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Post by carllove on Feb 14, 2022 1:51:09 GMT
I really enjoyed the Super Bowl Halftime show! I have seen Eminem live and he is an incredible performer. Always love to see him with Dre. 50 Cent upside down - loved it! Snoop is always fun. Had no idea Kendrick Lamar was so short!
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Post by jk on Feb 14, 2022 9:42:51 GMT
I really enjoyed the Super Bowl Halftime show! I have seen Eminem live and he is an incredible performer. Always love to see him with Dre. 50 Cent upside down - loved it! Snoop is always fun. Had no idea Kendrick Lamar was so short! H'mm -- an all-rapper show. Glad you enjoyed it, cl. And, if you ever want to start a rap thread... I'm not much of a rap person myself (too many words), although my attitude towards the genre seems to be softening. Eminem comes across as a sympathetic bloke. "Lose Yourself" is a brilliant track. Dr. Dre was in NWA, right? My son had a tape of Straight Outta Compton. Heavy stuff -- from the same year as "Kokomo"!! And Snoop has a rare sense of humour -- Doggystyle is very funny at times and musically interesting too. I have a goodly chunk of it on tape, thanks to my brother, who added some really heavy stuff by a terminally ill Eazy-E. I can't get my head around rappers like 50 Cent and The Game -- it's just too hardcore for me. As for Mr Lamar, rapmeister Ovi at Smiley tried to wean me on him. (He had to laugh when I described Macklemore as rap: "drunk-in-the-club stuff!") I'll admit KL is very impressive... but no. A rapper I do appreciate is MF Doom. I like his use of samples and outlandish scenarios -- and his wordplay is something else:
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MF_Doom
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Post by carllove on Feb 14, 2022 12:06:59 GMT
Well I’m no rap expert - but the Gen X Mom version of rap at the Super Bowl Halftime show was just something I liked. I enjoy some country music too, but just like rap, don’t have any of it on heavy rotation. I don’t get Kendrick Lamar, though. He is obviously talented, but I have never enjoyed anything he has done. Just like R&B and Drake. I just don’t like it. Yes - Dr.Dre was in NWA as was Ice Cube. I did purchase and watch “Straight Outta Compton” when it came out on video. Good movie.
I did my usual early morning Fox News perusal this morning and everyone had their panties in a wad about Eminem kneeling. Several posters however, did make a point that it was different than kneeling during the National Anthem and I have to agree. I didn’t even notice it until it was mentioned, but I’m never looking for something to offend me either. Dan Crenshaw got some hate on Facebook for saying that he enjoyed the Halftime performances. My goodness, no wonder liberals think that conservatives are a bunch of goobers. Have an open mind folks! It was fun! The sets were amazing!
The only rap music I ever listened to on repeat was Tech N9ne’s “All 6’s and 7’s”. Tech is kind of a big deal here in KC. I think it was about all I listened to for about a month after it was released. I think “World Wide Choppers” is brilliant.
Love that sample in the MF Doom video. Nice!
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Post by Sheriff John Stone on Feb 14, 2022 13:09:23 GMT
WARNING: This is gonna be negative.
Sorry, but I'm not a fan. Not a fan of rap music in any way. It's...musical merit...continues to escape me. I found the halftime show boring but I'm not the one to ask because I wouldn't know good rap from bad rap. I was not impressed, frankly, but I have been reading some positive comments on the internet so there ya go.
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Post by Kapitan on Feb 14, 2022 13:17:42 GMT
I do think it was well past time to have some rappers as the halftime show performers, considering rap (or at least hip hop more broadly) has been the dominant form of popular music in America for at least 20 years now. And while it has gotten some mentions as if it were some kind of subversive or daring move, that's just it: this was an oldies show!
Dr. Dre broke through in the late '80s. Mary J. Blige and Snoop in the early '90s, Eminem in the late '90s, 50 Cent in the early 00s. The "new guy" was Kendrick Lamar, whose debut was a decade ago and whose three major label albums went, #2, #1, and #1 on the Billboard 200.
Super Bowl halftime shows are generally legacy artists. These, other than Lamar, who is a legitimate contemporary star, were all legacy artists. I think there's just a large audience that has missed them entirely--in the same way that I would be clueless about a show by, say, Maroon 5, Coldplay, or any number of chart-topping contemporary country artists.
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Post by kds on Feb 14, 2022 13:38:10 GMT
I had a bit of a rap phase in 5th and 6th grade. This was very early 90s, so it was stuff like Vanilla Ice, MC Hammer, RUM DMC, DJ Jazzy Jeff, The Fat Boys, Heavy D, Kris Kross, etc. But, at some point in 1992, I lost interest in the genre.
There are only two rap songs that I still enjoy today. DJ Jazzy Jeff and the Fresh Prince's Summertime, and RUM DMC's Christmas in Hollis. And, I really like them because they're nostalgic callbacks to two of my favorite times of year.
I actually watched much of the Super Bowl on tape delay, so I FF through the commercials and half time. It just held no appeal to me. It's funny that scrolling through my Facebook feed after the game was a reminder of how out of touch I am with my generation, when I saw a ton of people around my age raving about how it was "the best halftime ever." For me, that was when The Who played a little over ten years ago.
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Post by Kapitan on Feb 14, 2022 14:01:31 GMT
It's funny that scrolling through my Facebook feed after the game was a reminder of how out of touch I am with my generation, when I saw a ton of people around my age raving about how it was "the best halftime ever." For me, that was when The Who played a little over ten years ago. Totally relate to that first part, just in general. "Oh, you love, A, B, and C? Cool! [I've never heard of A or C, and I don't like B...]"
Best halftime show for me was Prince--I think the best showman in popular music (not to mention one of the very best musicians) of the past 40 years--but I can't say I've really given most of them all that much attention. I honestly can't remember the actual performances of almost any of them. I do remember several of the artists who performed, but not the performances.
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Post by carllove on Feb 14, 2022 14:04:26 GMT
The first time I really took notice of a rap song and thought it could actually be considered an “art form” was when I first heard the Dre produced “Freedom of Speech” by Above the Law, on the Pump Up the Volume soundtrack. That piano, the horns, the message - it just captured me. Most of the stuff now though just sucks. I don’t even like hearing it coming out of someone’s car radio. Give me some Snoop “Gin and Juice” Hip Hop - and I’m turning the volume up to 100!
Kapitan - I don’t think that Prince Halftime show will ever be topped. Mother Nature also helped out there as well. Would “Purple Rain” have seemed as epic without the rain? Bruno Mars also unexpectedly blew me away with his energy and showmanship. I don’t even listen to his music - but I enjoyed the show!
“Now see, there's just one more thing I have to talk about 'bout how they say rap music is turnin kids out You got to give your child credit for what he can do Plus the way that they're raised is really up to you Rap music, a form of literature Words and verbs and adjectives Painted up like a picture Yo, it's gonna hitcha, yo, it's gonna getcha And when I'm all finished up, it's gonna fitcha (Hittin the nation) station to station (heavy rotation) So strong that it's keepin the pace, and We will speak out on any situation But while we're doin Yo, we gotta have freedom of speech”
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Post by kds on Feb 14, 2022 14:28:16 GMT
It's funny that scrolling through my Facebook feed after the game was a reminder of how out of touch I am with my generation, when I saw a ton of people around my age raving about how it was "the best halftime ever." For me, that was when The Who played a little over ten years ago. Totally relate to that first part, just in general. "Oh, you love, A, B, and C? Cool! [I've never heard of A or C, and I don't like B...]"
Best halftime show for me was Prince--I think the best showman in popular music (not to mention one of the very best musicians) of the past 40 years--but I can't say I've really given most of them all that much attention. I honestly can't remember the actual performances of almost any of them. I do remember several of the artists who performed, but not the performances.
While I'm not really a Prince fan, playing Purple Rain in the rain in Miami was pretty amazing. I remember the Stones put on quite a show for Super Bowl XL. I remember U2 playing the first Halftime after 9/11. I remember Springsteen awkwardly tweaking the lyrics to Glory Days to be about football rather than baseball. And, then there was The Who, who I thought did a fantastic job. Over the last decade or so, the tide has turned away from rock music, so it's basically been a part of the background while I'd get more food or drinks. That's until recent years, with the game coinciding with my son's bedtime. So, the last 3-4 years, I've watched the game on delay and didn't see any of the shows.
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Post by Kapitan on Feb 14, 2022 14:31:22 GMT
Bruno Mars is another super talented guy. A lot of his music doesn't do anything for me at all, but he's really gifted to the point that he can more or less do whatever style he wants and sound good at it. So, for example, I can suddenly stumble on and love his doo-wop influenced " If I Knew" from 2012's Unorthodox Jukebox, or anything from last year's '70s soul-style Silk Sonic project with Anderson Paak.
As for styles of rap, it definitely first hit me as just big dumb fun--quite frankly not a lot different from the likes of glam rock, just different costumes. Instead of kabuki makeup and platform shoes, or tight leather and feathers and lace, it was oversized, unlaced sneakers, cartoonish jewelry, etc. The topics weren't all that much different: I want to party, I want to dance, I want to find a girl, and, well, that's about it.
It was around the late '80s that I realized you could do a lot within rap in the same way you could in any other style of music. De La Soul's 3 Feet High and Rising, the Beastie Boys' Paul's Boutique (possibly the sharpest sudden left turn in pop history from the debut), and social commentary like the East Coast All-Stars' single " Self Destruction" showed a wide range of subject matter interest and musical aesthetic. Then I learned Miles Davis had been messing around with hip hop styles, and there were "alternative hip hop" groups like Arrested Development and Tribe Called Quest--I liked various parts of all that. As much as NWA struck me like it did most everyone in 1988-89 or so, I think in the end it was awful for rap and hip hop in general, making huge numbers of rural and suburban (mostly) white people think there was nothing to rap except the glorification of gangs, drugs, prostitution, and violence. (And in some cases, thinking the same of black people.) Obviously that isn't true, but there were people ready to jump to that conclusion.
The number of people I've heard over the years say that what they don't like about rap is the violent lyrics is amazing. Because, think about that. It's like saying the thing you don't like about rock music is the dungeons-and-dragons style lyrics. I mean, there's some of that in metal to be sure ... but it's music. You can put whatever lyrics in it you want. Rap has always been about a lot of things, just like rock.
(That's not to say anybody has to like rap, though. Or that there's something wrong with them, or racist about them, if they don't. That's boring and nonsense, like saying disliking country means you hate white people. Stupid.)
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Post by Kapitan on Feb 14, 2022 16:30:42 GMT
I did my usual early morning Fox News perusal this morning and everyone had their panties in a wad about Eminem kneeling. Several posters however, did make a point that it was different than kneeling during the National Anthem and I have to agree. I didn’t even notice it until it was mentioned, but I’m never looking for something to offend me either. Dan Crenshaw got some hate on Facebook for saying that he enjoyed the Halftime performances. My goodness, no wonder liberals think that conservatives are a bunch of goobers. Have an open mind folks! It was fun! The sets were amazing! I saw a bunch of comments this morning about how risque the set was. "Basically pornography on television ... shouldn't have been permitted for cable television," said one. "Sexual anarchy," said another.
So, I didn't watch it last night. This stuff got my attention. And...
What. The. Fuck.
This was nowhere as risque as dozens of previous Grammys, MTV Music Awards, hell, even Super Bowl halftimes of the past. What the hell are they talking about? Yes, there were suggestively dressed women dancing in 50 Cent's song, uh, "In Da Club." (Guess how people dress in dance clubs?) But they honestly weren't even that scantily clad. Did people forget that Jennifer Lopez literally did a pole-dancing routine way back in [checks notes] 2020?
You can see cheerleaders more sexually suggestive than this halftime show every single football or basketball game, pro or college. I truly don't get that complaint, other than maybe if it's just a matter of "I hate rap / hip hop, so I am going to complain about EVERYTHING."
EDIT - and now I see the NY Post and other conservative media making a big deal that Snoop was caught on camera smoking weed before the halftime show began. Umm...I hate to break it to you, Red-State America, but Snoop smoking weed hasn't been news in a long, long time! Hell, it hasn't even been illegal under state law for a long time where he lives. What next, will we be shocked to learn Willie Nelson also smokes weed? (Wait til they find out what their rock-star heroes of the 60s and 70s did or do...)
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Post by Kapitan on Feb 14, 2022 16:46:47 GMT
My actual halftime show comments (as opposed to questioning the nonsense critiques):
It was a good spectacle, which is what these shows are. Having the band miming the instrumental tracks annoys me. Anderson Paak was really playing his drums--and he's a really good drummer--but they weren't mic'd... The other guys, I couldn't always tell. On one hand, their instruments were plugged in to wireless setups. On the other, even if they were all playing all the time, those instruments didn't make up a big part of the tracks. Dr. Dre pretending to play piano was especially obvious, considering the piano flourish that happened both before and after he began to "play." Him having a prop mixing board was also pretty funny to me.
If you're a band, I want you to play live. If you're not, just use tracks and don't fake it. Use dancers, props, and all that.
I wouldn't have had that many artists, either. It felt like "oh no, we haven't really represented rap before: let's cram in as many stars as we can to make up for it." Snoop was mostly just a hype man for Dre (the most laid-back hype man in history!), and Eminem, 50 Cent, and Kendrick Lamar felt like brief interruptions. To me, it was Dre and Mary J. Blige feat. special guests Snoop, Eminem, 50 Cent, and Kendrick Lamar, plus Anderson Paak sort-of involved. (To be fair, Dre seemed awfully out of breath after his first little feature early on, so maybe he needed the breaks!)
If this were the direction they were going generally, I'd have kept it to Dr. Dre, Snoop, and Eminem. The latter two were both prodigies mentored by the former. They have WAY more than enough hits to fill the 15 minute set.
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Post by kds on Feb 14, 2022 17:05:00 GMT
I did my usual early morning Fox News perusal this morning and everyone had their panties in a wad about Eminem kneeling. Several posters however, did make a point that it was different than kneeling during the National Anthem and I have to agree. I didn’t even notice it until it was mentioned, but I’m never looking for something to offend me either. Dan Crenshaw got some hate on Facebook for saying that he enjoyed the Halftime performances. My goodness, no wonder liberals think that conservatives are a bunch of goobers. Have an open mind folks! It was fun! The sets were amazing! I saw a bunch of comments this morning about how risque the set was. "Basically pornography on television ... shouldn't have been permitted for cable television," said one. "Sexual anarchy," said another.
So, I didn't watch it last night. This stuff got my attention. And...
What. The. Fuck.
This was nowhere as risque as dozens of previous Grammys, MTV Music Awards, hell, even Super Bowl halftimes of the past. What the hell are they talking about? Yes, there were suggestively dressed women dancing in 50 Cent's song, uh, "In Da Club." (Guess how people dress in dance clubs?) But they honestly weren't even that scantily clad. Did people forget that Jennifer Lopez literally did a pole-dancing routine way back in [checks notes] 2020?
You can see cheerleaders more sexually suggestive than this halftime show every single football or basketball game, pro or college. I truly don't get that complaint, other than maybe if it's just a matter of "I hate rap / hip hop, so I am going to complain about EVERYTHING."
EDIT - and now I see the NY Post and other conservative media making a big deal that Snoop was caught on camera smoking weed before the halftime show began. Umm...I hate to break it to you, Red-State America, but Snoop smoking weed hasn't been news in a long, long time! Hell, it hasn't even been illegal under state law for a long time where he lives. What next, will we be shocked to learn Willie Nelson also smokes weed? (Wait til they find out what their rock-star heroes of the 60s and 70s did or do...)
Pornography? That's pretty funny. I guess a lot of pearls got clutched last night.
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Post by carllove on Feb 14, 2022 17:36:18 GMT
I did my usual early morning Fox News perusal this morning and everyone had their panties in a wad about Eminem kneeling. Several posters however, did make a point that it was different than kneeling during the National Anthem and I have to agree. I didn’t even notice it until it was mentioned, but I’m never looking for something to offend me either. Dan Crenshaw got some hate on Facebook for saying that he enjoyed the Halftime performances. My goodness, no wonder liberals think that conservatives are a bunch of goobers. Have an open mind folks! It was fun! The sets were amazing! I saw a bunch of comments this morning about how risque the set was. "Basically pornography on television ... shouldn't have been permitted for cable television," said one. "Sexual anarchy," said another.
So, I didn't watch it last night. This stuff got my attention. And...
What. The. Fuck.
This was nowhere as risque as dozens of previous Grammys, MTV Music Awards, hell, even Super Bowl halftimes of the past. What the hell are they talking about? Yes, there were suggestively dressed women dancing in 50 Cent's song, uh, "In Da Club." (Guess how people dress in dance clubs?) But they honestly weren't even that scantily clad. Did people forget that Jennifer Lopez literally did a pole-dancing routine way back in [checks notes] 2020?
You can see cheerleaders more sexually suggestive than this halftime show every single football or basketball game, pro or college. I truly don't get that complaint, other than maybe if it's just a matter of "I hate rap / hip hop, so I am going to complain about EVERYTHING."
EDIT - and now I see the NY Post and other conservative media making a big deal that Snoop was caught on camera smoking weed before the halftime show began. Umm...I hate to break it to you, Red-State America, but Snoop smoking weed hasn't been news in a long, long time! Hell, it hasn't even been illegal under state law for a long time where he lives. What next, will we be shocked to learn Willie Nelson also smokes weed? (Wait til they find out what their rock-star heroes of the 60s and 70s did or do...)
I saw a sign on the highway by my house that said - "Drive High - Get a DUI". Weed is still not legal in Kansas, even for medical reasons. Then again - no one much pays attention to that here - so I guess the government is being sort of realistic there. I thought they tamed things down quite well considering the type of music they were performing. I agree that it was nowhere near as raunchy as the most recent halftime show or most music award shows. It was downright family friendly IMHO. Haters gonna hate. It was fun. Glad to see Dre is recovering so well from his brain aneurysm. I don't think he has performed since that happened last year.
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Post by kds on Feb 15, 2022 13:18:33 GMT
It seems there's more manufactured outrage about the Halftime show, as Enimem taking a knee is gaining some attention. From what I've read, it seems like he took a knee at the beginning of a Tupac song as a tribute, but of course, since it happened at an NFL game, the Merchants of Divisiveness have taken the incident and spun in make it appear as of it was some sort of protest. Never mind the fact that the National Anthem protests largely fizzled out four year ago. Or, the mere fact that the National Anthem wasn't even being played at the time.
For Christsakes, are people these desperate for stuff to be angry about? A faux protest. Sexual anarchy. Crazy.
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