Music Stars Ready To Rock Super Bowl XLIV
By Jeffrey Hyatt
As Super Bowl XLIV looms closer, we’re not only wondering if it’ll be the New Orleans Saints or the Indianapolis Colts who claim the championship trophy, but whether or not The Who are going to kick ass during the halftime show.
Joining The Who for Super Bowl Sunday will be Carrie Underwood, performing the “The Star Spangled Banner,” and Queen Latifah, who will sing “America The Beautiful” during the Super Bowl XLIV pregame show.
As a preview of their halftime show, The Who’s Roger Daltrey and Pete Townshend played a brief acoustic set Thursday for a room full of reporters at the Ft. Lauderdale Convention Center. Townshend had already let slip that parts of “Pinball Wizard,” “Baba O’Riley,” “Who Are You” and “Won’t Get Fooled Again” will be performed Sunday, an extended mash-up of greatest hits that should wow the crowd.
Said Daltrey:
“It’ll be an experience, and it is an amazing game. You know, I’m a soccer fan, and we have rugby of course, but American football is an incredibly skilled game too. It’s going to be an experience.”
And if you really dig The Who’s performance Sunday, you can follow in their footsteps via Rock Band.When the game ends, Harmonix will release the same version of the show The Who play on-stage in Florida in the Rock Band Music Store to download.
The Who Super Bowl S-mashup will be available in the Rock Band Music Store for $1.99 immediately after the game on Xbox 360 and Wii, with PlayStation3 to follow soon after.
As for Underwood, the beautiful, four-time Grammy Award winner is among many great performers who have been honored with singing the National Anthem at the Super Bowl: Billy Joel, Diana Ross, Neil Diamond, Whitney Houston, Harry Connick, Jr., Luther Vandross and Cher among others.
For Queen Latifah, she joins an exclusive group of performers to sing “America The Beautiful” at the Super Bowl: Vicki Carr, Ray Charles, Mary J. Blige, Faith Hill and Alicia Keys.
There’s been lots of chatter about why a legendary rock band like The Who would want to play the Super Bowl. For a band well-known for their spontaneous, rock n’ roll performances, it’s odd they’d want to link up with the somewhat rigid National Football League; they’re not referred to as the No Fun League for nothing. But if you think there’s someone on the planet who hasn’t heard “Baba O’Riley” then the Super Bowl is really the best platform to make that happen.
Rock n’ roll purists might shudder at the thought of such rock royalty busting out the most predictable set-list since… last year’s halftime performance, but if it means a whole new generation of music fans get a taste of an iconic group they should already be listening to in the first place, then The Who’s 12-minutes at the Super Bowl is a good idea.
For the record, I would pay large sums of money to see The Who say to hell with the approved set-list at the last minute and bust out “A Quick One While He’s Away,” “The Seeker,” “You better, You Bet” and “Squeeze Box” instead. Now that would be a kick ass Super Bowl halftime show!
