Taylor Swift dominated Sunday night’s Billboard Music Awards, taking home eight trophies, including top Billboard 200 album and top artist.
Swift won eight of the 11 awards she was nominated for, including both country awards. While accepting one, she told the crowd, “You are the longest and best relationship I ever had.”
The “Red” singer also had a colorful performance of her latest hit, “22,” which included the singer starting backstage on a bike and making her way to the front amid a mass of background dancers and red balloons.
While Swift dominated for the women, Justin Bieber appeared to take over for the men. Bieber performed twice at the Billboard awards and won three awards, including top male artist, social artist, and fan-voted milestone award. In his acceptance speech, Bieber alluded to his latest troubles , saying:
“I’m 19 years old; I think I’m doing a pretty good job. And basically from my heart I really just want to say it should really be about the music, it would be about the craft that I’m making.”
Along with Taylor Swift, fun. and Maroon 5 were also nominated for 11 awards. They each walked away with one win in pre-telecast announcements. Gotye and Rihanna were both honored with four trophies each. And while the Billboards is certainly about the trophies, it is also about the performances.
The show began with Bruno Mars and his band in silky red suits. He performed the old-school flavored “Treasure.” Selena Gomez performed her latest hit, “Come & Get It,” while Chris Brown sang “Fine China,” though his voice started to crack during the performance.
Gomez and Brown’s performances led Kid Rock to comment, “Let’s give it up for people lip-syncing under pre-recorded music!” as he took the stage to present the award for best rap song.
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