Katy Perry Named MTV’s First Artist of the Year

Katy Perry’s year of number 1 singles has earned her the honor of becoming MTV’s first ever artist of the year.

After much spirited debate, MTV decided to award Perry the distinction over Adele. Adele’s “Rolling in the Deep” was chosen top song of 2011.

MTV also declared Skrillex its electronic dance music artist of the year over David Guetta.

Different parts of MTV would make “best of” lists in the past, but this year the network wanted to establish a franchise that brought all its online and TV arms together and emphasized MTV’s music roots. The network, hopes it becomes an annual thing

Seven panelists made the final choice, and their deliberations were featured in MTV programming this week.

A rep for MTV said, “You just really felt her presence in pop culture throughout the year.”

Rihanna Expects New Album to “Change Music”

Rihanna had great success with Grammy-nominated Loud, and is looking to change music with her sixth full-length album, Talk That Talk.

Def Jam’s VP of A&R, Bu Thiam, talked about how the next album with Rihanna needs to do no less than “change music.”

“My job as an A&R is to always bring her different records that are hit records but doesn’t sound like anything she’s done in the past,” Thiam said. “Her whole thing is, ‘How can we be different? How can we change music? How can we go from having a great album like Loud and still come with a better album and keep pushing and keep hitting the bar?’ The good thing about Rihanna,” he said, “is that she doesn’t want to be in the same realm as anybody else. She wants to be in a zone where when you think of Rihanna, you think of new, you think of different.”

“Different” meant bringing well-known DJ Calvin Harris into the creative process. Producer Harris collaborated with the singer on her tracks, “Where Have You Been” and “We Found Love,” giving Rihanna the 11th #1 single of her career.

The growing popularity of DJ culture in pop music helped get Harris involved with the album, but the Rihanna’s desire to create a new sound was ultimately what made it happen. “It’s a different sound and that’s what she wanted to go with,” Thiam said. “She wanted to change music. I have to salute her for taking a chance ’cause most artists wouldn’t have done that.”

Swift Discusses New “Different” Album and Working with Minaj

After another big year from Taylor Swift, the country pop crooner discusses her new upcoming album, saying that her new songs are not about “moving on” and this fourth release will be a much different feel than her other three albums.

When asked what experiences stirred such an emotional album, Swift said, “I can’t tell you, because it’s a secret. It will be unveiled when it all comes out, because they all seem to have a theme to them, the records that we’ve put out so far, and this one is no different. It’s very different in what it’s about, but it’s no different in the fact that it has its own name.”

In speaking of Nicki Minaj, who she had a chance to perform with, Swift said, “I love her. One of my favorite moments of the tour was when she came out at the Staples Center and sang ‘Super Bass’ with me, which was, like, the coolest thing. It was like a dream come true, so it’s amazing to get to run into her and see her around, and I’m just such a fan.” When asked if Swift would ever collaborate with Minaj, she answered, “I mean, we’re not working on anything right now. But I would love to at some point. That would be amazing.”

First MTV O Music Award for Most Innovative Music Video Decided today! Livestream panel debate at 4pm.

Today marks the official kick off of the week long MTV O Music Awards celebration, www.omusicawards.com. Today at 4pm, MTV will be live streaming a panel with Jermaine Dupri, legendary music video director Wayne Isham, and music journalists Caryn Ganz (Yahoo Music) and Brenna Ehrlich (Mashable) where they will debate the nominees for the most innovative music video. At the end of the live stream, the winner will be announced. Hosted by James Montgomery with appearances by Robyn, Tim Nordwind of OK Go, Andy Grammer, Perry Farrell, My Chemical Romance, Ke$ha, and more. Below, please find the list of nominees, as well as the URL and embed code (please note the embed code won’t work until the livestream begins).

The inaugural OMAs will stream live from Las Vegas at 11 p.m. ET/8 p.m. PT on OMusicAwards.com. Tune in to see who will reign supreme in categories like Most Viral Dance, Funniest Music Short and NSFW Music Video!

Below, please find the full list of innovative music video nominees:

Innovative Music Video
Arcade Fire, “We Used To Wait”
Robyn, “Killing Me”
The Johnny Cash Project, “Ain’t No Grave”
Cassius, “I Love You So”
Sour, “Mirror”
OK Go, “Back From Kathmandu”
Das Racist, “Who’s That? Brooown!”
Craig Wedren, “Are We”
Andy Grammer, “Keep Your Head Up”
Au Revoir Simone, “Knight of Wands”

Watch the Panel Debate Live at 4PM here (please note embed video will not work until 4PM) –

Or you can watch it live on MTV.com!

MTV to debut new award show, The `O’ Music Awards, with the `O’ TBD

MTV is hoping to have another breakthrough in the world of music, and it seems like they are making a smart move.

MTV is naming its new digital music awards the OMAs — and leaving the “O” up for grabs.

The network is to announce Thursday that the O Music Awards will take place April 28. MTV is leaving the “O” undefined and open to interpretation from viewers.

The awards, the network said, “honor the migration of music to the digital space, and celebrate the art, artistry and technology of digital music.” MTV plans to present an untraditional, heavily interactive award show, spread out across multiple screens, including the Internet, social media and mobile.

MTV hopes the show will do for digital music what its Video Music Awards, launched in 1984, did for the music video.

“We think this space now needs an award show,” said Dermot McCormack, head of MTV Music Group digital. “We think we’re fairly well qualified to come up with a way of rewarding achievement in these new categories.”

MTV, which is part of the Viacom-owned MTV Networks, will later announce a “hub” for the event and categories. Categories could include things like best app and best Kanye West tweet. Social media buzz will play a role in choosing the winners.

More Details On Lady Gaga’s New Album ‘Born This Way’

It seems like the promotion for Lady Gaga’s upcoming album ‘Born This Way’ may already be underway as the pop star and her team have begun revealing more and more details about what fans can expect on the new album.

Akon told MTV:

“If I was going to compare it to her previous work, I would definitely say it’s a notch up,” he said. “It’s like she’s slowly taking you on to this journey down this road. If she were to just drastically do it, she probably would have lost everybody from the first album, but once the sound was created and established, now we can use that as a tool to grab all the monsters and walk them down this graveyard. It’s crazy. It’s amazing.”

The Lady Gaga took to her twitter account and revealed the following:

“Endless melodies, hooks, + poetry sledge-hammering my skull. It won’t be much longer, its almost perfect. But I (we) don’t want almost.”

Sounds like it’s going to be another incredible year in the world of Lady Gaga.

[video] Rihanna Performs ‘What’s My Name’ on MTV’s The Seven

Rihanna took to the stage in NYC’s Time Square to perform her new hit single ‘What’s My Name’ for MTV’s new show, The Seven.

Thanks to neonlimelight.com for posting the video.

[video] 2010 European Music Awards Performances. Katy Perry, Rihanna, Ke$ha and more!

The European Music Awards took place yesterday in Madrid and the line up of performers was incredible! Katy Perry, Rihanna, Ke$ha, Miley, and more took to the stage. Check out some of the performances below!

Ke$ha ‘Tik Tok’ –

Miley ‘Who Owns My Heart’ –

Rihanna ‘Only Girl’ –

Katy Perry ‘Firework’ –

Ellen DeGeneres After The VMA Interviews

Following Sunday night’s MTV VMAs, Ellen DeGeneres sat down the night’s biggest winner, Lady Gaga, and more.

Justin Timberlake

Lady Gaga

Katy Perry

2010 MTV VMA Performances

Check out the performances from the 2010 MTV VMA’s!

Taylor Swift – Innocent

Justin Bieber – U Smile/Baby/Somebody To Love medley

Usher – DJ Got Us Falling In Love Again/OMG

Florence + The Machine – Dog Days

Drake. Swizz Beatz and Mary J Blige – Fancy

B.o.B, Bruno Mars and Paramore – Nothin’ On You/Airplanes/Only Exception

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