As much as I believe in holding people accountable for their actions, I also believe in giving credit where credit is due. So I’m pleased to report that after a week in the national hot seat, Adam Lambert appears to have learned his lesson.
As regular readers are aware, I felt the need last week to assume the role of concerned parent after Lambert’s hyperactive and disappointing number at the “American Music Awards.”
Of course I wasn’t alone in my criticism. Quite a few other writers (as well as a substantial number of readers of Pollstar and other sites) agreed that the singer’s re-introduction to the public via a vocally weak performance of “For Your Entertainment” that was accompanied by a cartoonish S&M dance routine was just plain awful – regardless of his sexual orientation. Apparently even Lambert’s father agreed, telling his 27-year-old son he should have apologized.
On today’s episode of “The Ellen DeGeneres Show,” Lambert finally dropped the put-upon victim persona he clung to last week (“I think it’s because I’m a gay male,” he said on CBS’ “Early Show”) and owned up to his mistakes.
“ I think on ‘Idol’ I experimented with a lot of different styles and outfits and tempos and things like that,” the singer told DeGeneres. “I went on tour over the summer and experimented with different types of performing there, and then I was in the studio making a record.
“For me this has all been one journey, and for me, I was like ‘I’m going to try and do something a little risqué now,’ and it just, you know … It was maybe a little too far.”
Curiously, another statement Lambert made to DeGeneres echoes a comment left on this site by reader HoosierDaddy?, who responded to the singer telling Rolling Stone the AMA incident was just “one performance” with this: “Yes Adam, but for thousands and thousands of people, it was the first time they'd seen you perform. In lots of ways it was your debut. You knew that. And yet that's the picture of yourself you chose to present.”
Lambert told the talk show host today, “I suppose part of what I got caught up in that I forgot – this was the first time people were seeing me on TV again after ‘Idol.’ I didn’t really think about that as objectively as I might have wanted to.”
(Btw, kudos to HoosierDaddy? and all the other readers who via their comments engaged in a thoughtful and intelligent dialogue about this controversy last week. There was some concern in the office about how the discussion might go, but you once again proved that Pollstar has the greatest readers on the Internet.)
The singer also told DeGeneres that, despite the outcry from his fans and protests from the Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation (GLAAD), he now understands and agrees with ABC’s decision to cancel his scheduled “Good Morning America” performance last week.
“Yes, I think ABC was a little bit mad at me,” Lambert said. “I don’t blame them. I got carried away. It was stuff that I did not do in rehearsal, so they were probably a little bit taken aback. They gave me a great opportunity to close the AMAs, and I would never want to smack that gift horse in the mouth. I think they were taking a leap of faith having me do that, and it unfortunately didn’t work out as well as we all thought it would.”
Well stated Adam, I think I speak for disappointed fans everywhere when I say we’re proud of you for taking your lumps and perhaps growing up just a little in the process.
Unfortunately, Lambert’s actions will still have consequences for other performers. Thanks to the singer’s little on-air stunt, ABC and parent company Disney have taken steps to make sure it doesn’t happen again.
Disney/ABC Television Group President Anne Sweeney told Reuters that in the future the network will require artists to guarantee in writing that the performance that takes place in front of live cameras will be the same as the one that happens in rehearsal.
“We certainly don’t want to suppress artistry at any level, but we also have to be very cognizant of who our audience is,” Sweeney explained.
While it’s not at all clear how ABC and Disney will enforce the contract (fines, withholding of performance fees pending FCC investigations, etc.), it’s more than likely that just the threat of some kind of punitive action will be all it takes for most performers to toe the line.
Happily, with the whole unfortunate AMA incident quickly fading in the rearview mirror, Lambert is looking toward the future where he’s hoping to hitch his star to what’s quickly become a monster of a cultural phenomenon – and I when I say monster, I mean monster.
The singer told MTV News that there are several tracks, including the Rob Cavallo produced “Suburban Decay,” that he recorded for his debut which didn’t make the final cut, a situation he’d like to rectify.
“It’s a great song and I hope to perform it someday, and I think it will find a home, on a soundtrack or something … maybe ‘Twilight,’” Lambert explained. “It just didn’t quite fit [in my album]. It’s very theatrical … It’s very campy, and it was just a bit too campy for the album as a big picture.
“Hey ‘Eclipse’ … Want my song?,” the singer challenged. “It’s kind of about vampires.”
If “Suburban Decay” is even half as over-the-top as the Shirley Bassey-meets-Freddie Mercury-at-a-James-Bond-convention tune “Soaked” – which made it onto “FYE” and is without a doubt the most blatant audition for a Bond theme song gig since Scissor Sisters’ “Land of a Thousand Words” – it sounds like a perfect addition to the modern gothic soap opera saga of Edward Cullen and company.