NEW YORK: Taylor Swift led the nominations announced Wednesday for the MTV Europe Music Awards after she caused a stir with her vengeful new persona on “Look What You Made Me Do.”
The pop superstar was up for six prizes including Best Artist and Best Video at the international edition of MTV’s awards gala, which will take place in London on November 12.
“Look What You Made Me Do,” the lead single from Swift’s upcoming album “Reputation,” broke the record for first-day views on YouTube as Swift, long an anodyne cultural force, showed a sinister new side to herself.
The video opens in a graveyard where a tombstone reads “Here Lies Taylor Swift’s Reputation” and goes on to take subtle jabs at her ex-boyfriends as well as rapper Kanye West, with whom she has a simmering feud.
Young Canadian sensation Shawn Mendes was second with five nominations, followed at four nods each for English songwriter Ed Sheeran and rapper Kendrick Lamar, who was the big winner at MTV’s signature Video Music Awards in Los Angeles in August.
Nominees for Best World Stage category, which recognizes international performances, include the Los Angeles-based DJ Steve Aoki for an MTV special in Malta and Foo Fighters for a gig aired from Barcelona.
The Europe Music Awards differ from the VMAs by recognizing international impact and featuring non-English categories.
But like the VMAs, the awards generally more watched for its pop culture moments, both scripted and unscripted, than for the actual winners.
MTV earlier announced that Rita Ora, a major pop singer in Britain who is set to release her first album in five years, will serve as host of the show in her hometown.
Taylor Swift leads MTV Europe award nods
Taylor Swift leads MTV Europe award nods
Vietnam police find frozen tiger bodies, arrest two men
Vietnamese police have found two dead tigers inside freezers in a man’s basement, arresting him and another for illicit trade in the endangered animal, the force said Saturday.
The Southeast Asian country is a consumption hub and popular trading route for illegal animal products, including tiger bones which are used in traditional medicine.
Police in Thanh Hoa province, south of the capital Hanoi, said they had found the frozen bodies ot two adult tigers, weighing about 400 kilograms (882 pounds) in total, in the basement of 52-year-old man Hoang Dinh Dat.
In a statement posted online, police said the man told officers he had bought the animals for two billion dong ($77,000), identifying the seller as 31-year-old Nguyen Doan Son.
Both had been arrested earlier this week, police said.
According to the statement, the buyer had equipment to produce so-called tiger bone glue, a sticky substance believed to heal skeletal ailments.
Tigers used to roam Vietnam’s forests, but have now disappeared almost entirely.
