Alicia Keys Breaks Out The Air Horns

jharv | November 19, 2007 12:30 pm

Downing many beers during the first hour of the American Music Awards live-blog last night to dull the pain made me a little sleepy, even if I was in no way as out of it as 90 percent of the performers and presenters. But I snapped back during the only real highlight-cum-spectacle of the evening that didn’t involve boggling at Chris Brown’s Tron costume, where Alicia Keys proved that the best way to sell ersatz reggae during one of the cheesiest events of the year is by turning your performance into a celebration of late ’80s and ’90s dancehall, squeezing in Junior Reid, Chaka Demus and Pliers, and Beenie Man for an air-horn happy medley of their most iconic hits. Probably the first time “Murder She Wrote” has been heard on American awards show in some time, and sadly probably the last, since you could almost hear the rest of the country wondering where Daughtry was already.