2017 MTV Video Music Awards
The 2017 MTV Video Music Awards were held on August 27, 2017 at The Forum in Inglewood, California, honoring music videos released between June 25, 2016 and June 23, 2017. It was hosted by Katy Perry. The 34th annual award show aired live from the venue for the second time in its history. The music video for Taylor Swift's song "Look What You Made Me Do" premiered during the broadcast. Lil Yachty co-hosted the pre-show with Terrence J, Charlamagne Tha God, and MTV News' Gaby Wilson, while Gabbie Hanna hosted backstage for  the show. It was broadcast across various Viacom networks and their related apps. Compared to the previous year, viewership was down from 6.5 million to 5.68 million viewers, making it the lowest viewed show since 1994. A combination of having to compete with the season finale of HBO's "Game of Thrones", which drew over 12.07 million viewers, and the ability to now stream the award show online is said to account for the drop in viewership. Performances. Source: Appearances. Main show. Source: Winners and nominees. The list of nominations was revealed on July 25, 2017. For the nominations, MTV  continued to eliminate gender-specific awards categories, as they did at the 2017 MTV Movie & TV Awards. MTV also announced the "Moonman" statue would be renamed a "Moon Person". The Best Female and Best Male Video awards were replaced with one category, Artist of the Year. Kendrick Lamar leads the list of nominees with eight categories, while Katy Perry, The Weeknd, and DJ Khaled received the second most nods with five. Nominees for Song of the Summer category were announced on August 22, 2017. Winners are listed in bold. Video of the Year. Kendrick Lamar — "Humble" Artist of the Year . Ed Sheeran Best New Artist. Khalid Best Collaboration. Zayn and Taylor Swift — "I Don't Wanna Live Forever" Best Pop. Fifth Harmony (featuring Gucci Mane) — "Down" Best Hip Hop. Kendrick Lamar — "Humble" Best Dance. Zedd and Alessia Cara — "Stay" Best Rock. Twenty One Pilots — "Heavydirtysoul" Best Cinematography. Kendrick Lamar — "Humble." (Director of Photography: Scott Cunningham) Best Direction. Kendrick Lamar — "Humble." (Directors: Dave Meyers and The Little Homies) Best Art Direction. Kendrick Lamar — "Humble." (Art Director: Spencer Graves) Best Visual Effects. Kendrick Lamar — "Humble." (Visual Effects: Jonah Hall of Timber) Best Choreography. Kanye West — "Fade" (Choreographers: Teyana Taylor, Guapo, Matthew Pasterisa , Jae Blaze and Derek Watkins) Best Editing. Young Thug — "Wyclef Jean" (Editors: Ryan Staake and Eric Degliomini) Song of the Summer. Lil Uzi Vert — "XO Tour Llif3"