“I am very unpredictable,” Beyonce said on last night’s concert special about her, and, uh, that is just not true. She is a lot of things — talented, beloved, a non-stop hit-maker — but she’s also one of our most reliable celebrities. We count on her to be beautiful, to make top-40 jams we’ll shout along to in the car, to be essentially scandal-free. “Beyonce: I Am…Yours” was one giant (fun!) infomercial for her brand of lovely diligence, but its title, like its star’s declarations about herself, wasn’t quite accurate: Are there performers less “ours” than Beyonce? I can’t think of one.
Look, this special was totally enjoyable, and the concert footage demonstrated for the jillionth time that Beyonce is one hell of a performer — she can command an entire stadium’s attention with the arch of an eyebrow. (Being in a leotard helps.) She has an awesome all-female band, and everyone in it respects and admires her. Beyonce is a very hard worker, and when we’re extremely lucky, we get to see her interact with her husband for a second or two.
But she’s also elusive, and even telling her own origin story glosses over details that everyone in the audience already knows. If you’re going to bring up the old days of Destiny’s Child, do you want to utter the words “Michelle” or “Kelly”? If you show footage from the then-tween group’s debut on Star Search, might you mention that yes, there were six people in the group at the time? No on all counts. She says that she wrote “Crazy in Love” when she was falling for Jay-Z, whose name she doesn’t say (actin’ kinda shady?), but she doesn’t mention anything beyond that. It’s fine — that’s her right, certainly, to try to retain a shred of privacy — but this hardly makes her ours.
And that’s how I, at least, want it: Beyonce’s best anthems have always been about selfhood, independence, confidence, and ladypower. I just wish this special had the balls to call itself “I Am…Mine” and admit that among the many things we admire about Beyonce is that she’s not ours. In fact the opposite’s true. We’re hers.
Photo credit: Isaac Brekken/WireImage.com
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It was a great teaser for the DVD….which I bought.
She is one of select few performers who can work a small stage, sing live and dance at the same time without missing a note.
If you buy the whole DVD she probably does mention her husband and the members of Destiny’s Child.
Sorry to burst your buble but a lot of hwat you saw on the special was not live singing. It’s called singing to a pre-recorded track.
you hater. its one thing that Beyonce does NOT do and that is lip sync. those echos you hear are mike effects. She is the ONLY person who sings as hard as she does AND sings at the same time. You cant believe ity because she is flawless every time. And that’s what makes her the greatest at what she does. NOBODY does it better.
Pretty accurate, I must say. I love the woman, but she has the music industry (and her audience) wrapped around her weird, “Sasha Fierce” gloved finger.
I love her, love her music but please give us a break already. A whole decade of being in our face is enough. Please take a break, make us want you, cus at this moment im so not yours!
Your fan
JCD
She does mention Jay-z when she does Bonnie and Clyde. It might shock you that there was more to the concert than 40 minutes.
I think that the fact that we really don’t care much about her personal life is amazing. She’s all about her work. She’s the one really megasuperstar out there today. She’s the best. After seeing her Vegas special I believe she belongs with the legendary. I would even dare to say she’s underrated for her talents and her charisma.
I think the whole point of being labeled a “megasuperstar” is when the public is obssesed with both the public and private life of a person (i.e. MJ, Madonna, Britney). Beyonce, while a great performer, does not have an interesting persoanlity. In fact, watching the special I realized that a lot of her songs are really forgetable.
We might not wanna admit it, but Beyonce is THAT WOMAN!
Yeah, that overrated woman…
learn how to spell
You know it’s sad right? It’s very sad that Beyonce’s show was so perfect, in order for you to bring some negativity, all you could do was attack the name of the show…I LOVE IT!
Calm down. Attack is hardly the right word. Lyons sang Beyonce’s praises throughout the entire article; she was just pointing out the inaccuracy of the show’s title.
And pointing out Beyonce’s apparent lack of self-awareness.
Shes such a lame singer and 2010 will be reign of the haters when she flopps to hell xo
Yall say this every damn year…LMFAO!
i am a beyonce fan. but 2 things about her special bothered me:
1.) beyonce is a huge international superstar. i get that she wanted an intimate feel for her tv special, but it looked like she was performing in a high school auditorium. she even said the stage was too small. come one, B. we know you can fill arenas, so show us that!
2.) she talked a lot about writing her songs. any B fan can looked through her solo cds and look up her writing creds. unless those creds are lying, she does very little writing. when she is credited for “writing” a song, she’s credited with 5 to 6 other people! come on now. when Michael Jackson wrote a song (Billie Jean, Beat It, Smooth Criminal, Bad), he’s the ONLY writer credited.
the las vegas encore can only fit max of 1500 people thats why she did three shows
I like Beyonce as well, but I agree about the songwriting. Mariah Carey does the same thing and always forgets to mention that several others did the heavy lifting.
Until 1995’s Daydream, Mariah Carey had many songs that only her and another person wrote, just check out the her wikipedia page, there’s always Mariah Carey, Someone. Someone could be her friend Ben, Babyface, a bunch of people. With butterfly and beyond is different there’s like 1000 songwriters, you can’t say who wrote what! It’s Unbelievable!
I love Beyonce!! She has the hold package…beauty, brains, talent and a real “sistah”. GOD will continue to bless her as long as she stays the way she is.
Preach, sister!
The haters and the reviewer are annoyingand redundant. Beyoncé, no matter her incredible success , still a supershy girl who wants to rock the stage. She’s doing what she loves the most and doesn’t like to discuss details about her private life. Btw, everybody knows everything about the Destiny’s Child history.
So what are you expecting, jealous haters? Do you want her to get punched in a face before the Grammys or to take drugs with her husband to find her “unpredictable” and “opened”? To the left, please.
More like, “I am severely overrated!”!
Am i rite?
Nop.
I so agree with you. There are so many other good singers out there and they get ignored because of this person. Enough already. HA!
I agree there are a lot of GREAT singers… but not ENTERTAINERS- there’s a difference. Nobody’s touching Beyonce right now. If they want to get noticed then they should take notes…clearly just standing on a stage with a mic & no stage presence does not get you noticed. Beyonce has nothing to do with other ppl’s careers.
No, you’re not right, just annoying.
Is nop I agree is Polish?
Learn how to spell, then come back.
nop.
Is rite MORON for right?
Is darclyte Polish for fat-free chocolate?
Yawwwwn. I’ve rarely seen a more boring, opaque, tedious and above all CALCULATED superstar then Beyonce. It seems she doesnt make a single arch of her eyebrow that wasnt pre-planned 6 months in advance.
Lololol! I so agree.
DIDO!!!!!
LMFAO! I’m really enjoying this…everybody and their mama is mad!
She’s still better than ALL of you haters so GET MAD AND STAY THAT WAY
She’s better than your lame ass too! HA!