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Nicki Minaj

Photo: Michael Caulfield/ WireImage

Another crucial member of the Young Money crew will be in the house next Sunday during the MTV Video Music Awards. The crew's resident bad girl, Nicki Minaj, will give her first-ever televised solo performance during the pre-show of the big event. The festivities kick off at 8 p.m. (live ET/ tape delayed PT) on September 12, with Minaj warming up the party with a performance of her hit single, "Your Love."

And starting on Tuesday (September 7), Minaj will kick off a Twitter contest in which 10 fans will win a front-row seat to watch her performance. For information on the contest, follow both @NickiMinaj and @MTVTJ. Winners will be announced on Friday, September 10.  

"I am truly honored to be a part of this year's VMAs. Just yesterday I was an underground female rapper. See, Barbz? Dreams do come true," Minaj said in a statement announcing her participation in the big show.

MTV News will have the whole night covered from every angle, with correspondents Sway, Tim Kash, SuChin Pak and Jim Cantiello updating you on all of the action from outside the Nokia Theatre as they interview the night's hottest stars on the VMA white carpet. MTV's first-ever TJ (Twitter Jockey), Gabi Gregg, will also be on hand to run MTV News' Twitter Tracker, which will give users a look at the second-to-second chatter about the VMAs on Twitter. Gabi will be checking what people are saying about the VMA nominees, performers and presenters while vetting fan questions and tweeting all the white-carpet action @MTVTJ.

She's not the only new member of the MTV family who will be onboard, as award-winning documentary filmmaker Andrew Jenks, star of the upcoming MTV docu-series "World of Jenks," will visit the pre-show stage with rapper Maino to unwrap a sneak peek of his new series, which premieres on Monday, September 13, at 10 p.m. ET/PT. The special post-VMA "World of Jenks" sneak peek, featuring Maino, airs at 11 p.m. ET/PT right after the 2010 MTV Video Music Awards.

But wait, there's more. MTV News will also bring audiences a first-look at the hotly anticipated "Jackass 3D" as seen through the eyes of the cast of "Jersey Shore." MTV News threw the cast a screening party of the movie in Seaside Heights and will show audiences the reactions from the cast, plus exclusive scenes from the movie. As a lead-in to the 2010 MTV Video Music Awards Pre-show, viewers will get to watch an all-new episode of "Jersey Shore" at 7 p.m. ET/ 6 p.m. CT. Then during the live pre-show, the cast will hit the white carpet to treat fans to a previously unaired bonus clip from the episode that aired that night.

Then the action will kick off in earnest at 9 p.m., when comedienne Chelsea Handler hosts the awards show, which will feature performances from Eminem, Kanye West, Justin Bieber, B.o.B, Drake, Linkin Park, Usher, Paramore and Florence & the Machine, along with Travie McCoy, Jason Derülo and Robyn, who will take the stage with this year's VMA house artist, deadmau5. 

In addition, Ke$ha, Minaj, Emma Stone, Penn Badgley, Trey Songz, Ashley Greene, Selena Gomez, Ne-Yo and "The Social Network" stars Justin Timberlake, Jesse Eisenberg and Andrew Garfield are confirmed to present awards.

The 27th annual MTV Video Music Awards will be broadcast live from the Nokia Theatre in Los Angeles on Sunday, September 12, at 9 p.m. ET. Fans can go to VMA.MTV.com (or text VMA to 97979 if they are Verizon subscribers) to vote for Best New Artist through September 12.

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Lady Gaga at a 2009 VMA afterparty

Photo: Amy Sussman/ Getty Images

By most accounts, Lady Gaga turned it out at the 2009 MTV Video Music Awards. Gaga stormed the event with an outrageous performance of "Paparazzi" and a cavalcade of costumes that made her debut one of the most memorable first-time VMA outings in the show's history. In the MTV special, "The VMAs: Revealed - Presented by New 5 React Gum," viewers will get an inside look at how Gaga and her team pulled off the show-stopping fashion extravaganza.

"I told them I wanted to bleed to death for four minutes, and it just went silent. And then they said, 'OK Gaga, if that's your vision we're gonna do it,' " Gaga says in the special, describing her meeting with VMA organizers.

Gaga didn't let her status as a VMA rookie stop her from constructing an awards-show appearance for the ages. The singer got her wish to depict her stylized demise onstage, ending her performance by dangling above her crew of dancers, her skimpy white lace ensemble smeared with blood.

When the "Poker Face" singer won the Moonman for Best New Artist, she thrust the trophy in the air and declared, "This is for God and the gays!" But for the most part, Gaga let her outfits do the talking for much of the show. In addition to the head-to-toe crimson lace number she donned to accept the award, Gaga hit the carpet and held court in the audience in a bevy of OMG-inducing looks. She was snapped in a corseted Victorian-era Jean Paul Gaultier creation replete with black feathers and a gilded mask. She later showed off her trophy as a vision of Jetson chic, in a space-age lavender bodysuit with three-dimensional details.

Gaga owned VMA night when it came to daring style but executing her elaborate fashion show within an awards show was a major enterprise. To learn how it all went down, catch
"The VMAs: Revealed - Presented by New 5 React Gum" Saturday at 11 a.m. on MTV.

The 27th annual MTV Video Music Awards will be broadcast live from the Nokia Theatre in Los Angeles on September 12. The party starts with MTV News' VMA Pre-Show at 8 p.m., followed by the main event at 9 p.m. ET. Fans can go to VMA.MTV.com (or text VMA to 97979 if they are Verizon subscribers) to vote for Best New Artist from now through September 12.

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