There were several memorable arrivals at the 2009 MTV Video Music Awards, including Lady Gaga showing up with a Muppet on her arm, Pink cruising in a fire truck and Taylor Swift emerging from a horse-drawn carriage. But one of the arrivals was so big it simply couldn't fit in the confines of the preshow. Before storming Radio City Music Hall, sitting in with house band Wale and UCB and voicing their opinions about Kanye West, the All-American Rejects brought along a marching band and arrived at the red carpet on a massive parade float.

The band eased their way to the VMA red carpet on the very patriotic-looking float as the two-dozen member marching band played the group's hit "Gives You Hell." Once the conveyance stopped, frontman Tyson Ritter (dressed in a red suit, obviously before he donned his all-glitter ensemble), drummer Chris Gaynor and guitarists Nick Wheeler and Mike Kennerty emerged from the vehicle and hit the red carpet. Ritter gave the MTV cameras some devil horns before greeting fans and heading into the venue for the show.

After taking some time off for the show, the Rejects head back out on the road on Friday to re-join the Blink-182 reunion tour. They'll stick with them for the rest of the U.S. stretch of the tour and then head over to Europe for another set of dates before returning to the States for a tour with Taking Back Sunday. Though the group wasn't nominated for any awards on Sunday, their in-house performance coupled with their larger-than-life arrival made it a memorable night for the Oklahoma quartet.

In professional wrestling, sometimes beloved heroes will do something that turns them evil and makes the crowd absolutely hate them. It's referred to as a "heel turn," and last night's Video Music Awards featured a classic turn from Kanye West. What at first seemed like a charming lark (maybe he just wanted to meet Taylor Swift?) quickly turned ugly when West started talking about how much better the Beyoncé video was before storming off the stage and flipping off the crowd. A bewildered Swift wandered away, clearly confused and upset.

It was the defining moment of last night's show (complete with a heroic save at the end of the show care of Beyoncé), and just about everybody weighed in on the incident. A number of stars voiced their opinions via Twitter, but just as many spoke about it with MTV News. Jim Cantiello caught up with Tyson Ritter and Nick Wheeler of the All-American Rejects to discuss what went down. The band was fresh off of their performance with Wale and the house band (where Ritter decided that his fashion statement would involve little more than silver body glitter) and they were fired up. "That was just plain rude," said Wheeler. "But there are a lot of rude people out there," added Ritter. "I think everybody has rude moments. But she's like 15. Who picks on 15-year-olds?" (Swift is actually 19, but let's not split hairs.) Ritter added, "God knows I have! But I always apologize." West did issue an apology later on in the evening; let's hope that the boys from the Rejects found it suitable.

We're only a handful of hours away from the start of the 2009 MTV Video Music Awards, and we're even closer to the start of the VMA preshow, which will beam to you live from the Radio City Music Hall red carpet starting at 8 p.m. ET. (You can also follow the live blog right here at the Newsroom blog.) At last year's Video Music Awards (which were live from Hollywood), a handful of superstar acts made grand entrances (Tokio Hotel in a monster truck, T-Pain on an elephant), and there have been rumblings all week that another group of big stars would be kicking it up a notch again this year and showing up to the red carpet in grand fashion.

But how will everybody enter? The folks over at Buzzworthy got the inside scoop on a few of the big arrivals, and needless to say, it's an impressive and mind-blowing list. We still don't know exactly which stars will arrive in which ways, but we do know that Taylor Swift, Pink, Leighton Meester and the All-American Rejects will all make big arrivals via fire truck, Jaguar convertible, parade float and horse and carriage. But which artist will match up with which arrival? The idea of Taylor Swift on a parade float (after all, she does seem like America's favorite beauty queen) or the All-American Rejects on a fire truck (because they're hot!) is pretty enticing. But no matter what, it's going to make for a series of interesting and memorable moments to start the evening off right.

Every day a multitude of stars wanders through the halls of MTV News to talk about their latest projects and goof around with staff members. But sometimes we catch stars elsewhere, and that's why we put together Spotted!, a daily compendium of stars in the wild.

Chris Brown arrived at the Los Angeles County Courthouse for sentencing on Wednesday (August 5), only to hear that his sentencing was postponed. While Brown was busy dealing with his legal issues, newly single ladies Jessica Simpson and Kim Kardashian enjoyed their night by partying at Eva Longoria's restaurant, Beso, in Los Angeles. Simpson was there to celebrate her stylist Ken Paves' birthday.

Check out our photos of Chris and Jessica, and also follow the link below to see who else MTV News spotted, including the "Gossip Girl" cast, Mary J. Blige and the All-American Rejects.

(Click here for more "Spotted!" photos of Jessica Simpson, Eva Longoria, the All-American Rejects and more!)

By Haley Murphy

After their electric performance of "I Wanna" on "It's On With Alexa Chung," the All-American Rejects came back to New York to hit the stage of the "Today" Show Concert Series this morning. Fans circled the NBC building — some who had been waiting since 5 a.m. — in hopes of meeting the band during their warm-ups.

Frontman Tyson Ritter came onstage before the rest of the band and was quite chipper for his 7 a.m. call. The band busted through some Beatles covers and singing Kenny Loggins' "Danger Zone" before chatting with Matt Lauer. During the interview, Ritter flashed the crowd his tattoo of the band's logo (each band member has one), located on his chest.

The crowd went wild when the band launched into their hit single "Gives You Hell," and guitarist Mike Kennerty finished the song by throwing his guitar pick to an adoring fan. I was able to get close to the band — so close that Ritter nearly fell on me while attempting to jump off the stage into the crowd during "I Wanna." During commercial breaks, the band would go offstage and into the crowd to keep the energy alive, and took time to sign autographs. The greatest moment came when Ritter and guitarist Nick Wheeler whipped off a version of their breakout tune "Swing Swing," which got everybody singing along — including the "Today" camera crew!

(Check out more photos from All-American Rejects' performance on "Today!")

The All-American Rejects certainly made the most their interview time at the Wango Tango fest last weekend.

Usually, the backstage areas at radio fests are where artists play nice — with each other and the journalists on hand — exchanging pleasantries, giving the usual sorts of answers to the usual sorts of questions, and generally not rocking the boat in any way. But not the Rejects.

First, they strongly hinted that they were going to be touring with Blink-182 this summer, to the surprise of pretty much everybody. (A rep for Blink has not commented on those comments.) Then they slammed just about everyone else on the Wango stage. Read more...

Does anyone really need to hear yet another "American Idol" contestant sing "Turn the Beat Around"? Tonight's disco theme is another reminder that "Idol" has begun to scrape the bottom of the barrel when it comes to theme nights.

Last year's theme weeks included the first trip through the Lennon/McCartney songbook, another "Year They Were Born" night, as well as the rehash of inspirational songs, a Neil Diamond night and Rock and Roll Hall of Fame themes. In years past, we've had nights devoted to the British Invasion, American classics, Bon Jovi, Queen, love songs and Elvis Presley. All fine themes, but at this point, the show is running on fumes when it comes to mixing things up.

I understand that there are always issues with getting songs cleared for the program, but how about a few unsolicited suggestions for spicing things up?
Read more...

By Todd Brown

Imagine living in a Gucci house. Sure, many people have Gucci bags, maybe Gucci sunglasses, but that's nothing compared to a Gucci house. Well, there is no Gucci house, but L.A. does have a red-white-and-blue-striped Paul Smith house, and that was the shoot location for the All-American Rejects' upcoming video "Gives You Hell," the first single from their third album, When the World Comes Down, due December 16.

Read more...

By Christopher "CJ" Smith

Yesterday we ran a story about this fall's slate of superstar releases, but there are plenty more albums due out this leaf-changing season.

October 7

Rise Against's Appeal to Reason: Will these punkers be able to follow up on the success and critical acclaim of 2006's The Sufferer & the Witness?

Oasis' Dig Out Your Soul: The Brit rockers cling to legitimacy on their seventh album, which (surprisingly) has been getting favorable reviews. Can they stage a comeback to relevancy? Read more...

This in from MTV News producer Matt Elias, out in LA:

We just recently shot with Tyson Ritter, aka lead singer of All-American Rejects. We were up in Runyon Canyon, and boy are my calves killing me! For those not in the know, Runyon Canyon is the spot for all of Hollywood's hardbodies to get their cardio on, which was the perfect contrast to the waify wisecracker. Seriously, the dude should be in contention for funniest frontman in rock, if such an award existed (you hear me VMAs?). He had our whole crew in stitches.

While he was there to dish on his upcoming role in "House Bunny," which you'll hear about closer to the Movie Awards -- including Tyson picking up dog doody (yup!) -- we were able to squeeze some music news out of him as well. He and the rest of the Rejects are still holed up in the studio, finishing their yet untitled album. But while the disc doesn’t yet have a name, one of his new favorite songs does: "I Hope It Gives You Hell." Here's what Tyson had to say about it:

"It probably won't come out first, but it will be the one that opens up the power kegs. The chorus is, 'Every time I see your face, I hope it gives you hell.' It's kind of a bitter song about people…It's mainly towards people back home that never thought it could happen. It's really full of rage and fun. It’s definitely going to be a beer-drinking, party song."

Tyson told us to look out for the new album in September.