Guest Author - Michelle Snow

While her older sister, Jessica, is no stranger to controversies, Ashlee Simpson has spent the last few months being the belle of pop rock. Her appearance on NBC's Saturday Night Live this weekend changed all that.

Her first song went without a hitch – “Pieces of Me", her big hit. But when she went to do her second song of the night – “Autobiography” – you could hear the beginning of her vocals for “Pieces of Me".

But this was no ordinary gaff where she was just singing the wrong song. See, problem was, she wasn’t singing at all. Her microphone was down by her waist.

Yup, Ashlee was lip-syncing and they played the wrong vocals for the second song. After 35 seconds of embarrassment and some odd dancing, Ms. Simpson simply left the stage and NBC quickly ran for logo cover before fading to commercials.

At the end of the show, host Jude Law remarked, “"What can I say? Live TV.” Standing next to him, Ashlee then interjected, “I feel so bad. My band started playing the wrong song. I didn’t know what to do so I thought I’d do a hoe-down.”

You heard it right…she was placing the blame on her band, instead of owning up to the not-so-live performance. Her record company, however, issued a statement that a computer glitch that played the previous performance instead of some pretaped electronic percussion was actually to blame.

It’s common knowledge in the industry that many musicians, especially the pop singers, have often used a pre-recorded vocal track in live performances. The artist then either sings over it to make the voice sound stronger or merely lip-syncs if the dancing has left them winded. Of course, some performers abuse the use of the track, but many are able to use it as an occasional aid, not as a crutch.

So why is everybody pointing fingers?

Ms. Simpson, who has several hits on the charts, doesn’t want it known that it’s not always her live voice you hear. After all, she was quoted in a recent interview in Lucky magazine as saying, “I’m totally against it and offended by it. I’m going out to let my real talent show, not to just stand there and dance around. Personally, I’d never lip-sync. It’s just not me.”

I guess that was just lip service, eh, Ashlee?

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