In a spectacular ACM Awards Show tonight, one thing was blaringly clear: Taylor Swift is NOT an industry darling anymore!
Taylor Swift may have performed during tonight’s Academy of Country Music awards show, but that’s the only stage time she’d get as the peer-voted industry award show shunned the pop princess. Miranda Lambert walked away with 3 awards including Top Female Vocalist and Album of the Year, Carrie Underwood takes away Entertainer of the Year for the second year straight, and Taylor… well Taylor’s probably counting the days till the next fan-voted awards show so millions of texting teens can keep her thanking Mom and God with her shaking hands and ever-surprised face.
So what led to this lack of industry peer votes for team Taylor? Perhaps over-saturation? Much like the Hannah Montana craze, have many grown adults heard Taylor’s tunes courtesy of their little girls radios so often that they are now on absolute burnout? Perhaps.
Or perhaps, and far more likely, Taylor has been outdone by pure talent. With such a rock-solid performance of “The House That Built Me” from Miranda Lambert, the flaws in Taylor’s live vocals were painfully clear. Add to it the almost too-technically-perfect Carrie Underwood, and the timelessly amazing Reba McEntire all on the same show, and suddenly Taylor is looking more like the little kid they let in for fun.
I KNOW I’ll get a ton of hateful comments, but please, just for one minute, do the math and open your mind to the idea that the perfect princess may not be so perfect after all.Country Music Photo Gallery
From the start of her first appearance on national TV several things have been transparently true about Swift. Without the safety net of the studio she sings grossly out of tune and is not very good and she is not country. Now that she is growing older and moving into the arena of having to compete with quality female adult country singers and adult listeners and not little girls her weaknesses and flaws become glaring. I for one was pleased to see the ACM’s deservedly shut her out.
I have always believed that Taylor’s career was jumpstarted because her first single had Tim McGraw in the lyrics. From there, the tweens jumped on the bandwagon much like (as you say Hannah Montana).
I have never believed that she was near as talented as the others on the show. In fact, as I have watched American Idol the past few seasons, I can’t help but think that she would not even have made it past the first round of auditions because she cannot perform live very well at all.
She has not improved in her live performances since she broke onto the scene. All of her theatrics on stage are very robotic and put on. The jumping around and “headbanging” seems to be her trying to imitate Miranda only it is not natural like it is for Miranda. Last night she leaned back for a “big” note like a Martina McBride or Faith Hill would. The only problem is there isn’t the big voice to back that up; thus it was a very “corny” move as Simon Cowell would say.
There is only so long that the tweens will stay with her before they move on to the next fad. It appears that her peers have moved on from the “aww she’s cute stage” and have gone back to recognizing real talent.
I remember the first time I saw Taylor perform live and commented within 10 seconds of her singing that she was not good. I was jumped on by so many people. But like both comments before me she is a studio singer (ala Melodine and Autotune). She would have made it through the auditions at American Idol where it’s televised so the audience could get a good joke. Don’t get me wrong for the type of music she writes, she’s brilliant but her vocals are as tarnished as a piece of silver sitting on the ocean floor.
Finally, she was shut out. Been waiting for this moment. That is the most obvious, that she has not progressed at all. She must know she cannot compete with real singers. Her fan base is already moving on. She can keep writing, but she won’t ever get big again performance wise.