BET, You Did Good.

Watching the BET Awards is like going to your ignorant family member's cookout. You never really want to go, but you do because people you havent seen in years are going to be there. Plus, there is always some sort of foolishness jumping off. Basically, you go to be nosey. Once you get to this cookout, oftentimes, you wonder why you even exerted the effort in getting dressed and coming over. But once in a while, those ignorant family members put together a solid one. Such is usually the case with BET. Last night was the exception though.Most of the performances and awards given out were expected and therefore forgettable. There were really about five or six moments worth talking about.

First, respect must be given to Queen Latifah. She brought an element of class to the show that hadn't been there in a very long time. Although, her dressing up like her former movie characters was a bit contrived and lame, she made up for it with her enthusiasm and fun spirit. However, one of the funniest moments of the show was when T.I. kept calling her 'Set It Off' character "Chloe" instead of "Cleo". Her opening performance great. I loved when she sang over the year's most popular beats. And as if that weren't enough, she made every new female MC pay their respects with that rhyme she dropped. The lyrics were nothing but truth and that New Jersey swag was undeniable.

Secondly, the all girl Prince tribute was everything a Prince tribute should be. The performances were powerful. Done in Prince's style, but they had an air of orginality to them. Janelle Monae tore it up with her rendition of "Let's Go Crazy". She danced and sang her way around the entire auditorium. At one point, I thought she was going to shake her hair poof loose. She gave it her all. Esperanza Spalding made the mass public aware of who she was with her sexy and jazzy version of "If I Was Your Girlfriend". After that, Alicia Keys performed "Adore". Where she made it quite obvious falsetto is not her strong suit. But she was forgiven after she hopped her pregnant self on that piano and writhed like she was a back up dancer for Prince in his heyday. Ms. Patti LaBelle had everyone on their feet with the singing of The Purple One's signature, "Purple Rain". Patti got so into her singing, she kicked off her Christian Louboutin heels and hit notes most songstresses dream of hitting. By the way, Prince caught one of the heels and raised it for the crowd to see. That was classic.

The BET Awards was also a night of the comeback. Kanye West and T.I. both performed their new material with passion and fervor. El Debarge surprised all of us with a performance. He did a medley of his family's biggest hits. BET automatically won with this one because you show me a black person who doesn't love Debarge and I'll show you a liar. Deneice Williams joined Monica on stage to sing "Everything To Me/Silly". The only problem with this was Deneice dressing like she wasn't somebody's grandmother. Nia Long and Larenz Tate recited their poems from "Love Jones" and the place went wild. Nia was wearing a dress like she was trying to tempt Jesus to the darkside and Larenz looked like he hadn't aged since that movie. Perhaps, the most touching comeback was Chris Brown's Michael Jackson tribute. Chris danced and popped like only Michael could. Then, he brokedown when he was supposed to be singing "Man In The Mirror". Many will say the crying made the tribute more about Chris than Michael. I don't see it like that. That performance was about Michael Jackson and reminded us why we liked Chris Brown in the first place. He left everything he had on that stage and that's more than we can say for most of the artists in the industry right now.

I would be remiss if I didn't mention Nicki Minaj. She was on stage the most, performing three times and winning the Best Female Hip Hop award. Maybe it's me, but my disdain grows for her with every passing performance. She lip synched each and every one of her performances. I was surprised she didn't lip synch her acceptance speech. The wigs and outfits were not cool. They had her looking like a bad version of the Lil Kim "Crush On You" video, which makes it even worse that she beat Lil Kim out in the Best Female Hip Hop category.

At the end of the award show, I was left feeling like the show's producers did a good job. Sure there was some of the foolishness BET is known for, but there was a substantially less amount of it than shows of the past. The people behind the scenes must have made a conscience effort to bring some real intelligence and class to the telecast. Hopefully, BET continues on this upward slope. We'll see next year.