How the Super Bowl half-time show evolved from marching bands and pop superstars to hive of controversy
Maroon 5 have ignored calls to join the NFL boycott in solidarity with Colin Kaepernick and are appearing in a slot of previously played by Prince, Bruce Springsteen, Beyonce and Lady Gaga
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Your support makes all the difference.Maroon 5 will provide the entertainment at this year’s Super Bowl halftime show, where they will be joined by rappers Travis Scott and Big Boi at the Mercedes-Benz Stadium in Atlanta, Georgia.
Being asked to play the 15-minute showcase midway through the biggest event in the NFL calendar used to be considered a huge honour for any American musician. The invitation to bring down the house has previously been accepted by such greats as Diana Ross, James Brown, U2, Prince, Bruce Springsteen, Madonna, Beyonce, Lady Gaga and Justin Timberlake.
The show offers a point of interest even for non-football fans. Katy Perry’s performance at Super Bowl XLIX in 2015 was watched by a record-breaking 118.5m viewers, according to Nielsen.
However, the past two years have been shrouded in controversy, with Rihanna, Jay-Z and Cardi B all reportedly rejecting approaches from the NFL to perform in solidarity with ex-San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick over his “Take a Knee” national anthem protest, which opposed police brutality and racial injustice. Kaepernick's actions angered the Trump administration and the athlete has since become a pariah to the sport’s governing body.
More than 100,000 people signed a Change.org petition urging Maroon 5 to boycott the gig. Big Boi will be the sole representative of Atlanta at what should have been a celebration of America’s hip-hop heartland, the city home to the likes of Childish Gambino, TI, Migos, 2 Chainz, Gucci Mane, Young Thug and Killer Mike, all of whom must have been on the organisers’ wish list.
The first Super Bowl was held at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum on 15 January 1967 and its half-time entertainment came courtesy of marching bands from the universities of Arizona and Grambling State.
The format continued largely unchanged for the next two decades, with loose themes introduced like “America, Thanks” and “Tribute to Mardi Gras” to give the presentation greater structure.
Super Bowl VI in Tulane Stadium, New Orleans, in 1972 saw Ella Fitzgerald and Carol Channing among those paying tribute to the Louisiana city’s favourite son, Louis Armstrong.
By the mid-1980s, corporate sponsors took an interest and alternatives were trialled, from ensemble performance troupes like Tops in Blue and Up with People to mascots dressed as Disney characters. George Burns, Mickey Rooney, Chubby Checker, The Rockettes and impersonator Elvis Presto all appeared at this time.
Things really began to change in 1991 when New Kids on the Block were brought in to freshen up the format and engage a younger audience, followed by Gloria Estefan a year later.
Michael Jackson played Super Bowl XXVII at the Pasadena Rose Bowl in 1993, playing “Jam”, “Billie Jean”, “Black or White” and “Heal the World”, arguably setting the standard for others to follow.
Diane Ross played Super Bowl XXX at Sun Devil Stadium in Arizona in 1996, playing both solo and Supremes hits, before the following year offered a strange medley of The Blues Brothers (Dan Ackroyd, John Goodman and Jim Belushi in character) with James Brown and ZZ Top.
A “Salute to Motown” saw Boyz II Men, Smokey Robinson, Martha Reeves and Queen Latifah take to the stage at the Qualcomm Stadium in San Diego in 1998, by which point the idea of having multiple performers cameoing to play a signature song had taken root.
This approach was surely perfected in 2001 when Aerosmith, *NSYNC, Britney Spears, Mary J Blige and Nelly all appeared at an MTV-produced show introduced by Adam Sandler, Chris Rock and Ben Stiller. The group came together to sing the rock band’s Run-DMC collaboration “Walk This Way”.
The next year’s event took place just months after the 9/11 terror attacks and U2 performed “Beautiful Day” in front of a giant banner bearing the names of those who lost their lives when the World Trade Centre was brought down in New York, frontman Bono revealing a stars-and-stripes lining to his jacket to huge applause.
The half-time show was hit by controversy in 2004 when Janet Jackson’s breast was exposed by Justin Timberlake during a duet, an incident later attributed to a “wardrobe malfunction” but widely thought to be a publicity stunt. The affair, later immortalised as “Nipplegate”, cost broadcaster CBS a $550,000 fine.
Sexually suggestive lyrics from The Rolling Stones were duly muted in 2006 but Prince’s phallic wielding of his guitar in 2007 and Bruce Springsteen’s kneeslide across the stage, slamming his crotch into a TV camera in 2009, would nevertheless cause new offence in conservative quarters.
A run of big established acts, from Paul McCartney (2005) to the Stones, Tom Petty (2008), the E Street Band, The Who (2010), Destiny’s Child (2013) and Lady Gaga (2017) brought bombastic spectacle and stability, with few moments more perfect than the heavens opening on Prince just as he launched into “Purple Rain”.
The show has also more recently toyed with pairing disparate artists like the combination of Madonna with Nicki Minaj, MIA and Cirque de Soleil in 2012 or Coldplay, Beyonce and Bruno Mars in 2016.
This year’s installment promises to be a complex beast, with the NFL’s desperate bid to keep politics out of the championship clash between the New England Patriots and the Los Angeles Rams seemingly doomed to failure.
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