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October 24, 2004
Ashlee Simpson has a Milli Vanilli moment on SNL
- Download the video. (1m 10s, ~10mb, mpeg)
- mp3 of Ashlee's apology/blameshift.
- Download problems? See below.
You knew it was going to happen sometime, to somebody.
Ashlee Simpson performed -- or simulated a performance -- on Saturday Night Live last night. But as she began her second song, it was immediately clear something was wrong: a taped soundtrack was playing the same song ("Pieces of Me") she performed earlier in the evening -- along with her taped voice. All was revealed. She started to dance awkwardly, then got confused, then tried dancing again, then shuffled off stage.
SNL cut to a still photo of Jude Law, and then to a commercial. When they came back, they showed a video short ("Bear City"), followed by a skit, followed by another video short, and then the show ended. Ashlee stood next to Jude at the end, and apologized, saying, "My band started playing the wrong song, and I didn't know what to do, so I thought I'd do a hoe-down." Ohhhh, so that's what happened! I'm sorry...I thought what happened is that your career evaporated while millions of people looked on, bemused. My mistake.
When she was "peforming" earlier on the show, it was clear that she was lip-synching, something that SNL used to never allow, but now, in this age of arguably-hot-girls-who-can't-sing-for-shit, Lorne M. seems to have given in (I think Britney and Janet have both lip-synched on the show), and now it's bitten him in the ass.
About a minute into her aborted perfomance, the band members were still on stage, gamely strumming and banging away on their instruments, looking at each other with expressions that clearly said, "Welp, this is what happens when you sell out."
Predictably, the forums on her official website [backup copy] are buzzing with people ridiculing her. Some dissect the clip and say the band was trying to save her, but then she went and blamed them anyway. And of course, there's the (supposed) interview from Lucky magazine in which she disparages lip-synching and says she wants her natural talent to shine through. What natural talent is that? The one for hoe-downs?
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» Ashlee Simpson, SNL and the pathetic state of pop from The Daily Grind
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Comments
Nice work getting the clip up and the run down. Thanks, I'll be back.
Posted by: Mateo at October 24, 2004 10:51 AM
wonderful!
Posted by: Erin at October 24, 2004 3:55 PM
irish spring!
irish spring!
[i think this is a reference to her leprechaun dance. -robot.]
Posted by: Nick Lacky at October 24, 2004 4:24 PM
thanks for posting the clip. hilarious stuff
Posted by: gmoney at October 24, 2004 5:31 PM
God bless you. My siblings and I were going crazy trying to find the video, and it was worth it!
Posted by: Galen at October 24, 2004 8:29 PM
Thanks so much for posting the video! I tried video links on other sites but this is the first one I could get to work. Yay!
Posted by: jane at October 24, 2004 9:53 PM
simply glorious.
Posted by: Raychel at October 24, 2004 11:57 PM
Guys check out http://www.lipsync.us
MTV just posted a news article, problem is the quoted they used are not from Ashlee Simpson. ;)
Posted by: Geoffrey Huntley at October 25, 2004 3:38 PM
i hope all those fake bitches get busted like her.
Posted by: SCoots at October 25, 2004 3:52 PM
Ok, it's not just you- everyone's saying it- but that Lucky magazine quote is made up. Not only does Lucky magazine not interview people (it's a magazine about shopping), Ashlee Simpson has never appeared in an issue. I've read every issue, every month. Maybe the quote's from another magazine, or maybe someone just made it up and everyone else picked it up. Sorry, it's just been driving me crazy:)
Posted by: Lucky at October 25, 2004 5:20 PM
"Welp, this is what happens when you sell out."
Classic line! I would buy those two guys a beer for facing the crowd though (not the one that turns around after it goes to hell). Too bad they were never able to get out of the wrong song. They just get sucked in deeper and deeper until they're full on jamming to "pieces of me" after she leaves. Funny thing is though that they seem kind of better once she's gone. Like the guy with the black pasty hair could've stepped up and started screeching his own thang over the distortion. Talk about instant star if he could've pulled it off.
Posted by: dave at October 25, 2004 7:28 PM
that may be the greatest thing I have ever seen. Who doesn't like to watch a pop star crash and burn...ON LIVE TV!!!!
Posted by: melissa at October 25, 2004 8:20 PM
this is all hillarious, and thanks so much for posting, and in a good format no less, but does anyone have, or know where one could get, the first performance? cause that's almost just as funny, and makes the second one even funnier. hook it up.
[if anyone else wants this and can't find it elsewhere, post a comment and we'll take care of it. -Amy's Robot]
Posted by: bigmanoncampus at October 25, 2004 10:09 PM
hey i heard that a radio station website in chicago also has a clip of some extra footage from backstage after they went to commercial. anyone seen it? if i find it i'll share the link.
Posted by: burt tozt at October 26, 2004 1:17 AM
What a coward that girl is! My GOD. The rest of the band plays gamely one and it's LEAD runs off with her tail between her legs. Looks like the band is good enough (maybe even better) without her. =)
Posted by: Leanne Anysia at October 26, 2004 3:43 AM
I think this is one of the best things I have ever seen on live TV. We all know this type of thing goes on, but the best part was and is watching how the Simpson and SNL camps are trying to spin this. One excuse after another. Funny thing is, her music, like all the rest before her (Jessica, Britney, Christina, and all the rest) is total crap, so who cares anyway. To all the music execs out there, take these bulls*%* cookie cutter albums and overpaid one hit wonders and shove them up your a*#. You suck, they suck and thanks for providing extra proof last Saturday Night.
Posted by: Phil at October 26, 2004 1:38 PM
Hey,
I didn't see anything wrong with her preformance. There's a perfectly valid explanation for what happened.
-the Star Wars Kid, the New York Yankees, Paris Hilton, and George Bush's intelligence advisor
Posted by: Chris at October 26, 2004 3:10 PM
Money can buy a professional band of musicians, but daddy's money can't buy talent. She should crawl back under her sister's shadow.
Posted by: steve at October 26, 2004 11:06 PM
Ashley's comments regarding the SNL incident sob (among other things) true passion for music. Give me a break! Clearly she is not even creative enough to figure out how to cover up HER mistake (her mistake, NOT her BAND'S) with any finesse or artistic flare. Rather she blames the only real musicians on the stage that night. Can't wait for her to end up with her sexy home video released on the internet and maybe then we'll finally see some talent!
Posted by: ASHLEY SUX at October 27, 2004 12:26 AM
Hahaha! Ever since she started out, I knew she was such a fucking sham! She's a trying-hard rock artist...she's putting legendary rockers to shame...rock stars don't lipsynch nor dance like a chimpanzee...she should be in the zoo...or release a Paris Hilton sorta sex video tape...she doesn't have the talent to be on stage! SHe's better off as a porn star! Nyahnyahnyah! Or better...crawling behind the her sister's shadow!!! She didn't even try to do something about it! What a coward bitch!!!
Posted by: Adialeigh at October 27, 2004 4:49 PM
she looked loaded to me. probably why they rolled a cut anyway. to cover up her drunken/high/tripping state of mind.
Posted by: shane at October 27, 2004 9:42 PM
did anyone else click the link and notice that the forums on her website are down? now, i don't think that is very fair.
Posted by: lara at October 28, 2004 4:27 AM
Official forums are down? Well, it's a good thing we had the foresight to make a copy of them a few hours after the original incident!
see http://amysrobot.com/files/ashlee/forum/news_comment.asp.htm
Posted by: Amy's Robot at October 28, 2004 4:34 AM
Every time I see it, it just keeps getting funnier and funnier.
Posted by: Lisa at October 30, 2004 3:34 AM
I can't believe all of you!!! Ashlee Simpson is wonderful! Seriously. Beethoven? Uhn-uhn. Dvorak? Shit. The beatles? Puh-leez. No, Ashlee is the greatest musician in the history of the universe. Just look at how she spells her name. Ashley with a 'y' is so passe. All you haters ought to be ashamed of yourselves.
Posted by: David at October 30, 2004 8:46 PM
do you have the clip of the skit "Bear City"?
[yes: http://www.amysrobot.com/links/index.php?linkid=4939 ]
Posted by: solo at November 4, 2004 8:26 PM
I went to the link above that is supposedly the copy of Ashlee's official forum so I could save it on my hard drive. I go there only to find someone has screwed it up! My only guess is that after it gets old, making up new is the only way? Sure, some of the comments were originally there, but one can only wonder why so many new ones were added. Trying to enhance it wasn't cool. I wanted to see it like it was.. Has anyone else noticed this!?! Doesn't anyone have a link to the real thing? Probably not much point since we'll never know which copy is the real copy, and countless fakes will probably emerge anyway. :-(. At least I have the video clip. :-)
[We think you're right. It may be those comments in our archive were generated by a script, and we didn't notice when we archived the page. -AR.]
Posted by: Krissy at November 11, 2004 1:47 AM
Wow, I missed all this the first time around. I happened to be unknowingly watching a rerun of a certain infamous SNL episode last night and, miraculously, they aired Ashlee's fuck-up in all its uncut glory. I agree with 1) most of you, that she's an entirely studio manufactured no-talent, symptomatic of All That Is Wrong With The Music Industy Today, but also with 2) only a few of you, that she deserves some sympathy. The poor, poor girl. I mean, thus far the American public has eaten her up with a spoon, and her band DID start playing the wrong song. The regrettable part of her "apology" was that she neglected to comment on the fact that her band's mistake revealed her lip-synch sham to the world. My mind's eye can't stop replaying that strange little dance she did. A dance of desperation, or resignation? Of cowardice, rebellion, or just plain panic? The world may never know.
Posted by: caroline at December 5, 2004 3:27 PM
Hey all.. I am of the same mind as those who think Ashlee is a great musician and singer. I love her music and am still one of her fans even after her mishap. Anyone who has been one of her fans from the start knows about her acid reflux and what it does to her voice. I might have just come out with it instead of singing but I guess she kinda didn't have a choice. By the way lipsynching for those who don't know the definition means someone is moving their lips to a track, or if they actually sing to synch up better then their michrophone is off. This was not the case in Ashlee's performance because she did sing and her michrophone was on! Yes there was a track behind her, but she was SINGING over top of it. If you listen to the performance you can hear it so you can't tell me she was lipsynching because that isn't what lipsynching is.
Secondly, why haven't you posted the video of Lindsay Lohan's GMA performance? I am actually a fan of both of the girls, but I have not seen the whole clip of Lindsay's performance so I don't know if she was singing over a track or lipsynching. The only thing I've seen was the few seconds where her lips aren't moving, but I'd like to hear if her michrophone was actually on during the performance or what!
By the way to those who will flame me as I'm sure you will beacuase of your distaste for Ashlee/Lindsay/pop music in general we are all entitled to our opinions, but whether you like them or not as far as Ashlee's performance goes you can't deny the facts and she was singing over her track which is not lipsynching (and the acid reflux was the reason for the singing over the track and the pushing the wrong button was the fault of the drummer which he has himself admitted). I can't respect those who make an judgement without actually looking at the facts!
Thanks all!
[AR replies: Lip synching means synchronizing your lips to a pre-recorded track, which is what Ashlee was doing, or at least attempting to do. I don't think she was actually singing because if she was, you have been able to HEAR HER, which you couldn't. But let's not get bogged down in semantics. Ashlee perpetrated a fraud on the audience. You can defend it anyway you want, but that's what happened.
Why didn't we post a video of Lindsay Lohan on GMA? Well, I guess because as unbelievable as it may seem, we don't have a bank of Tivos continually recording everything that appears on television 24 hours a day. (But we did mention the incident on the Link Factory.) When we get lucky enough to Tivo something funny or strange or otherwise worthy of comment we post it, but I don't think readers should assume that we have some kind of special access to stuff that happens on TV. We're just regular people sitting on our regular couches, just like everyone else.]
Posted by: Linda at December 10, 2004 12:20 PM
Bueno hola como estas espero que bien
solo te escribo para decirte que me escantas y soy tu fans n.1 me gustan tus cansiones me gusta tu forma de ser de interpretar tus cansiones soy peruana y tus cansiones les gusta atodos
buno me despido con en boso y un abraso suerte y sigue triunfando como lo has estado haciendo desde peru tu fans carla bye SMILE GOD IS LOVE FOREVER BYEEEEEEEE
Posted by: carla loyola ibañes at January 8, 2005 9:16 PM
she sucks so much. i think it's sad that some people like her.. i understand that her songs may be catchy and stuff,but we have all heard cathy pop songs before. The other day i head a girl telling someones about how cool and "diffrent" ashlee simpson is. damn. you can like her,but don't go around sayng she is soo unice and great. she really isn't
http://www.petitiononline.com/StopAsh/petition.html
everyone sign this! ^
Posted by: Ena at January 15, 2005 5:55 PM
the forum on her website has been removed. hmmmmmm
Posted by: jc at January 21, 2005 8:24 AM
» Milli Vanilli rules! from have a nice day.
Tracked on October 25, 2004 5:04 AM