Last Sunday at the American Music Awards, America got a taste of the "real" Adam Lambert, uninhibited, confident, and ready to shock audiences with his sexually charged performance. Everything about the performance was constructed... complete with its placement at the end of the show, and CBS' feigned lack of knowledge about the content of the piece when faced with many audience complaints in the aftermath. Lambert was also clearly in on the joke--his new single, "For Your Entertainment," can be seen as a self-reflexive, tongue-in-cheek commentary on his visibility in the public sphere as spectacle. And his performance provided plenty of spectacle. With pole dancers, men on leashes, simulations of oral sex, and a male/male kiss, Lambert sauntered across the stage completely owning it all. Was it excessive? Yes. Was it exhibitionist? Clearly. But since when has entertainment ever not been preoccupied with spectacle, especially of a sexual nature?
Don't we all remember Britney's striptease? Madonna's unholy writhing on the floor with a wedding dress? Janet's breast? All examples of women who have utilized their (hetero)sexuality to create controversy. Lambert's performance was no different from these overt displays of sexuality, except in its queering of conventions. His (homo)sexual behavior on the public stage becomes, well, freakish. The hyper-visibility of his queer desire is in contestation wit
h the public's desire to see a very heteronormative display of sexuality. So why is the general public still s
o unnverved by gay male performers that break convention? I've observed that in the music industry, this attitude is incredibly pervasive. Not since Ricky Martin has a male musical artist received so much attention based on his questionable sexuality. It seems that not winning American Idol was the best thing that could have happened to Adam Lambert. Unlike his counterpart Kris Allen, he can fully explore his aesthetic without the strict regime that AI status brings with it.
No comments:
Post a Comment