Springsteen to play 2008 Super Bowl halftime show

[EveryColorOfFun]

NFL officials are apparently in final negotiations with Bruce Springsteen for him to play the halftime show of Super Bowl XLII which will be held in Arizona next February? Seems it's down to either Springsteen or Nora Jones. Thoughts?

I think this is an awesome idea and while Bruce would have been adamently against it 28 or so years ago, I think he'd like and appreciate the offer. Plus no one, I mean NO ONE brings it like Springsteen does.

Nora Jones just seems a bit too mellow for the halftime show, much better suited for one of the endless pre-game performances or perhaps to sing the National Anthem.

And before someone says it, you can forget about ANY rasp act performing at halftime.

It ain't gonna happen, not for at least 10 years, or until a rap star comes along who doesn't bleat out some variation of "nigger!!! Nigger!! Nigger!!! Bitch/ho's/sluts/ motherfucker/cocksucker" etc for every other line of their songs.

The only rapper that I see even having a chance of performing at halftime would be Will Smith as he has a more or less squeaky clean reputation as far as his lyrical content is concerned, but Smith is far more concerned with being an actor then a rapper these days

 

[rosco rathbone]

He's undergoing a big wave of popularity amongst the youth. Times change and he's not seen as corny anymore but rather a harbinger of gritty authenticity.

 

[Ham Murabi]

Maybe Springsteen, Barry Sanders, Emmitt Smith and Jim Brown can all get on stage to perform "Born to Run."

 

[pretty_green_eyes]

Superbowl would be a perfect place for a New Kids on the Block reunion.

Just sayin'

 

[Morcheeba]

I heard about this months ago.

Am all set for The BOSS to do this even though I understand how some of his biggest fans are against it.

Norah Jones would be great for the National Anthem... but c'mon. Who on earth thinks she can carry an entire halftime show? Nobody, that's who.

Yes, in Arizona at an almost brand new stadium.

OH wow, I just noticed all the niggers in threadstarter's post.

Meh, I'm not backspacing...

 

[Nott]

I'm so glad that I'm not a football fan.

 

[spacekowboy]

If so it will be the greatest superbowl halftime show in the history of the NFL. Provided we get the E Street Band and not solo, accoustic guitar harmonica around the neck Bruce.


Not that i dislike that bruce, but it isn't exactly a show stopper.

 

[Hippychic]

Someone shoot Springsteen.

 

[Oliver Clozoff]

He's undergoing a big wave of popularity amongst the youth. Times change and he's not seen as corny anymore but rather a harbinger of gritty authenticity.

Which is ironic because his image has been as carefully crafted as many fluffier pop-stars with his handlers shoving Steinback and Hemingway novels at him.

Still, if you have to ape something...

 

[pretty_green_eyes]

If so it will be the greatest superbowl halftime show in the history of the NFL. Provided we get the E Street Band and not solo, accoustic guitar harmonica around the neck Bruce.


Not that i dislike that bruce, but it isn't exactly a show stopper.

I would think if they are going to shell out the cash for Bruce they would want the entire package - live Bruce is great, but Bruce and the Band - that's a life altering concert experience.

 

[EveryColorOfFun]

I heard about this months ago.

Am all set for The BOSS to do this even though I understand how some of his biggest fans are against it.

Norah Jones would be great for the National Anthem... but c'mon. Who on earth thinks she can carry an entire halftime show? Nobody, that's who.

Yes, in Arizona at an almost brand new stadium.

OH wow, I just noticed all the niggers in threadstarter's post.

Meh, I'm not backspacing...

I used the "niggers" as an example of the kind of language that peppers the vast majority of rap music both in the past and currently.

Why exactly would some of his "biggest fans" be against it?

When you think about it, it's probably one of the ultimate accolades in today's popular culture universe and it's not like Springsteen isn't already well known on every single continent and doesn't sell out every single show that he does.

I ask again, what problem do his so-called biggest fans have against it? Only one I can see is that very few if any of them would be able to actually see him perform at the game due to how the NFL distributes tickets, but that's a whole other issue.

 

[EveryColorOfFun]

Which is ironic because his image has been as carefully crafted as many fluffier pop-stars with his handlers shoving Steinback and Hemingway novels at him.

Still, if you have to ape something...

Wow, that's the single most ignorant and bullshit filled post since Matthew Craig barfed out his latest?

You obviously:

1) Know absolutely nothing about Springsteen, either as a musician or a human being.
2) Despise and hate him for whatever reason.

#2 is fine, nothing against disliking someone or the art they create, but using that as an excuse to play character assassination is so junior high school.

Springsteen has always made his own choices in his music and has never had his handlers "shove" anything in his face and demand that he read or look at it. He will take gladly take input from everyone, giving a bit more weight to the members of the E Street Band and manager Jon Landau, but in the end it is Springsteen's decision. End of story.

 

[MakersandIce]

The Boss is from Jersey, so it would be appropriate for him to play at a Super Bowl that includes the Giants. Of course, Eli will lose to big brother.

 

[rosco rathbone]

Which is ironic because his image has been as carefully crafted as many fluffier pop-stars with his handlers shoving Steinback and Hemingway novels at him.

Still, if you have to ape something...

The kids have a sixth sense for when someone's image has been massaged by too many oily showbiz paws; regardless of whether the end result is pleasingly slick or pleasingly gnarly....I don't know what weird warm front is sweeping through the jet stream of the upper ironosphere but the result is heavy downpours of authenticity and a general rehabilitation of not only the boss but some of his main imitators.

 

[Oliver Clozoff]

Wow, that's the single most ignorant and bullshit filled post since Matthew Craig barfed out his latest?

You obviously:

1) Know absolutely nothing about Springsteen, either as a musician or a human being.
2) Despise and hate him for whatever reason.

#2 is fine, nothing against disliking someone or the art they create, but using that as an excuse to play character assassination is so junior high school.

Springsteen has always made his own choices in his music and has never had his handlers "shove" anything in his face and demand that he read or look at it. He will take gladly take input from everyone, giving a bit more weight to the members of the E Street Band and manager Jon Landau, but in the end it is Springsteen's decision. End of story.

Well, Bruce Springsteen was Jon Landau's future. Over the next couple of years, Landau insinuated himself into Bruce's artistic life and consciousness (while remaining on the Rolling Stone masthead) until he became Springsteen's producer, manager, and full-service Svengali. Unlike the down-on-their-luck Springsteens of Freehold, N.J., Landau hailed from the well-appointed suburbs of Boston and had earned an honors degree in history from Brandeis. He filled his new protégé's head with an American Studies syllabus heavy on John Ford, Steinbeck, and Flannery O'Connor. At the same time that he intellectualized Bruce, he anti-intellectualized him. Rock music was transcendent, Landau believed, because it was primitive, not because it could be avant-garde. The White Album and Hendrix and the Velvet Underground had robbed rock of its power, which lay buried in the pre-Beatles era with Del Shannon and the Ronettes. Bruce's musical vocabulary accordingly shrank. By Darkness on the Edge of Town, gone were the West Side Story-esque jazz suites of The Wild, the Innocent, and the E Street Shuffle. In their place were tight, guitar-driven intro-verse-chorus-verse-bridge-chorus songs. Springsteen's image similarly transformed. On the cover of Darkness, he looks strangely like the sallower cousin of Pacino's Sonny Wortzik, the already quite sallow anti-hero of Dog Day Afternoon. The message was clear: Springsteen himself was one of the unbeautiful losers, flitting along the ghostly fringes of suburban respectability.

Thirty years later, and largely thanks to Landau, Springsteen is no longer a musician. He's a belief system. And, like any belief system worth its salt, he brooks no in-between. You're either in or you're out. This has solidified Bruce's standing with his base, for whom he remains a god of total rock authenticity. But it's killed him with everyone else. To a legion of devout nonbelievers—they're not saying Bruuuce, they're booing—Bruce is more a phenomenon akin to Dianetics or Tinkerbell than "the new Dylan," as the Columbia Records promotions machine once hyped him.

http://www.slate.com/id/2117845/

 

[Oliver Clozoff]

The kids have a sixth sense for when someone's image has been massaged by too many oily showbiz paws; regardless of whether the end result is pleasingly slick or pleasingly gnarly....I don't know what weird warm front is sweeping through the jet stream of the upper ironosphere but the result is heavy downpours of authenticity and a general rehabilitation of not only the boss but some of his main imitators.

The same warm front that's done away with the aliens?

 

[sweet soft kiss]

Can you imagine a whole football stadium singing the opening verse of Thunder Road? It's a pretty beautiful thing.


Norah Jones no way...

 

[rosco rathbone]

The same warm front that's done away with the aliens?

That was a great Slate article...I'd read them more if I could stomach their vibe. It perfectly explains the well-entrenched anti-Springsteen mood that the kids are rebelling against.

 

[Oliver Clozoff]

That was a great Slate article...I'd read them more if I could stomach their vibe. It perfectly explains the well-entrenched anti-Springsteen mood that the kids are rebelling against.

Yep. And I can relate, right down to the liking him through the crafted authenticity. I have to hand it to him for proving himself in the crucible of pop culture. If there's anything that marks a great performer it's the ability to be raised up by a new generation after he gets torn down.

 

[Morcheeba]

What's the weather like in Arizona around late January early Feb.?

Would suck for him to fall smack on his ass during "Glory Days" during an unexpected monsoon, ya know.

 

[MakersandIce]

What's the weather like in Arizona around late January early Feb.?

Would suck for him to fall smack on his ass during "Glory Days" during an unexpected monsoon, ya know.

Retractable roof stadium.

 

[Morcheeba]

Retractable roof stadium.

But he's the Boss.

If Prince could handle heavy rain whilst wearing high heels... ah, nevermind.

 

[Drinking Cap]

He's a great songwriter but I've never been blown away by his actual performances.

I'm sorry but the only good choice, even though it will never happen, is AC/DC. They would tear the roof off that mother.

 

[Morcheeba]

I'm sorry but the only good choice, even though it will never happen, is AC/DC. They would tear the roof off that mother.

They're awesome and Lord knows how they would tear the retractable roof off that stadium, but... they're Australian.

I know I know, Peyton Manning and the Colts are currently WORLD CHAMPIONS (hooo-rah!) but it's nice when we can get folks who were actually born in the United States to perform before and during our annual Super Bowl fiesta. Canucks like Vegas Mamacita Celine Dion singing "God Bless America..." make my butt fart.

Perfect '08 Set Up:

Jennifer Hudson - whatever song (35 lbs. lighter, we won't recognize her)

Rob Thomas - National Anthem (I like him, get over it)

Gwen Stefani - intro funky stuff for The Boss (you know, to REALLY wake up the audience before he hits the stage)

The Boss - Powerhouse Performance




Colts win 23-16

 

[Purple Haze]

Springsteen has always seemed like a big phoney to me, like he always went out of his way to appear blue-collar or common-guy while suing clubs that allowed bands to cover his tunes. Like Ollie said, his image is as carefully constructed as anybody's. He's as much a sellout as anybody.

Springsteen blows. He's supposed to be the greatest live act ever, but I can name ten other bands that have had the same said about them...