Rihanna and Drake each grabbed a leading five nominations for the 2012 MTV Video Music Awards, including for video of the year for Drake’s “Take Care” featuring Rihanna.
Rihanna’s dizzying visual romp in the video for her hit “We Found Love” was also nominated for video of the year, along with Katy Perry’s “Wide Awake”, Gotye’s “Somebody That I Used To Know” and M.I.A. for “Bad Girls.”
Perry received four nominations, second overall to Drake and Rihanna, including best female video for her inspirational anthem “Part of Me,” which also is the name of her 3-D concert film that debuted earlier this month.
The awards, which will feature Alicia Keys premiering a new song from her upcoming album and a performance by British boy band One Direction, will be handed out during a televised show in Los Angeles on Sept 6. Winners are picked by public voting.
Nominees for best new artist include Fun. featuring Janelle Monae for “We Are Young,” Carly Rae Jepsen for “Call Me Maybe” and Frank Ocean for “Swim Good.”
Joining Drake and Frank Ocean in the best male video category are Justin Bieber for “Boyfriend”, Chris Brown for “Turn Up the Music” and Usher for “Climax”.
Along with Rihanna and Perry, best female pop video nods also went to Beyoncé for “Love on Top,” Nicki Minaj for “Starships” and Selena Gomez & The Scene for “Love You Like a Love Song”.
And in a sign of dance music’s growing popularity in the United States, a new category for best electronic dance music video has been added this year.
