There are no formal anointment's with these kinds of things, but it's hard not to crown Beyoncé as the current queen of pop music.
She's the female artist who has spent the most weeks at No. 1 this century with five No. 1 singles, she is the woman with the most Top 5 hits since 2000, and she has the most hits in the Top 10 with a dozen.
Her latest, and third, solo album "I Am … Sasha Fierce" — named after her onstage alter ego (who sounds like a Tyra Banks character) — is one of the best-selling albums of the year. With more than 2 million in sales, the album is still in the Top 30 after 34 weeks; its latest million-selling single, "Halo," is still in the Top 15 after 25 weeks. Its newest release "Ego" is No. 2 on the R&B charts.
Forbes just listed her as the No. 1 best-paid celebrity under 30, with over $87 million in earnings from June 2008 to June 2009. She's married to Jay-Z, who is No. 2 on the magazine's Hip-Hop Cash King list, making them a power couple beyond peer in recorded music.
But it's not just her money and chart positions that earn her a crown, it's how she carries herself and who her inspiration has been.
At the Essence Music Festival in Atlanta this month, she shared some home videos of her excitement as a child going to a Michael Jackson concert.
"When Michael Jackson hit the stage, that's when I decided who I wanted to be," said Beyoncé (who has long since dropped her full name Beyoncé Knowles except on movie marquees).
All this was by way of introduction to her current hit "Halo, " when she dropped to her knees and sang, "Michael, I can see your halo, I can feel your halo ... I pray it won't fade away."
She's included the moment in her "I Am" tour since then, and it will likely be part of her only New England stop, a sold-out show Thursday at the Mohegan Sun Arena in Uncasville.
But it's not the only Jackson tribute she's made on tour. In a Philadelphia show just two days after Jackson's unexpected death, she covered one of his hits, "I Can't Help It" saying, "You know the reason I'm here is because of Michael Jackson."
Her life first intersected with the King of Pop when she was just 1 year old. She has been told that she cried when he reached out to her.
"I can't believe I started crying; that's crazy," she told VH1.
As a grown-up, Beyoncé presented the World Music Awards' Diamond Award to Jackson in 2006, one of his last public appearances. And she and her group Destiny's Child were also on the bill in the final "30th Anniversary Celebration" concerts in Madison Square Garden in September 2001, singing "Bootylicious" with a little "Billie Jean" flair.
The two had a few things in common growing up. Both were working to be successful performers from an early age, taking away a lot of the simpler childhood activities enjoyed by their peers. Both had fathers who were driven to make them stars. Both were successful beyond their dreams.
But as Beyoncé controversially commented in an interview with Elle magazine last year, "I grew up upper class. Private school. ... My dad had a Jaguar. We're African American and we work together as a family, so people assume we're like the Jacksons, but I didn't have parents using me to get out of a bad situation." (It was a comment that reportedly angered Janet Jackson at the time.) Still, there was more that bound the two together than separated them.
As presumed pop royalty, Beyoncé has found herself at the intersection of greatness, be it in the presence of Michael Jackson or, perhaps more significantly, last January when she seemed to be the one bestowing power to President Barack Obama and Michelle Obama at their inauguration night "Neighborhood Ball," singing the Etta James classic she had performed in the movie "Cadillac Records."
And though as president he would seem to have the power to designate her anything from ambassador to ceremonial queen, when she sang "At Last," she seemed to be transferring her magic to them.
http://www.courant.com/entertainment...,4917797.story
Princess of Pop or R&B or whatever the **** she considers herself would be more appropriate, but not "Queen".
*Reports* Brain of my own ? i could give two ***** as two what talisa is doing im my own unique person get with the dam program
