Shawn Mendes, Eminem among winners at MTV EMA show in London
LONDON—Shawn Mendes beat Taylor Swift and Ed Sheeran to win the best-artist prize Sunday at the MTV EMAs, while U2 were proclaimed global icons in a show that celebrated London’s diverse culture, from pubs to pirate radio.
Mendes, the 19-year-old Canadian star, also won the best-song trophy for “There’s Nothing Holdin’ Me Back,” to the delight of fans standing in a polite onstage mosh-pit at the city’s SSE Arena.
Fittingly, he also took the prize for best fans.
The show, formerly known as the MTV Europe Music Awards, opened with a clip of Eminem performing his new single “Walk on Water” in a London pub. He then emerged onstage in jeans and a black hoodie to perform the slow-burning number live, with Skylar Gray filling in on the duet duties Beyoncé performed on the recording.
Eminem was also named best hip-hop artist, and proclaimed surprise.
“I don’t know how I got this because I haven’t had an album out in a few years,” he said.
Sunday marked the awards’ return to London for the first time since 1996, and locally bred singer Rita Ora was a suitably chipper host. Taking the stage clad in a bathrobe and towel, she kept things moving, changed outfits every few minutes and gamely joshed in video clips with the stars of pirate-radio sitcom “People Just Do Nothing.”
The show featured plenty of visual dazzle, from the 50 dancers accompanying Demi Lovato on “Sorry Not Sorry” and “Tell me You Love Me” to the giant animatronic bird carrying Travis Scott onto the stage.
Singer Camila Cabello, who won the best-pop prize, performed “Havana” with a troupe of dancers dressed as bathing beauties around a realistic projection of a pool. London grime artist Stormzy arrived in a police car and left in a blaze of fireworks after performing the rousing “Big For Your Boots.”
Performers ranged across genres and generations, and included singer-songwriter Kesha, electronic act Clean Bandit, rapper French Montana and rockers The Killers.