Katy Perry Throws It Back to Warped Tour in MTV VMAs Speech

Katy Perry had a lot to reminisce about during her 2024 MTV Video Music Awards acceptance speech Wednesday night (Sept. 11).

The singer accepted the coveted Video Vanguard Award after performing a medley of her greatest hits including “Dark Horse,” “E.T.,” “California Gurls,” “Teenage Dream,” “I Kissed a Girl,” “Firework” and “Lifetimes.”

She also brought out Doechii to perform their new collaboration, “I’m His, He’s Mine,” during an out-of-this-world, high-flying production featuring a legion of backup dancers, lights and special effects.

Watch Katy Perry’s 2024 VMAs performance, below.

After the nearly 10-minute performance, Perry returned to the stage to accept her Moon Person trophy, joking she was able to get through her performance “on the first day of my period.”

Perry began her speech by thanking MTV for “believing in my weirdness from day one and for helping artists extend their worlds beyond a song.” The singer told the crowd there are “no decade-long accidents.” She also thanked her team and family before giving a shout out to her days spent on MySpace and the Vans Warped Tour, which were the “bygone places where I found a voice, identity and a community so early on.”

READ MORE: 2024 MTV Video Music Awards Winners List

Perry gave a shout out to her friends that were always there for her, even when her Jetta was repossessed, before acknowledging her Katy Cats and the LGBTQ+ community who taught her that “you can be both kind and c–t.”

Perry offered words of wisdom to her fans, telling them to block out the norms, stay true to yourself and remember to take breaks from social media and “safeguard your mental health, pause, touch grass and do what you were born to do just like I was going to do this.”

She concluded her speech by thanking her beau, Orlando Bloom, for keeping her grounded and saying that the “only flowers I’ll ever need” is her daughter, Daisy.

Finally, Perry teased her new album 143, out Sept. 20.