What do you get when you combine Lady Gaga with fan votes, YouTube stars and a quirky live show? Last night’s inaugural YouTube Music Awards.
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If you weren’t one of the 872 000 who tuned in to the live stream, don’t worry — all the highlights are nicely packaged in playlists on YouTube’s official channel. The award show, which was held in New York and featured cross-overs to Seoul, Moscow, London and Rio, was by all accounts an interesting night — Billboard called it a “gleefully messy show”, which seems like an apt description of an event which was hosted by Jason Schwartzman and featured Grammy Award-winning music video director Spike Jonze as its creative director.
The night saw live performances from the likes of Eminem, Lady Gaga, Arcade Fire, Avicii and major YouTube stars like Lindsay Stirling, as well as the announcement of winners which were selected based on fan votes. YouTube selected the nominees based on social and viewing data (comments, likes, subscriptions, shares, etc), then asked fans to pick their favourite in mid-October and selected the artists whose official nomination videos were shared the most on Google+, Facebook and Twitter as winners.
These are the ones who came out top:
Video of the Year: Girls’ Generation – I Got A Boy
Artist of the Year: Eminem
Response of the Year: Lindsey Stirling and Pentatonix – Radioactive
YouTube Phenomenon: Taylor Swift – I Knew You Were Trouble
YouTube Breakthrough: Macklemore & Ryan Lewis
Innovation of the Year: DeStorm – See Me Standing
