Half-assed halftime

My negative feelings about the Super Bowl halftime show being a forced and contrived presentation were further confirmed in this column by Rick Reilly on the ESPN website. Reilly volunteered to be one of the almost 2000 "fans" who ran out onto the field at halftime to be the visible audience to the performance of Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band, creating a phony concert atmosphere for the TV viewers at home. It turns out that these volunteer fans couldn't even hear Springsteen's performance because the speakers were on the field perimeter and directed away from them and towards the fans in the stands. They were merely pretending to hear and enjoy the music. I don't understand why this story isn't being picked up by the greater media and exposed for the fraud that it is.

Bruce forgiven

I was pleased to see that Bruce Springsteen admitted that his deal with Walmart was a mistake. He put on about as high-energy a halftime show as one could ask for in the twelve minutes allotted to him at this evening's Super Bowl, and managed to avoid giving a lecture between songs. In fact, he hardly paused between songs at all, trying to squeeze as much as he could into the performance. Pretty good for a 59-year-old. However, I can't say I am a fan of the Super Bowl halftime show. It is all a bit too forced and contrived to come off as very enjoyable. A stage set is rushed onto the field, along with a thousand fans (where do they come from?), and then the band comes out and plays three quick songs, and it's over in time for the next commercial break. I wouldn't mind seeing the NFL try a simpler, more low-energy halftime show, something in contrast to the high energy of the game. Maybe Springsteen alone with his guitar and harmonica would have been a good show. He could have performed, among other songs, "The Wrestler," which he wrote for the movie by the same name. It's a beautiful song that functions as a moving epilogue following the abrupt ending of the movie, and playing as the credits roll by. That the Oscars didn't nominate it for Best Song still has me scratching my head.