Cyrus hosts, Swift possibly rules at MTV Video Music Awards

Here are the nominees in several 2015 MTV Video Music Award categories:

Video of the year: “Alright,” Kendrick Lamar; “Bad Blood,” Taylor Swift featuring Kendrick Lamar; “Thinking Out Loud,” Ed Sheeran; “7/11,” Beyoncé; “Uptown Funk,” Mark Ronson featuring Bruno Mars.

Best male video: “Alright,” Kendrick Lamar; “Chains,” Nick Jonas; “Earned It,” The Weeknd; “Thinking Out Loud,” Ed Sheeran; “Uptown Funk,” Mark Ronson featuring Bruno Mars.

Best female video: “Anaconda,” Nicki Minaj; “Blank Space,” Taylor Swift; “Elastic Heart,” Sia; “Love Me Like You Do,” Ellie Goulding; “7/11,” Beyoncé.

Best pop video: “Blank Space,” Taylor Swift; “Sugar,” Maroon 5; “7/11,” Beyoncé; “Thinking Out Loud,” Ed Sheeran; “Uptown Funk,” Mark Ronson featuring Bruno Mars.

Best rock video: “Ship To Wreck,” Florence and the Machine; “Shut Up and Dance,” Walk the Moon; “Take Me To Church,” Hozier; “Uma Thurman,” Fall Out Boy; “Why’d You Only Call Me When You’re High?,” Arctic Monkeys.

Miley Cyrus or Taylor Swift: Who will be more talked about after the 2015 MTV Video Music Awards?

It’s a valid question, for reasons as different as the two music stars themselves. In announcing she would host the annual event – being televised from Los Angeles’ Microsoft Theater on Sunday, Aug. 30, by the cable music channel (which admittedly has significantly less music in its era of such series as “Teen Wolf” and “Scream”) – Cyrus knowingly said, in signs posted in Instagram, “MTV won’t let me perform, so I’m hosting this year’s VMAs.”

The former “Hannah Montana” has a history with the VMAs that arguably reached its peak (to date, anyway) with her 2013 gyrating to Robin Thicke’s performance of “Blurred Lines” that immediately made “twerk” one of the best-known verbs in the English idiom. And last year, she sent a young man to the stage to collect her award for video of the year and make a speech on behalf of homeless youths.

Swift goes into this year’s VMAs with the most nominations of any artist, enjoying nine bids for her album “1989” and its tunes. Her run with the ceremony has been calmer, but still talkable on several occasions; in 2009, an elaborately choreographed, live performance followed her through a good chunk of Manhattan (including a subway car) and onto the Radio City Music Hall stage.

And, of course, there was that year’s situation not of Swift’s own doing–other than her winning one of the “Moonman” trophies–that kept her in headlines for days afterward. Kanye West suddenly took the stage during her acceptance speech for best female video (for “You Belong With Me”) to advocate for Beyoncé, who he felt should have won the honor instead for “Single Ladies.”

As for “1989,” whose hits include the VMA-nominated “Bad Blood” and “Blank Space,” Swift told this writer upon its release that she knew what she wanted it to be: “I definitely make an album for lots of different reasons. I think there should be things on the album that make you want to dance, there should be things on the album that make you think about your life, there should be things on the album that immediately conjure up a past relationship, and there should be things on the album that make you want to fill in the blanks and figure out the rest of the story.”