It’s been eight years since the infamous Super Bowl halftime show of 2004, where Justin Timberlake and Janet Jackson brought the term “wardrobe malfunction” to a mass audience. The NFL promised that no such thing would happen again, and, through 2010, the entertainment at the Super Bowl has skewed older, white and male. Even when Prince performed in 2007, then a youthful 48, his medley of songs included covers of songs by Creedence Clearwater Revival, Bob Dylan, Foo Fighters and Queen. He played fewer songs by Prince (three: “Purple Rain,” “Baby I’m a Star” and “Let’s Go Crazy”) than by (white) artists who aren’t Prince.
Paul McCartney was 62 when he performed at the Super Bowl in 2005. Since then, that’s not been too far from the median age. Mick Jagger and Keith Richards were both 62 in 2006, Tom Petty was 57 in 2008, Bruce Springsteen was 59 in 2009, Roger Daltrey was 65 and Pete Townshend was 64 in 2010, when The Who performed at halftime. Black Eyed Peas were a bit of an outlier, with frontman will.i.am being only 35 years old when his group performed in 2011.
I’ve been to Super Bowl parties at least dating back to 2005 and I don’t remember hearing anyone asking how old Tom Petty or Paul McCartney were, and certainly not as often as I heard the question from fellow guests at the party I attended, and friends on Facebook and people I follow on Twitter asking about the age of 2012 halftime performer Madonna, who is 53.
Madonna’s halftime show was the most dazzling and exciting I can remember. Aside from a few minutes of the regrettable party rap duo LMFAO, her halftime show was as perfect as one could expect in that format. Madonna looked great, obviously from a lifetime of taking care of herself, yet the implication was obvious whenever I read or heard someone querying about her age: what is this old hag doing on stage when she’s no longer young enough to appear in the tasteless and unsexy commercials for GoDaddy.com?
The ageist, sexist and rockist biases are a little much to take, and quite a bit inconsistent. Football fans, I know. “But she used pre-recorded tracks!” cried out some on Twitter. So did Bruce Springsteen. When I put the issue of the ageism and sexism on Twitter, at least one response I got noted that that the others weren’t shoving their crotches in the face of viewers. I can only respond by saying I did not notice her doing that, and, umm, so did Bruce Springsteen.
This wasn’t just coming from conservative-minded football fans, but people I know who consider themselves open-minded and liberal. It is bothersome that these biases come forward as an excuse to either dismiss discussion and continue to limit the canon of music we can talk about or hide that some are more puritanical and prudish than they claim.
The point, I suppose, is moot as the outrage now seems to be about MIA’s middle finger, while the NFL is surely going to avoid any potential for a repeat of that next year. Maybe we can start looking forward to a “Smooth Jazz Super Bowl” in the future. Grumble, grumble, something about not having nice things.
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Maybe they’ll finally bring back Up With People next year!