Photo: Splash
One of the most important nights in the musical calendar, last night's Brit Awards undeniably lived up to expectations once again.
With a healthy dose of controversy, awkwardness, injuries, and some stunning performances from the world's biggest artists, this year's ceremony was memorable in many ways. The problem is, cameras can only pick up so much from such a large event, so to give you the full picture, here's what we saw from our seat in the O2.
Glitter (and dare we say, Swifty) are pretty underwhelming in person
Shy of Queen Madge's scheduled appearance, Taylor Swift was without doubt the biggest pop act on the bill last night, and the idea of her kicking off the show with one of the best songs of the last year was pretty exciting. Unfortunately though, the sound started shoddily , whilst Swifty's staging and choreography felt remarkably flat throughout. Throw in the minimal bit of glitter that came down at the end of the song and you have the makings of one of the most underwhelming performances of the night (which is a real shame, because 'Blank Space' is such a banger).
Kanye's uncensored performance was just what the ceremony needed
Yes it got muted to a ridiculous extent (and yes some idiots thought he was shouting the name of a budget supermarket), but Kanye once again proved himself as one of the world's most forward thinking rappers. Choosing to perform a previously unheard new song, Yeezy's performance was a lot more meticulously planned than the simple staging and flamethrowers showed, with the rapper tipping his hat to UK talent by having the likes of Novelist, Stormzy, Skepta, Krept and Conan and a wealth of others join him on stage. Also, if the strength of 'All Day' is anything to go by, this next album could be phenomenal.
An entire arena gasped in unison to Madonna's fall, which was weirdly poignant.
There are some jobs you wouldn't wish on your worst enemies, and we had nothing but sympathy for the brave souls filming and doing the sound for Madonna's performance last night. You've obviously seen the fall that saw the birth of a million vines and memes, but one thing that was missed from the broadcast was the biggest gasp we've ever heard from an arena full of artists, labels and fans unsure whether they should be laughing out loud or genuinely concerned (a woman sat near us actually screamed after it happened, which felt like a bit of an over-exaggeration). Nevertheless, props to the pop icon for actually finishing her performance like nothing happened - even if she has put us off capes for good.
More people knew Take That's new material than we expected
Of all the scheduled performances last night, we decided the best time to go to the bar would be during Take That's rendition of 'Let In The Sun'. However, being stuck in the middle of a row surrounded by dedicated fans of the group made that pretty much impossible, so we just sat there and got through it. Though it was remarkably underwhelming in comparison to the rest of the performances on the night, the atmosphere in the arena was electric, and we genuinely felt like we were in the minority by not knowing every word to the song.
Jimmy Carr's jokes fell flatter than usual
Though many say the controversy from The BRITs is all but gone nowadays, you can always rely on Jimmy Carr to make things suitably awkward with some close to the wire material. He quipped about Oscar Pistorious at The Q Awards, and last year's Brits saw him make headlines with chat about drugs, but last night saw things truly escalate on the awkwardness scale. Presenting with eye-rolling supermodel Karlie Kloss, Carr made a joke about Madonna's age ahead of her performance, and needless to say it totally lead ballooned. That may have been evident from the TV coverage, but in the arena itself there might as well have been a tumbleweed roll across the stage. Beyond cringeworthy.
The atmosphere in the room gets very awkward during long acceptance speeches We've all been there, someone starts talking and just keeps going. You don't know where to look, whether you can really cut them off or not and each unnecessary second feels endless. You can only imagine the energy in the room then when Paloma Faith decided to thank everyone she had ever met during her acceptance speech for Best British Female.
Despite the speech being heartfelt and poignant as she had never won before, the reactions of people around us were quite something, and we've never seen so many people awkwardly look at their watches or phones so many times. Needless to say, Brits crowds are impatient.
Royal Blood don't seem understand how massive they are
"You probably don't know who we are" felt like a strange sentence to come from a band who have celebrated a no.1 album, a prestigious Mercury Prize nomination and seen gargantuan crowds at festivals throughout the summer. Nevertheless, Royal Blood seemed shocked to be at The Brits all night, from their storming performance of 'Figure It Out' through to the dry chat with Ant and Dec. We weren't sure if they were just playing it down or genuinely didn't understand how massive they are, but they'll no doubt get more comfortable at awards shows in the future.
Read more on our thoughts on the Brits here and see all the performances here.
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