended version of her latest album The Life Of A Showgirl. And they also made up an award, the MTV VMA Artist Director Honors, to give to Swift for being an artist who directs her own videos in what I can only assume was an attempt to ensure she would be at the ceremony and not at her husband Travis Kelce’s game against the Miami Dolphins yesterday.
Now, from the clips I’ve seen there were a couple good moments during the show (and no, it wasn’t whatever Madonna was doing). Kacey Musgraves delivered a touching tribute to Dolly Parton with a performance of “I Will Always Love You.” And Taylor also took time during while accepting the award for Video of the Year for her song “The Fate of Ophelia” to honor the country music legend:
“I want to thank and dedicate this award to one person without whom this wouldn’t be happening, and that person is the ultimate showgirl, Dolly Parton.
Every single song that she wrote, her storytelling was so vivid and so rich. It was like, listening to her songs, it’s like watching the best music video you have ever seen in your life every single time you hear what she has written. And man, she handled this thing with such grace and joy and love and gratitude for the fact that she got to do this, and everything that happened in her life or her career, she channeled back into love and gratitude and appreciation for her fans.
I am lucky I got to be one of them, and I will always be one of them. I love you all so very much, and I think that we were all very, very lucky to share this planet with Dolly Parton for a time. And thank you for this amazing moment, I love you all.”
While Taylor and Dolly never collaborated professionally, one of the last videos released by Dolly was a thank you to the pop superstar and her husband for their donation to Dolly’s Imagination Library, one of several donations the couple made leading up to their wedding:
And Dolly also praised Taylor’s generosity back in 2016, after she donated $100,000 to Dolly’s fundraiser for those impacted by wildfires in the Great Smoky Mountains:
“Taylor, I noticed through the years, she’s the first to throw herself right into any good cause. Any time anything happens, Taylor’s there to make big donations. I’m so thankful to her. I just think she’s precious anyway.”