When Christina Aguilera brought her greatest hits to VH1 Storytellers in 2010, she dropped the pop game to transform into a rock goddess for one night only, and the footage is totally changing the internet’s opinion of the powerhouse singer.
Racking up just under 100,000 views to date, Music Man readers can watch the moment Christina reinvented herself and her Top 5 UK single, “Fighter,” in the viral video below…
Filming an episode of VH1 Storytellers – the music series where artists spill the secrets of their music – Christina didn’t simply dive straight into another phenomenal performance of her hit single.
Instead, she prepped her live audience, revealing the inspiration behind the song, remembering: “When I was younger there were a lot of people, as I’ve mentioned before, that were sort of people around me for the wrong reasons… felt kinda hurt by it. But like I said, there’s always a positive to those negative times because throughout it you come out so much stronger, wiser. Strength comes from every hardship and it truly has been a lesson learned for me.”
Cue the most show-stopping rendition of “Fighter” from the entirety of Christina’s career, the star rising from her ashes to serve a punchy, grit-fueled track empowered by fearlessness, studded with blinding guitar solos and dazzling leather-clad aesthetics.
Renowned for her squeaky clean ballad, “Beautiful,” and her R&B-pop landmark single “Genie In A Bottle,” Christina lets loose as she severs her pop princess trademarks to truly embrace the cut-throat, femme-fatale personality behind her lyrics. And, even sixteen years on, both fans and haters are still trying to get to grips with this performance.
As one fan controversially reckoned, “She deserves to be in the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame for this song,” another top commenter beneath this viral clip noticed, “She was exorcising some demons with this performance!”
Amidst calls that Christina served the “best live version of this song,” yet more fans are finding themselves caught up in the true story behind the hit, writing, “Fighter is exactly what Christina Aguilera is.”