Twerking & other news from 2013

Truth to tell, I expected more out of the twerk. I mean that after Miley Cyrus scandalized everybody by twerking with a huge styrofoam finger at the MTV VMAs, then we should have seen the whole world twerking after her. But that did not happen. We did see some attempts at twerking by other celebrities but for the most part, what we all thought would be the big trend of 2013 has died with only a little whimper.

Maybe it was because everybody was just too stunned at what Hannah Montana, once the most popular Disney princess, had become. Maybe it was really just too much that even the usual attention grabbers stayed away. Most probably though it was because Miley herself next did something even more scandalous than that twerk. 

Barely a few weeks later, Miley rode a wrecking ball wearing absolutely nothing in the music video of her single Wrecking Ball and precipitated a media frenzy of tsk, tsk, tsk, lectures and rationalizations about what she did. Which was really a pity because all that furor took attention away from Wrecking Ball as a well-written, well-produced song.

While she did sell a lot of copies of her singles We Can’t Stop and Wrecking Ball, those were still not enough to make her the most exciting and biggest selling artist of the year. That honor went to singer, composer, arranger, producer and performer Bruno Mars whom Billboard Magazine named Artist of the Year on the strength of the massive sales of his album Unorthodox Jukebox and singles like Locked Out Of Heaven and When I Was Your Man. Taylor Swift and Justin Timberlake came in second and third.

Now, Mars maybe technically American but he is part-Filipino and his success was one of several that showed the world what extraordinary music artists the Pinoys really are. This was also the year when Bataan-born Jessica Sanchez who was named first runner-up at last year’s American Idol made a well-received album debut with Me, You And The Music, which also featured the work of Filipino producer Mark Feist. And that guy Robert Lopez, who is up for a Golden Globe for the song Let It Go that he composed with his wife Kristen Anderson for the movie Frozen, is also of Filipino parentage.

It was also in 2013 when producer Cameron Mackintosh announced the names of the cast of the West End revival of the musical Miss Saigon, which will open in May 2014. And what do you know, three of the major roles will be played by Filipinos. These are 17-year-old Eva Noblezada as Kim; Jon Jon Briones, who was in the original Miss Saigon production, as the Engineer; and singing champion Rachelle Ann Go as Gigi.

It is not only in boxing or beauty contests where the Filipino excels. It is also in music. All that our talents need are the right breaks and then they can truly soar to the top. Let us all look forward to more news like these in 2014.

Here now are the best in pop music in 2013 as tabulated in the year-end issue of Billboard. The Top 20 albums of the year are: The 20/20 Experience by Justin Timberlake; Red by Taylor Swift; Take Me Home by One Direction; Unorthodox Jukebox by Bruno Mars; Babel by Mumford & Sons; Night Visions by Imagine Dragons; Here’s To The Good Times by the Florida Georgia Line; The Truth About Love by Pink; Crash My Party by Luke Bryan; Unapologetic by Rihanna.

Nothing Was The Same by Drake; Magna Carta… Holy Grail by Jay-Z; The Lumineers by The Lumineers; The World From The Side Of The Moon by Phillip Phillips; The Heist by Macklemore & Ryan Lewis; The Marshall Mathers LP 2 by Eminem; Based On A True Story by Blake Shelton; Night Train by Jason Aldean; Random Access Memories by Daft Punk; and Pitch Perfect, the motion picture soundtrack by Various Artists.

The Top 20 songs are: Thrift Shop by Macklemore & Ryan Lewis featuring Wanz; Blurred Lines by Robin Thicke featuring T.I. & Pharrell; Radioactive by Imagine Dragons; Harlem Shake by Baauer; Can’t Hold Us also by Macklemore & Ryan Lewis but featuring Ray Dalton; Mirrors by Justin Timberlake; Just Give Me A Reason by Pink; When I Was Your Man by Bruno Mars; Cruise by the Florida Georgia Line featuring Nelly; Roar by Katy Perry.

Locked Out Of Heaven by Bruno Mars; Ho Hey by the Lumineers; Stay by Rihanna featuring Mikky Ekko; Get Lucky by Daft Punk featuring Pharrell Williams; Royals by Lorde; I Knew You Were Trouble by Taylor Swift; We Can’t Stop by Miley Cyrus; Wrecking Ball also by Miley; Wake Me Up by Avicii; and Suit & Tie by Justin Timberlake and Jay Z.