First and foremost,
this was a long time coming for Indiana sports fans. At least since 2000, when the Colts had at least two, sometimes three of the most effective offensive position players in the conference, perhaps the league, but managed to completely blow it in so many different ways in the postseason. It's the first professional sports championship of any sort to come to the state since 1973, and I have to include the ABA even for that. Yet while I'm extremely happy that I can let the Pacers off the hook for another couple years, I'm still thinking more about the Super Bowl halftime show.
There was a bit of pre-game chatter (some by
me) about Prince's appropriateness for an appearance of this level, and rightfully so. He's long since past his pop-ubiquity stage; that ended in 1991/2 with the very good
Diamonds and Pearls and the VMA booty-pants shock. But at halftime of the Super Bowl last night, he put on the absolute best show he could, in the pouring rain, in front of a crowd that probably couldn't even see him, but still talking to them nonetheless. It didn't matter what songs he played (fun fact: no "Darling Nikki"), it mattered that he played impeccably, like he's been doing for the past 25 years. Over the last 3 or 4, though, Prince has been working his way back from a post-mid career slide, and has two solid comeback records (
Musicology and
3121) to show for it. But last night, in front of like 2 billion people, he showed us why there's no doubt about his legacy. James Brown died a little over a month ago, and while Prince has no direct claim to the massive throne left behind, he's the most fitting heir imaginable---no one else even comes close. Don't tell me you didn't get goosebumps when he started into "Purple Rain," and there were actual raindrops all over the camera lens, and the glowing,
Tron-ish marching band marching in sync, and the lights went out except for the purple ones circling the stadium, because it means you're lying. Almost forty years after Elvis' '68 Comeback Special, when the average television has 700 channels and television shows premiere on YouTube or whatever, Prince reaffirming his legacy (what a lot of us knew he'd do the whole time) during halftime of the Super Bowl is the closest chance there is for unified, (inter)national recognition of an iconic live performer while he's still around to enjoy it. He was on a stage in front of billions of people, he's two years shy of 50, and he just
fucking killed it. I really hope media outlets much, much larger than myself (read: all of them) realize it.
Okay, enough drooling. Thing number two has to do with the Shins---specifically, the James Mercer
post I did a while back. Although I'm fine with the content, I was never happy with my tone throughout it, because it resulted from lazy writing and lazier editing. I've made some changes, but the original post has been archived and is still available. Details at the bottom of the original
post.
