In a Jewel-esque “What if God was one of us” moment, reports surfaced that our lord and savior Beyoncé relied on a backing track during her earth-shattering, suspiciously flawless performance of the national anthem at the presidential inauguration Monday.
I, for one, couldn’t be more pleased. Finally, she and I have something in common: Beyoncé and I both like to lip-sync to Beyoncé’s music. The only difference: She did it on national television, and I only do it while I’m on my last mile on the treadmill.
At first, I heard the news and wrote it off.
“No one will care about this,” I thought dopily.
But then, I checked my Facebook feed.
From my extensive research — or bored perusal of Jezebel and www.salon.com comments — I found two schools of thought on the controversy (Beyonc-oversy?). The overwhelming majority was horrified and indignant. “How could she?!?!?!!!111!!!!” they pounded on their keyboards furiously before bitterly returning to their boring, non-Beyoncé lives.
The more levelheaded commenters said, “Whatever. All live music is prerecorded. It’s the nature of the industry. At least we know it was still Beyoncé singing on the backing track. ”
My first reaction was similar.
Does anyone actually care if Beyoncé lip-synced? Is anyone personally offended? I mean, just when it seems like the pop culture news cycle can’t get any more stupid, — what with a certain football player’s imaginary girlfriend — people go up in arms because Beyoncé chose to use a backing track last minute.
Hello — even Queen Bey is allowed to get nervous in the minutes before going onstage to sing for the presidential inauguration in near-freezing weather.
And unless your name is Adele or Lea Michele, I don’t want to see any more of your griping on my news feed.
You’re blocking my Grumpy Cat photos and updates from Steve Martin. I don’t want to hear how “disappointed by life” you are.
Clearly you have not watched enough TLC reality shows about the Amish and child beauty pageants if a well-known singer’s lip-syncing makes you lose faith in humanity.
As the many reports on Beyoncé-Gate note, a star lip-syncing through an inauguration isn’t cutting-edge news.
Whitney Houston did the same thing during the Super Bowl in 1991.
Honestly, I’m surprised anyone sings anything before a large audience these days. Sure, there’s no excuse for relying on backing track for, say, an acoustic show.
But for an event like the inauguration that will be televised and remembered for years? Why would anyone NOT want to sound the best he or she can?
Lip-syncing doesn’t have to be a big deal anymore. It’s a good thing every once in awhile!
I cringe whenever I hear Paul McCartney sing live these days, because let’s face it, dude’s old. “Saturday Night Live” could stand to use some backing tracks every now and then for their musical performances. Case in point: Lana Del Ray.
And who could forget Christina Aguilera’s disastrous word fumble during the Super Bowl national anthem?
I, like every rational human being, realized a long time ago that performers lip-sync during music videos and TV shows that involve dancing — but only after having my 12-year-old self-esteem destroyed by Britney Spears’ music videos, when I was convinced she knew how to dance, belt songs and maintain perfect hair, while I still didn’t know how to apply eyeliner.
So to everyone with a Pre-teen Chloe Finch complex, I say, get over it. Babies don’t come from the stork. Your parents have favorites among their offspring, and the tooth fairy isn’t real. People lip-sync. Welcome to adulthood.
As “The Wonder Years” lyric from “Hoodie Weather” goes, “Growing up means watching my heroes turn human in front of me.”
Growing up should also mean watching a regular person with regular feelings lip-sync in front of a crowd and being cool with it.
Chloe Finch is a journalism sophomore at UF. Her column runs Thursdays. You can contact her via opinions@alligator.org.
