For Your Entertainment (song)

"For Your Entertainment" is the debut mainstream single by American recording artist and American Idol season eight runner-up Adam Lambert. It is also the title track to his debut studio album, For Your Entertainment. The song was released commercially on November 3, 2009. The single was written by Claude Kelly and Dr. Luke. It's set to be his first U.K single and his third Australian single.

Background

On October 28, 2009, Lambert announced via Twitter that his lead single from his debut album would be "For Your Entertainment", a song that was produced by Dr. Luke. The following day, Lambert announced that the single would debut on Ryan Seacrest's radio show on October 30, 2009.

The song became available as a legal download in the United States on November 3, 2009 and on November 15, 2009 in the United Kingdom.

Performances

"For Your Entertainment" made its live debut at the American Music Awards on November 22, 2009, at the Nokia Theatre in Los Angeles, California, which aired on ABC. The Parents Television Council^[3] slammed the performance as being sexualized, and urged viewers to complain to the FCC if living in an area where the performance was shown before 10 p.m. local time.^[4] However, Lambert's performance reportedly was broadcast around 11 p.m. Eastern and Pacific time, "outside the FCC's usual 6am-10pm time frame".^[5] The performance drew 1,500 complaints to ABC, many of which probably came from the PTC.^[6] As a result, ABC announced that Lambert would not performing on Good Morning America on November 25 as planned.^[7][8] CBS subsequently invited Lambert to perform instead on The Early Show, on the same date in New York City.^[9]

Lambert told Rolling Stone magazine, "Female performers have been doing this for years — pushing the envelope about sexuality — and the minute a man does it, everybody freaks out. We're in 2009 — it's time to take risks, be a little more brave, time to open people's eyes and if it offends them, then maybe I'm not for them. My goal was not to piss people off, it was to promote freedom of expression and artistic freedom."^[10]

Lambert then went on a series of promotional interviews and performances to address the controversy, clear up rumors, discuss his rapid rise to fame, and promote the album. He was interviewed on The Ellen DeGeneres Show,^[11] The View,^[12] and The Oprah Winfrey Show.^[13][14]

Song as promo

Starting December 22, [Fox Broadcasting Company|Fox]] started using "For Your Entertainment" as the official song highlighting their January television show line-up.^[15] E! Network in February 2010 aired a Commercial promoting their television line-up with a remix of "For Your Entertainment". It was also featured in an advertisement for 4music in the United Kingdom in 2010. In addition, the BBC used it in a montage of the 'best and worst of the crucible 2010'^[16]

Track listing

Digital download

1. "For Your Entertainment" – 3:35

Remixes - (Part of Remixes Album)

• "For Your Entertainment" (Bimbo Jones Vocal Mix) - 6:29
• "For Your Entertainment" (Brad Walsh Remix) - 4:56

Music video

The music video premiered on Lambert's official website on November 24, 2009. It was directed by Ray Kay. The video was filmed in a one-day shoot, on November 15 at The Alexandria, an old hotel which is now an apartment building in downtown Los Angeles.

The video opens with a nighttime street level shot in a city. As the camera pans down below the ground, Lambert is shown walking into an underground club, filled with scantily clad men and women. As he begins singing, he walks through the crowd and interacts and dances with others. Mixed with dancing are close up shots of Lambert and various dancers. Towards the end of the song, Lambert begins to play with his band and the video shows everyone in the club dancing. As the song ends, the camera pans back up to the street level where life is continuing on, completely oblivious of what is going on below the streets.

Release history

Chart performance

"For Your Entertainment" debuted at number 84 on the U.S. Billboard Hot 100 for the chart week of November 28, 2009. That same week, the song also debuted at number 33 on the Canadian Hot 100. In March, the song was also featured as a VIP Track on the UK's 4Music, prior to the album's upcoming release the end of April.^[32][33] To date, the song has been the most successful in Canada and New Zealand, where it achieved Platinum and Gold status respectively (see below). The song has sold approximately 333,000 digital downloads.^[34]

"For Your Entertainment" also managed to enter the UK Singles Chart on May 2, 2010 at a current peak of number 39. In its second week in the chart, the single remained at number 39, on its third week, it climbed two more paces to its highest peak number 37.

References