I’m a football fan, so I opted for the Philadelphia/Dallas game over the AMAs on Sunday night, but, during a commercial break, I managed to catch Pink’s awesome and acrobatic performance of “Beautiful Trauma.” It’s pretty obvious that my favorite kick-ass singer kind of won the evening (with Diana Ross a close second, of course. I bow to musical royalty when it’s deserved).
Also during Sunday night’s ceremony, Christina Aguilera, no slouch in the vocal department herself, paid tribute to the late – and very much missed – Whitney Houston. On (I can’t believe it’s) the 25th anniversary of the release of The Bodyguard and its iconic soundtrack, Xtina performed a medley of songs from the film, including “I Have Nothing,” “Run to You” and, of course, the stirring “I Will Always Love You.” As Christina sang, a camera operator caught Pink in the audience, with a look on her face that many viewers felt indicated her displeasure with the performance. Of course, Twitter went crazy.
#AMAs Pink’s face during Christina Aguilera’s performance had me weak😂 pic.twitter.com/yPMcOGKkgC
— chickfiltay (@tcaxo_) November 20, 2017
Pink's face during Christina Aguilera's Whitney Houston tribute has me rolling on the floor. #AMAs pic.twitter.com/a8y160BRyE
— keaton bell (@keatonkildebell) November 20, 2017
Is it me, or @Pink ‘s face while Christina Aguilera was singing was like: what the hell is she doing? 🤨 #AMAS2017 #AMAS
— Luisa (@RavenBrite) November 20, 2017
Pink was none too happy about the tweets and took to Twitter herself to to set the record straight, once and for all. She tweeted a response to a fan stating that she’s friends with XTina, “Yes. THIS. Christina f—ing killed it tonight for one of our favorite singers ever. This about Whitney, and I am in awe of Christina’s talent. Show the clip where I’m in tears, you negative Nancy’s.” You tell ‘em, girl.
Yes. THIS. Christina fucking killed it tonight for one of our favorite singers ever. This about Whitney, and I am in awe of Christina's talent. Show the clip where I'm in tears, you negative Nancy's 🤘🏽✌🏼❤️ https://t.co/5Lroq73xrQ
— P!nk (@Pink) November 20, 2017
The “cringey” expression could also be attributed to the public’s perception of the singer. As she recently told Vulture, “I think people think I’m really angry a lot of the time. When you think of me, or the caricature of me, it’s this snarly person.” I think we could all agree with that assessment, right?
Besides, Pink has made it abundantly clear that, while she and Christina did have beef back in the “Lady Marmalade” days, they’ve definitely buried the hatchet. In October, Pink went on What What Happens Live and said that, after Xtina took a swing at her in a club, they’re quite civil with each other. She said, “We’re fine. She’s a really sweet person. We made up on ‘The Voice. I mean, it was funny, I laughed. I hadn’t seen her in years and years and years.”
I found a clip of Christina’s whole Whitney tribute online (and I make no guarantees of how long it’s going to stay up) and I thought Christina nailed it. Pink to me looked like she was holding in tears, as if shedding a tear might turn her reputation as a BAMF. A.) it wouldn’t and B.) I recognize that face because I do it at pretty much every Broadway musical I see (I didn’t hold back at Hedwig and the Angry Inch and just bawled like a baby. Won’t be doing THAT again). As for Christina’s performance, I’ll let RuPaul’s Drag Race queen Phoenix have the last word.
Can I get an “Amen”?
Photos: WENN.com, Getty Images
That’s a non-event people, stop trying to find beef everywhere… pfff.
Agreed. Plus I LOL’ed at Pheonix’s tweet.
Sigh. Any excuse to pit women against each other.
Yup. And i think both Pink and Christina are great singers. Not Whitney level but still…
Right? It’s kind of funny how people constantly analyze famous women’s faces, looking for drama where there is none. Including the “What, she’s not smiling or smizing? Clearly she’s dead-eyed because she’s a troubled woman/has made poor life choices” trend. If you watch the video of the performance and see all of Pink’s facial expressions during the performance it’s clear that she’s telling the truth.
@Otaku Fairy completely agree. I also think she is STILL, after all these years, stuck in the mindset of having been introduced to the world alongside her Mickey Mouse club compatriots, (Britney comparisons in particular) all of whose talent pales in comparison to hers. People were so ready to, and did, dismiss them as a whole and she wanted very badly to prove that she was different, so she oversang. I think that’s where all those awful, awkward tacked on runs come from. She ruins songs.
She’s got an incredible voice and an incredible ear, but it seems to me, all these years later, that she still is very self-conscious and, still sings to honor Christina, and Christina’s voice, and never really gets into the song, or honors the song. She’s sort of still in imitation mode, like a little girl with a hairbrush in front of the mirror. She’s still very self-conscious, affected. If she could step out of herself and get lost in the song, it would really be something else.
Sorry but I have to disagree. As much as I enjoy Christina she sounded awful during that performance. Off key, too many runs and way too much melisma (her usual). She was trying to do too much and put her own Xtina flavor on it and it fell flat 🤷🏾♀️
Agreed.
I agree too. She’s an amazingly talented singer, but this wasn’t her best. It drives me nuts that she always overdoes the runs and stuff, IMO it takes away from her natural talent.
Awful is a strong word. And I have no problem with a singer putting their own spin on a song – they should. But I can’t disagree with your other points. Christina is such a talented singer. A power house but she does tend to over sing. And yeah, sometimes the (unnecessary) runs and riffs drives me crazy.
Whitney wasn’t just a great voice. She had great technical ability, something Christina could use more of. She needs to take better care of her instrument as the growls she does is also hell on the vocal cords.
Terrible music arrangement. Pitchy vocal. Out of place show-offs. Distracting Gigi-Hadid cosplaying. How does that not equate to awful? Christina with her singing is now as cringing as Britney with the “dancing”. Sad that both are stuck in their 90s self.
I agree. The guy from This Is Us had the same look on his face as Pink. It was a bad performance.
Yeah further along in the tribute they cut back to pink, with the same frowned expression and she’s singing along, clearly feeling the performance
I thought Xtina did ok, not her best performance but certainly not her worst. People just like to nitpick and create drama.
Exactly. I watched her performance and thought-what’s all the fuss about?? She did ok, and it wasn’t bad by any stretch of the imagination. I expect her to do too many runs because that’s who she is, but it was fine. Nothing to see here.
I didn’t care for the beginning of the medley because it was kind of flat, but the middle and end were good. Overall it was a nice performance.
The issue is that the talent Christina Aguilera is known for is starting to work against her now. She still has a great voice and is clearly among the best singers out of all the A-list pop stars, but people expect her to still sound exactly like she did when she was in her 20’s. If a brand new, petite, pretty 19-year-old pop-star whom we weren’t used to or a nepotism starlet who was showing the world her talent had performed that Whitney Houston medley exactly the way Christina had performed it that night, it would probably be considered an amazing performance by almost everyone. People would rave about the starlet’s talent and say “Ariana and Demi, watch out!” (I like Ariana and Demi, but Christina they are not) But because people can see that it’s Christina Aguilera, people will be let down by the fact that she doesn’t sound like 2002 Christina, even though she still sings better than most pop stars. I did like Kelly Clarkson’s performances slightly better though.
Eh, I think Ariana and Demi are two of the greatest voices out of the new crop of mainstream pop girls, and I think they’re pretty on-par with Prime!Xtina as far as talent goes. Ariana has the same beautiful falsetto that Christina does (and more reliable whistle register) and Demi’s chest belt is much stronger. I love me some Xtina, but she’s always had very questionable vocal technique.
@Otaku Fairy completely agree. I also think she is STILL, after all these years, stuck in the mindset of having been introduced to the world alongside her Mickey Mouse club compatriots, (Britney comparisons in particular) all of whose talent pales in comparison to hers. People were so ready to, and did, dismiss them as a whole and she wanted very badly to prove that she was different, so she oversang. I think that’s where all those awful, awkward tacked on runs come from. She ruins songs.
She’s got an incredible voice and an incredible ear, but it seems to me, all these years later, that she still is very self-conscious and, still sings to honor Christina, and Christina’s voice, and never really gets into the song, or honors the song. She’s sort of still in imitation mode, like a little girl with a hairbrush in front of the mirror. She’s still very self-conscious, affected. If she could step out of herself and get lost in the song, it would really be something else.
I make all kinds of faces with music, depending on the emotion and reactions it inspires, etc— not a bad sign!
It looked to me like she was just really into it. But I guess that’s no fun to talk about?
Does Pink just have resting bitch face? I get accused of that all the time. Ppl ask what’s my problem. Nothing. I’m just sitting here.
My husband has RBF, big time. I used to see him at this sports bar and look at him. But he looked so mean, I would not approach him. Then one night, this guy he was taking to wanted to talk to one of my girlfriends. So they came over to us. My now husband and I started talking and 5 years later, we are married and live each other so much.
@Bethany – Me too! I have had RBF since the day I was born (so says my mother, though there wasn’t a name for it back then). My father has the same “issue.” It has been a problem for me my entire life. People are CONSTANTLY assuming I’m angry or unhappy, and while I’m generally not a positive person, I’m definitely not angry or unhappy the percentage of times people think I am. After 33 years, I am SICK and tired of people telling me to smile… it’s rude. Just because I’m not smiling all the time doesn’t mean I’m not happy – I’m usually just thinking…
I feel ya Pink. If they had panned to me, my face probably would’ve been knotted in a “not so friendly” way too…and not for any particular reason.
I think you nailed it. It is so exhausting to be asked constantly what I’m mad about. It’s jUST MY FACE. I have my work face and my home face. Home Face comes out when i’m too tired to put on Work Face and the comments seem relentless. Just let me be, sorry I don’t look happy enough.
msw – same. Also… are men constantly asked about their RBF or to smile? I don’t think so. And when you ask me what’s wrong or to smile…then you’ve just pissed me off. It is exhausting. And no matter HOW MANY TIMES you explain to someone that it’s just your face, they STILL make comments. I have no doubt it’s negatively affected my career. I’m constantly getting comments in the workplace, from my boss too. “But you’re so much prettier when you smile.” Ever had that one? Inappropriate.
I thought Aguilera’s performance was bad, especially compared to Kelly Clarkson and Pink’s opening. They both managed to stay on pitch unlike Aguilera. Some of the notes she hit were painful.
All that performance did was make me miss Whitney. When she was at her peak as she was at this AMA performance, nobody could beat her. This is how you do a medley, folks. And she makes it look effortless!
https://youtu.be/4KhTkjv8ppA
@Neelyo OMG I’m bawling after watching that. Whitney is an absolute legend and I miss her dearly 😢
Holy crap, almost forgot how insanely talented and beautiful she was. I can’t imagine any pop star today performing like that. She was of another world.
I don’t think Pink was making a face. However, Christina’s performance was awful. She was off key and flat a lot and she added so many runs to “I will always love you” that she ruined the song and made me suspect she was trying to add a lot to cover up the fact that she couldn’t actually do a good job with the song. It was absolutely terrible and Whitney deserved much better.
Xtina has a great voice (am a fan of some of her work thou she seriously overdoes it with the melisma) but she is not in Whitney’s league. Whitney in her heyday was easily 5 octaves, Christina is 4 at a push.
I liked Christina’s performance for most of it. There was a part I teared up. But another part kind of fell apart. Pink was teared up later by the end.
This is the media using women against each other for a nonstory, and I hate it. They both deserve better than the tired bitchy, cat-fight narrative regarding female artists.
I like that Pink set the record straight so quickly.
@neelyo thanks for that Whitney link. Amazing.
Is it just me or does Xtina have a new face? Also… she’s always been guilty of overkilling songs with extra runs and unnecessary vocal tricks. No one. NO ONE could do it like Whitney.
I love Pink’s music. I have to admit though, the girl makes a lot of faces, even her badass clenched teeth classic look is creepy to me. I doubt she was dissing Christina knowing the cameras were on her, she just makes a lot of faces, can’t think of any other way to put it. Sure her daughter will do the same by watching her or ask her wth you doing mom….lol
I didn’t like Xtina’s tribute at all. I had just watched the documentary Whitney: Can I Be Me, and was moved to tears hearing Whitney’s glorious voice again.
“When you think of me, or the caricature of me, it’s this snarly person.” Maybe that’s because your default red carpet photo expression is a snarl? Like in the pictures taken from this exact event? I mean, it’s not a caricature, that’s literally the facial expression that you yourself make, ad nauseam, basically since you took on your rebel teen persona decades ago?
I agree with Phoenix. 100%
I am in the minority who thinks her performance was good. It wasn’t great. But it was good. Ru Paul is so right. Christina at her worst sings better than 99% of the current singers at their best.
She oversang per usual. But in this age of autotune bs, we forget that many divas would do the same too.
What I want to know (and nobody was talking about) is the amount of plastic surgery she has had. I could barely recognize her.
Ps: let’s not forget the Whitney’s family chose Christina. Whitney said publicly to Christina she enjoyed her very much and she was the only one (besides Whitney) that could do a great rendition of “Run to you”
Pink hasn’t always rubbed me the wrong way and I can never put my finger on why.
I wish more pop star like Pink. She’s a proof that you don’t need to be annoying attention seeker to be a pop star. I’m tired the like of Taylor Swift, Katy Perry and miley cyrus.
Myth. Don’t get me wrong, I like Pink’s music and think she’s talented, but she has done the same things for attention that Katy Perry, Miley Cyrus, Christina Aguilera, Beyoncé, Lady Gaga, Ariana Grande, and all the other pop stars her biggest fans compare her to have done. I’m all for it, but it is what it is. Pink isn’t ‘not like the other girls.’ It’s all good though. None of them “just stand there and sing”- or at least, not all the time. And that’s perfectly fine. They’re allowed to express and present themselves different ways at different times.
I absolutely love Christina. Her voice is untouchable in my eyes. That being said… this was not her best performance. She was pitchy and her pacing was off, right? I had a little bit of secondhand embarrassment… I couldn’t even finish it.
Blame Twitter for that. Everyone loves to capture some supposed “shade” or “pink is all of us”. “Pink is goals”. God so annoying
Pink would never act like that even if she hated the performance. She has way more class than that. She’s a Philly girl come on!
While I don’t think Pink was actually cringing, I can’t blame her if she was. Xtina has a powerful voice but I still cringe whenever I hear her. She needs to work on the art of subtlety. She constantly over sings and it over powers the feeling behind the songs.