In 2003, Mark Morford commented on Shania Twain’s Superbowl XXXVII performance in “Is Shania Twain Human?” in the SF Gate Morning Fix. Here he compared the sex appeal of Twain’s performance to that of Gwen Stefani who performed with Sting afterwards. He suggests that in her lip-synced, “plastic” performance, “despite all the bare midriffs and push-up bras and coy lyrics, Shania Twain is not a sexual person.” Stefani, on the other hand, “swivelled her hips so gorgeously and so deeply that the TV cameras were forced to shoot her only from the waist up…”
I agree mostly with these statements, preferring Stefani’s music to Twain’s. But damn if this past Sunday’s performance by Prince wasn’t the most refreshing halftime show I’ve ever seen!
[EDIT] I had links to the videos on youtube here for a couple of weeks, with the warning to “get ‘em soon”, suspecting that they would be pulled for whatever idiotic copyright reason. Well, it turns out they were! I’m sure you can find them if you go here.
It was almost disconcerting watch Prince rock out, doing something so loose, when in recent years Superbowl halftimes have been as boring as the games they were interrupting. CCR, a Foo Fighters cover, All Along the Watchtower, and some killer guitar playing…Now that’s sexy!
‘well i guess i should of known,
by the way you parked your car sideways that it wouldn’t last.
but you’re the kind of girl,
who believes in making out once,
love em’ and leave em’ fast.
I guess i must be dumb,
she had a pocket full of horses,
trojan and some of em’ used’.
who the hell can get away with singing this kind of shit? it’s so bad… yet so good.
i think that what’s ‘refreshing’ aboout Prince at the superbowl is that he just takes their money and then does his best Jimmy Hendrix for a crowd that i suspect might prefer a little more Shania. Awww hell, i don’t know what a superbowl crowd prefers. have i read you my latest favorite poem? It’s actually called American Football. Not much to do with Prince unfortunately.
b.
Did you read the controversy over the ’symbolism’ in Prince’s performance? Evidently a little “guitar as phallus” doesn’t go over well when shadowcast on a fifty foot rippling curtain. Ah Prince….way to give it to ‘em with one hand and take the cash with the other.
prince, you really treat a guitar like it oughtta be treated. You know, there’s alot of people on whom we can turn our backs for ‘phallusising’ the guitar, but i ask: does Prince not own it? i don’t even have the right to put it to you as a question. i often lose track of where i am as i rewind and rewatch him do it in god knows how many ways in god knows how many videos… well maybe not that many videos. and i don’t think he does it in ‘little red corvette’. have i mentioned that that’s my fav?
‘Prince and American Football’
At the risk of revealing my intense obsession with Prince, i have been considering the previous poster’s remark re ‘the half time phallus controversy’ in conjunction with past superbowl performances–such as the infamous Jackson/Timberlake collaboration. I think we ought to ask the following: are the Jackson tit and the Prince phallus all bought and sold… and, moreover, is the resultant social and moral turbulence accomodated within the half-time budget? You know i used to play football and this just comes up more and more disapointing.