Taylor Swift Continues to Stretch Genres, Performs with Usher and T.I. Well, I have been harping on this whole Justin Bieber invading the country scene tangent for some time now. The last I said about this, I kind of left Taylor Swift off the hook. However, Taylor may just be contributing more heavily to the undermining of the country genre that I believe is going on, than maybe I originally thought. At a recent concert in Atlanta, GA that took place Saturday, October 1st, Taylor welcomed two guest performers to the stage, pop-icon Usher and rapper T.I. With Usher, Taylor performed his hit “Yeah“, and with T.I., she performed his hit “Live Your Life“. First, I would like to point out that this combination would be more impressive if Usher and T.I. were performing one of Taylor’s songs rather than their own hit singles. This, however, is pretty much unimaginable, and highly unlikely to take place. Similarly, it really doesn’t make sense that Taylor would choose these two guests, and perform these two songs in particular. Nothing about either song really has any connection to or resonance with the country genre. It is simply bizarre. Secondly, these songs are completely inappropriate for a live event. I honestly don’t know how Usher and T.I. get away with performing these songs live, when they perform on their own tours (and I like both of these artists and both of these songs! This is not a biased point of view). It may be the quality of the videos I watched, but there isn’t any chemistry between Taylor and either of these gentlemen and the sound quality is terrible. These really should be relegated to playing in the car or at the club. I appreciate that Taylor is trying to branch out, stretch her musical boundaries, etc. She might consider trying to stick closer to her genre a little more, though, until she gets some more experience with different types of music under her belt. I know she has done some very funny rap sketches in the past, but those were supposed to be funny. I really don’t think it qualifies her to perform with rappers. Watch a video of the Usher Performance Below [youtube:www.youtube.com/watch?v=w51HmLAymug] Watch a video of the T.I. Performance Next [youtube:www.youtube.com/watch?&v=4xmooPermwA]
