Nothing at the VMAs happens without a careful reckoning of how the act will make money. It’s one of the reasons that this awards show is even more nauseating than most; it’s a stilted, bloated commercial for an industry that needs no more advertising, an industry that already is little more than a long-winded marketing ploy. For Miley Cyrus, the VMAs were her record-release party; the charmingly titled “Miley Cyrus And Her Dead Petz” launched online, free, as soon as the show ended. (The servers for mileycyrusandherdeadpetz.com immediately crashed, though they are also available on SoundCloud.) The album art—a video version of which was on screens during her performance—is Cyrus’ face, mouth open, smearing what looks like dirty sprinkles onto her cheek. Stains from that same substance are smeared over the rest of her mouth and inside it, too. In the video, it looks more like a dark glittery syrup.
Maybe there’s an artistic vision behind Miley Cyrus’ vomited-rainbow aesthetic—who knows? But her attitude onstage, for the seemingly interminable three-hour live broadcast, was one of not vision but stunting; look what I can do and still make money, is what it read, as she cracked jokes about eating pot brownies that her “mammy” made her. Miley Cyrus is in some ways the quintessential rock god, because she is only interested in one thing: making a scene.