Maroon 5's Super Bowl Halftime Show - My Thoughts
DISCLAIMER - This is my opinion, and nothing more. Your opinion my be different than mine, and that's fine. With that…
So the Superbowl 53 Halftime show just got done not even 5 minutes ago at the time of this being written. Maroon 5 was the headliner, with appearances by Rap/Hip-Hop artists Travis Scott and Big Boi. When I found out that Maroon 5 was going to be the Halftime show performer, my first thought was "wait, what?". I am very opinionated when it comes to Maroon 5. In short, it seems that their more recent music relies heavily on electronically produced sounds than actually played instruments, and they have developed an extreme over-reliance on Adam Levine's falsetto. With that in mind, I didn't expect much from the show. Then they performed it, and completely proved me wrong. In my opinion, their show was, in a word, awesome.
They got started the way that every concert should start. It immediately pulled everyone who was watching in, no matter if they were watching on TV or if they were actually at the stadium and saw it in person. The song they started off with was "Harder To Breathe", and was a great song to start up with. It was upbeat and fun, and has a driving beat that people were bobbing their heads and hands to. The visuals that they had going on during the show helped to keep audience engaged, even before M5 took the stage. The use of fire and pyrotechnics was a really prominent effect that complimented Adam Levine & Co.'s performance. It was enough to be cool, but not enough to be a distraction.
After "Harder To Breathe", they immediately went into "This Love", one of the group's most popular songs. The performance was a lot more laid back from a technical standpoint, but the energy was carried over and maintained from their first song. It was during this song that I found something new out about Adam Levine - he can play guitar. His guitar solo at the end of "This Love" was something that I wasn't expecting. I knew that he played guitar, but I didn't know that he could take lead like that. It was after this song that Travis Scott made his appearance.
He was introduced in an homage to Spongebob Squarepants creator, Stephen Hillenburg. The character Squidward appeared on screen to introduce him, and the first few notes of "Sweet Victory" were played which lead into his song (I will touch more on this later). I have never heard Travis Scott before, so I didn't know what to expect from him. It turns out that I actually didn't mind him all that much. He had great stage presence, and he was able to keep people engaged and dancing. I will say that it was a little annoying whenever they had to censor him out. It took away from the song, and was distracting for the people watching on TV because it took them out of the moment for a couple seconds whenever it happened. I know that it's just FCC regulations, but I'm glad that the people at the stadium didn't have to deal with them. The way that Scott left the stage by falling into the crowd to be carried away was pretty awesome. Also, the pyrotechnics for his performance were also great. They fit the energetic nature of his performance, but again weren't used to the point of it being a distraction.
After Scott was done, a drumline and gospel choir came on to join Maroon 5. Those two kinds of things wouldn't normally be thought of when thinking about modern pop acts and what would go good with them, but they actually added a really nice touch to the show. They played with M5 for "Girl Like You", and they blended seamlessly to give the song a little extra depth.
Their next song was "She Will Be Loved", one of the band's oldest songs as well as one of their most popular. It was during this song that saw the usage of drones resembling Chinese lanterns. The drones were flown in and spelled out the words "One Love". I'm not exactly sure what this was referring to. I don't know if it was referring to something specifically, or if it was just a general message. Either way, it was a cool display. Although it wasn't the first time drones were used in a Halftime show performance (Lady GaGa used them in her SB LI performance in 2017).
Big Boi rolled up after that in a classic Cadillac to perform his portion of the set. I had never heard of Big Boi before, so again, I didn't know what to expect. He was good. He wasn't great, but he wasn't bad either. He had good flow, and good power behind his voice. Not to mention that he didn't need to be censored. My only thing with him was that he didn't seem to have all that much energy. However, he did have enough to keep the audience entertained for the time he was on stage, and that's what matters.
The rest of the show was just M5. They finished out their set with "Sugar" and "Moves Like Jagger". "Sugar" didn't really have much to it. It was fun, but I would argue that it was the least engaging performance they had. However, it was during this song that I noticed the lights on the field next to the stage that were showing patterns that went along with the songs, which I thought was cool. The light show really came out during "Moves Like Jagger", with a rainbow of colored lights flashing while the band played. It all culminated at the end to a fireworks show.
While the show itself was quite entertaining, there was one thing that I think was missing. The one thing that I really want to talk about is not something I think anyone would ever associate with the Superbowl - Spongebob. WHERE WAS "SWEET VICTORY?!?!" Okay, I know, it's Maroon 5's show, and they could do whatever they wanted with it. And again, I really enjoyed watching it. But their was so much buildup to if they were going to pay homage to Spongebob, and if so, how. It started when Stephen Hillenburg, the creator of the hit Nickelodeon show, Spongebob Squarepants, passed away. When this happened, fans of the show petitioned for the Halftime show performer to play the song "Sweet Victory" from the episode of the show, "Band Geeks", which is a fan favorite episode, and arguably the best episode of the show. Some kind of homage to the show was pretty much confirmed when both Mercedes-Benz Stadium and Maroon 5 both posted pictures/GIFs of Spongebob on their Twitter pages. Maroon 5 also put Spongebob in a teaser video that they released a couple weeks before the show. The homage ended up being just an introduction to Travis Scott from Squidward. Needless to say, I think a lot of fans were disappointed after so much buildup to what to me was little payoff.
Also, real quick, I want to address the controversy surrounding Maroon 5 playing this gig. To put it simply, the whole controversy completely ridiculous all around. The weird thing is that their show was controversial before they even performed the show. Other performers such as Rihanna and Cardi B turned the gig down in support of Colin Kaepernick. In the days leading up to the game, people were outraged over the fact that Maroon 5 decided to take the gig. A lot of people were saying that by them choosing to perform the show, that they were siding with the NFL in the whole Kaepernick ordeal. I never really got this mindset. Literally all they did was decide to perform the halftime show. That's it. Just because they made that decision doesn't mean that they're taking sides. All it means was that they were going to play the Super Bowl Halftime show, and they did. Not all decisions people make have a political undertone or motive. Okay, side tangent over.
After the show was done, people naturally immediately started to give their 2 cents on the show. A lot of what I saw was criticism. I saw people call the show boring, that it wasn't memorable, and I saw it called the worst Halftime show ever. One comment even took it a step further, and went so far as to say that Nickelback would have been better. Rolling Stone described the show as "surprise-free", and someone said that that equates to "really lousy". Deadline.com described it as lacking "Liftoff or Soul" (https://deadline.com/2019/02/maroon-5-super-bowl-halftime-show-review-big-boi-travis-scott-cbs-1202548769/). I don't think that these reviews were very fair. Personally, I think these people didn't like it just because they don't like Maroon 5. The Deadline article I'm going to dismiss because it didn't even try to find something good in the performance, and whoever wrote it was very biased.
Overall, I thought that Maroon 5 did a great job with their Halftime show. Do I think that it was the most memorable Halftime show ever? Not by any stretch of the imagination. But that's okay. Yeah, there wasn't anything special about it, and it wasn't over-the-top. But that doesn't mean it was bad. In fact, I liked the relative simplicity of it. It was fun and it was upbeat. The acts didn't try to be something that they weren't. Isn't that what the Halftime show is supposed to be about? To add on top of that, all the acts were on their game and singing and playing live. With all the commodified technology available today in the music business, some people in this show would have opted to play synced up to pre-recorded tracks or play with automation. That wasn't the case here. They stayed real, and I really respect that. Sure, Adam went off key a few times, but I would much rather hear that and know that he's genuinely trying, rather than have auto-tune on the singer or have them lip-sync. Maroon 5 definitely would not have been my first choice to play the Super Bowl Halftime show. I think a lot of people feel that way. However, I don't think that they did a bad job. With all the popular acts out there, it'll be interesting to see who gets the gig next year.
So the Superbowl 53 Halftime show just got done not even 5 minutes ago at the time of this being written. Maroon 5 was the headliner, with appearances by Rap/Hip-Hop artists Travis Scott and Big Boi. When I found out that Maroon 5 was going to be the Halftime show performer, my first thought was "wait, what?". I am very opinionated when it comes to Maroon 5. In short, it seems that their more recent music relies heavily on electronically produced sounds than actually played instruments, and they have developed an extreme over-reliance on Adam Levine's falsetto. With that in mind, I didn't expect much from the show. Then they performed it, and completely proved me wrong. In my opinion, their show was, in a word, awesome.
They got started the way that every concert should start. It immediately pulled everyone who was watching in, no matter if they were watching on TV or if they were actually at the stadium and saw it in person. The song they started off with was "Harder To Breathe", and was a great song to start up with. It was upbeat and fun, and has a driving beat that people were bobbing their heads and hands to. The visuals that they had going on during the show helped to keep audience engaged, even before M5 took the stage. The use of fire and pyrotechnics was a really prominent effect that complimented Adam Levine & Co.'s performance. It was enough to be cool, but not enough to be a distraction.
After "Harder To Breathe", they immediately went into "This Love", one of the group's most popular songs. The performance was a lot more laid back from a technical standpoint, but the energy was carried over and maintained from their first song. It was during this song that I found something new out about Adam Levine - he can play guitar. His guitar solo at the end of "This Love" was something that I wasn't expecting. I knew that he played guitar, but I didn't know that he could take lead like that. It was after this song that Travis Scott made his appearance.
He was introduced in an homage to Spongebob Squarepants creator, Stephen Hillenburg. The character Squidward appeared on screen to introduce him, and the first few notes of "Sweet Victory" were played which lead into his song (I will touch more on this later). I have never heard Travis Scott before, so I didn't know what to expect from him. It turns out that I actually didn't mind him all that much. He had great stage presence, and he was able to keep people engaged and dancing. I will say that it was a little annoying whenever they had to censor him out. It took away from the song, and was distracting for the people watching on TV because it took them out of the moment for a couple seconds whenever it happened. I know that it's just FCC regulations, but I'm glad that the people at the stadium didn't have to deal with them. The way that Scott left the stage by falling into the crowd to be carried away was pretty awesome. Also, the pyrotechnics for his performance were also great. They fit the energetic nature of his performance, but again weren't used to the point of it being a distraction.
After Scott was done, a drumline and gospel choir came on to join Maroon 5. Those two kinds of things wouldn't normally be thought of when thinking about modern pop acts and what would go good with them, but they actually added a really nice touch to the show. They played with M5 for "Girl Like You", and they blended seamlessly to give the song a little extra depth.
Their next song was "She Will Be Loved", one of the band's oldest songs as well as one of their most popular. It was during this song that saw the usage of drones resembling Chinese lanterns. The drones were flown in and spelled out the words "One Love". I'm not exactly sure what this was referring to. I don't know if it was referring to something specifically, or if it was just a general message. Either way, it was a cool display. Although it wasn't the first time drones were used in a Halftime show performance (Lady GaGa used them in her SB LI performance in 2017).
Big Boi rolled up after that in a classic Cadillac to perform his portion of the set. I had never heard of Big Boi before, so again, I didn't know what to expect. He was good. He wasn't great, but he wasn't bad either. He had good flow, and good power behind his voice. Not to mention that he didn't need to be censored. My only thing with him was that he didn't seem to have all that much energy. However, he did have enough to keep the audience entertained for the time he was on stage, and that's what matters.
The rest of the show was just M5. They finished out their set with "Sugar" and "Moves Like Jagger". "Sugar" didn't really have much to it. It was fun, but I would argue that it was the least engaging performance they had. However, it was during this song that I noticed the lights on the field next to the stage that were showing patterns that went along with the songs, which I thought was cool. The light show really came out during "Moves Like Jagger", with a rainbow of colored lights flashing while the band played. It all culminated at the end to a fireworks show.
While the show itself was quite entertaining, there was one thing that I think was missing. The one thing that I really want to talk about is not something I think anyone would ever associate with the Superbowl - Spongebob. WHERE WAS "SWEET VICTORY?!?!" Okay, I know, it's Maroon 5's show, and they could do whatever they wanted with it. And again, I really enjoyed watching it. But their was so much buildup to if they were going to pay homage to Spongebob, and if so, how. It started when Stephen Hillenburg, the creator of the hit Nickelodeon show, Spongebob Squarepants, passed away. When this happened, fans of the show petitioned for the Halftime show performer to play the song "Sweet Victory" from the episode of the show, "Band Geeks", which is a fan favorite episode, and arguably the best episode of the show. Some kind of homage to the show was pretty much confirmed when both Mercedes-Benz Stadium and Maroon 5 both posted pictures/GIFs of Spongebob on their Twitter pages. Maroon 5 also put Spongebob in a teaser video that they released a couple weeks before the show. The homage ended up being just an introduction to Travis Scott from Squidward. Needless to say, I think a lot of fans were disappointed after so much buildup to what to me was little payoff.
Also, real quick, I want to address the controversy surrounding Maroon 5 playing this gig. To put it simply, the whole controversy completely ridiculous all around. The weird thing is that their show was controversial before they even performed the show. Other performers such as Rihanna and Cardi B turned the gig down in support of Colin Kaepernick. In the days leading up to the game, people were outraged over the fact that Maroon 5 decided to take the gig. A lot of people were saying that by them choosing to perform the show, that they were siding with the NFL in the whole Kaepernick ordeal. I never really got this mindset. Literally all they did was decide to perform the halftime show. That's it. Just because they made that decision doesn't mean that they're taking sides. All it means was that they were going to play the Super Bowl Halftime show, and they did. Not all decisions people make have a political undertone or motive. Okay, side tangent over.
After the show was done, people naturally immediately started to give their 2 cents on the show. A lot of what I saw was criticism. I saw people call the show boring, that it wasn't memorable, and I saw it called the worst Halftime show ever. One comment even took it a step further, and went so far as to say that Nickelback would have been better. Rolling Stone described the show as "surprise-free", and someone said that that equates to "really lousy". Deadline.com described it as lacking "Liftoff or Soul" (https://deadline.com/2019/02/maroon-5-super-bowl-halftime-show-review-big-boi-travis-scott-cbs-1202548769/). I don't think that these reviews were very fair. Personally, I think these people didn't like it just because they don't like Maroon 5. The Deadline article I'm going to dismiss because it didn't even try to find something good in the performance, and whoever wrote it was very biased.
Overall, I thought that Maroon 5 did a great job with their Halftime show. Do I think that it was the most memorable Halftime show ever? Not by any stretch of the imagination. But that's okay. Yeah, there wasn't anything special about it, and it wasn't over-the-top. But that doesn't mean it was bad. In fact, I liked the relative simplicity of it. It was fun and it was upbeat. The acts didn't try to be something that they weren't. Isn't that what the Halftime show is supposed to be about? To add on top of that, all the acts were on their game and singing and playing live. With all the commodified technology available today in the music business, some people in this show would have opted to play synced up to pre-recorded tracks or play with automation. That wasn't the case here. They stayed real, and I really respect that. Sure, Adam went off key a few times, but I would much rather hear that and know that he's genuinely trying, rather than have auto-tune on the singer or have them lip-sync. Maroon 5 definitely would not have been my first choice to play the Super Bowl Halftime show. I think a lot of people feel that way. However, I don't think that they did a bad job. With all the popular acts out there, it'll be interesting to see who gets the gig next year.
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