Good God.

So this may be another Rihanna performance video, posted shortly after another Rihanna performance video post, but I think it is highly necessary (maybe because I'm totally and utterly infatuated.) This is the opening seven minute medley of Loud taken from the AMA (sounds like that pension scheme company with the adverts that feature Parkinson and Edie's mum) awards that took place last night. It featured performances from the bland (Taylor Swift), the brazen (Miley), the blokey (Enrique) and the Bieber, with two noteworthily polished ones by both P!nk and Xtina. But this is just blissful. What's her secret? Maybelline? The Loud campaign so far, although intense and vocally demanding, has been pretty much flawless; each incarnation of the single(s?) has been joyful, captivating, and in some way, innovative. Seeing the transfer from the smaller TV show studios to a MASSIVE LED STADIUM ARENA platform here (slight exaggeration there) only serves to improve it: the command of the stage, the fluid movement, the impeccable vocals, the charm and exuberance is irrefutably infectious. It's tempting to speculate as to why this works so well (in my opinion): is it extensive record label coaching? Probably. A fantastic choreographer? Most certainly. Rigorous dance and voice training further developed in stringent rehearsals? Evidently. The seeming effortlessness of it all must have been hard to attain, but you wouldn't have guessed from this. The surfeit of confidence and what seems to be pure ebullience look to be all her own, not something taught or memorised. Cue clichés like 'she's hit her stride', 'you wouldn't believe she was twenty two', a 'wisdom that belies her years' etc. etc.

The simplicity of it, of someone singing and dancing to a song, makes it so enjoyable. It is professional yet laidback, sexual yet spirited (a bit of a dodgy synonym - vibrant, vital, vivacious?) and lacks any empty, compensatory pretension or pyrotechnics. Beautiful. *runs off to write a fervent panegyric to the wonders of Rihanna, puts in envelope, posts with ring, passionate declaration of love and a marriage proposal*