The AMAs from the Gay Nosebleed Seats

Hey guys, so the American Music Awards aired last night on ABC, and aside from Michael Bublé's gracious shout out to his gay fans, Ke$ha's transvestite backup dancers... and maybe Justin Bieber's lesbian haircut.... there really wasn't much of GLBT interest. Not to say it wasn't interesting though.

I always have fun tallying up who lip syncs and who warbles live. I think there's an unwritten rule at the AMAs that if you do any moderately strenuous dancing you're allowed – even expected – to lip sync.

But last night it seemed like many of the performers didn't even bother to mumble along with their vocal track, which makes you wonder why some of them brought a microphone onto the stage with them at all.

Rhianna's opening number was a case in point. The woman certainly can move, and she clearly sang the first and last few bars of her performance live – as she was out of tune. But for the meat of her performance she was obviously on a vocal track – which she mouthed to only half-heartedly. In fact, she had a habit of dropping her microphone to her side midway through lyrics.

Usher and NeYo were other major offenders. I did enjoy Usher's performance, but NeYo? What the hell was that? Those nonsensical cinematic interludes were out of a bad student film.

Pink also lip synced, but at least we know the woman really can sing. And she's pregnant, so I guess we can give her a pass.

Ke$ha

The one performance I wasn't sure was lip synced or live was Ke$ha's. Whatever it was, it was entertaining. I loved all the male backup dancers in wigs and high heels, and Ke$ha gets bonus points for holding up the back of her guitar on which was written "Stop Hate!"

But then of course we had to deduct points when she tried, unsuccessfully, to smash said guitar against the stage. 

Moving on to the certifiable live performances. The ones that spring to mind this morning were Miley Cyrus, barefoot and rocking a muumuu of some sort. The thing I love about Miley is that she seems completely oblivious to critique. The possibility that people might not actually enjoy one of her performances never seems to enter her mind. It makes her fearless.

And then there was Taylor Swift, who has graduated to a more mature hairstyle and was mostly on key last night... until she decided to stray out of her comfort zone with a few unfortunate bars of One Republic's "Apologize." Why Taylor, why?

Katy Perry (left) and Taylor Swift

Katy Perry performed "Fireworks" which was arright, but I guess I was hoping for sparklers to shoot out of her bra or something. I was also hoping against hope for a "Teenage Dream" duet with Darren Criss, but no dice there. (They did pan to him once in the audience. What a cutie!)