Packer champs and superbowl vamps

Green Bay knocks down Pittsburgh in the American spectacle of the Superbowl.

Old news Joe, is what you’re thinking. The whole thing has been talked to death while it happened, immediately after it happened and even now as I’m putting words to screen about it.

Ok, so I was asked prior to the game who I was rooting for. Simple answer is, I wasn’t. I only like to see a good game. Something about the nature of the Superbowl now amps up the play in the NFL. Which makes it a fun game to watch. Of course the whole package of hopefully great commercials and what should be a cool halftime show round it out.

This year was probably the most mellow of Superbowls in terms of the gathering I attended. Usually I’m with a bunch of guys that are true NFL fans and they’re very vocal about the game. This time around it was a house full of working musicians and actors. Some whom you’d likely know of.

I missed kick off due to being out with another group of guys for a mountain bike ride. So I didn’t get to see the National Anthem thus I won’t comment on it. The game itself was not great, but it wasn’t bad. The halftime show is what I’ll comment on, as all of us in the room were commenting as it happened.

First off, I’ll say this: The show was exactly that – A Show. Musically speaking, it left a bit to be desired and I hate to say that because I like the Black Eyed Peas. To start, I would be (as would all the musicians in the room I was in) shocked if the BEP were actually lipsyncing. I’ve read one musician’s blog that in no uncertain terms states that they were. To put it bluntly, that’s absurd. Who the hell would record crap and flat notes as part of their presentation? Especially when it’s new versions of their songs.

Granted if you didn’t have the sound system like we had to listen to it through, you might say that. However, we were listening through a major recording studio setup. We could hear everything. Bum notes, missed cues, the whole nine yards. The intro were Fergie’s mic was on, but not coming through the mains – she was on, it was coming through the monitors. If anything the sound man is likely not going to be doing large live events ever again.

Did the BEPs know about the outside sound? I doubt it. As a musician that has done large shows and used in-ear monitors, I know that the mix that goes to the musician’s head is generally great. What happens to the front of house is a different story. That’s something the musician can’t control.

Add to the fact that we could hear when the auto-tune / T-pain effect was being used and when it wasn’t. Were there moments where it was like WTF? Yup. Some of the song choices were not great. The idea of bringing in Slash and doing Sweet Child O Mine, borderline – but Fergie attempting to do Axl’s dance, unfortunately that was a mistake that shouldn’t have been tried and it was really dumb.

If there was a section that was lipsynced it would have been Usher. As a singer, I know that doing those types of moves while singing will result in certain sounds that were not coming out of his mic. He put on a great performance, but that part was likely lipsynced.

For the pure entertainment value, I liked it. The entrance was cool. The group dancers in the white & lighted outfits were cool. The BEPs had strange and lighted costumed that were certainly a vegas style act vibe. It was nothing new in that respect. Stuff like that has apparently been being done since before the 70’s. I imagine those outfits were not very comfortable. But it was fun to watch, despite being a bit painful to listen to.

With respect to the winning team, I’m rolling out Do You Want To Play – Green Bay Packers for their fans. Go pick it up and join the winning crowd!