> ## Content Index > Fetch the complete content index at: https://go-fug-yourself.ghost.io/llms.txt > Use this file to discover other available public pages before exploring further. # Fug or Fab: The Super Bowl L Halftime Show - URL: https://go-fug-yourself.ghost.io/fug-or-fab-the-super-bowl-xl-halftime-show/ - Published: 2016-02-08T16:30:26.000Z - Updated: 2016-02-08T20:20:11.000Z - Author: Heather - Tags: #wp, #wp-gallery, #slideshow, #Import 2026-10-07 07:46 ## Chris Martin ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/bf/b9/bfb99790-924d-4e41-a7e6-5e3c6e04fe57/content/images/static-gofugyourself-com/uploads/2016/02/gettyimages-508987164_master.jpg) This halftime show exposed a bit that Coldplay is stuck in a bit of a developmental limbo. They're not all that exciting anymore -- it's Dad Rock, a friend of mine said, and while there's nothing fundamentally wrong with that, I don't think THEY are aware of it -- but they're not O.G. enough to be as big a nostalgic deal as U2 or Bruce Springsteen. They're not classic, but they're not cool. And their portions of the halftime show just made me want to listen to "Viva La Vida" on my iTunes instead. I don't even remember what else they played. ## Chris Martin ![](https://static.gofugyourself.com/uploads/2016/02/GettyImages-508988164_master.jpg) Part of the problem here for me is that Chris Martin never sounds good when he sings and moves at the same time. Especially on "Viva La Vida." I've never heard him sing that live, or on TV, or whatever, and be able to hit any of this high notes. But I do give him high marks for trying to bring energy to make up for whatever his live vocal shortcomings seem to be. As I noted on Twitter, though, he often performs like the biggest super fan in the audience rather than the lead singer of the band you've paid exorbitantly to see. ## Bruno Mars ![bruno mars](https://static.gofugyourself.com/uploads/2016/02/GettyImages-508986466.jpg) How was this not a leather sauna? You could cultivate a real uptown funk in that thing. I am not entirely sure his iPhone gave him the same weather information that Beyonce got. Also, is it just me, or did Bruno Mars's backup singers end up drowning him out most of the time? Don't a full four extra dudes seem like a sonic crutch Bruno really does not need? ## Beyonce ![](https://static.gofugyourself.com/uploads/2016/02/GettyImages-508987394_master.jpg) I appreciate that Beyonce wore low, thick heels as she danced across the grass. Many would have worn stilettos, and gotten stuck. ## Beyonce ![beyonce](https://static.gofugyourself.com/uploads/2016/02/GettyImages-508987746.jpg) I still haven't had a chance to see Bey's new video, so this was the first I heard of her new song. (I think the acoustics for the TV broadcast did NOBODY any favors; I couldn't really hear ANY of them as clearly as I feel like I should have. Maybe I just need to return my TV. Or my ears.) But yes: Her back-up dancers [are dressed to reference the Black Panthers](https://www.vox.com/2016/2/7/10934576/beyonce-super-bowl-halftime-2016-coldplay?ref=go-fug-yourself.ghost.io). She may have dropped this single yesterday, but this was no hasty performance or quickly memorized shtick. This was careful. Say what you will about Beyonce -- and I've felt just about every different way about her -- but she is not shying away from the platform that her fame has afforded her. She could just churn out easy hooks for the rest of her life, and indeed, we've talked here before about how she rarely changes the sartorial conversation; musically, however, she is constantly evolving. She is, rightly, unapologetic about the success and spoils of her extremely hard work -- "Formation" fuses nods to that with a larger mission, like "Jenny From The Block" but with wider, better aspirations -- and yet she's also not sitting atop Mount Beyonce and coasting home. In that, there is much to be admired. The music industry does so love to craft superstars that are simple pills to swallow, a mainstreaming that too often has undertones of painting its multicultural megastars a different color. But Beyonce is not standing for that, and... well, let me turn it over to [Danielle Belton of The Root](https://www.theroot.com/articles/culture/2016/02/beyonce%5Fdrops%5Fformation%5Ffor%5Fthe%5Fpeople%5Fthe%5Fblack%5Fpeople.html?ref=go-fug-yourself.ghost.io) here: *"What if I told you Beyoncé was always political? Even when she was doo-wop popping in Destiny’s Child. What if I told you that to be black in a public space, with all eyes on you and choosing carefully how to handle that spotlight is a form of politics, a negotiation between the self and the world that all black people must make? \[...\] Much like how Janet Jackson got increasingly political the further away she got from her toxic stage dad, Beyoncé has done the same since ditching her father as her manager. Artists grow into themselves. We watch them develop. She doesn’t have to play it pop-safe anymore and this show hasn’t been PG-13 since “Drunk In Love” dropped. Beyoncé is grown. She wants to have grown conversations with her audience. You can’t get much more grown than talking about police brutality and gender studies.*" In short, I think it's admirable and cool that Beyonce didn't let something as corporate as the Pepsi Super Bowl Halftime Show blunt the themes and imagery she infused into the video. She didn't march out there and turn "Formation" into candy-coated, whitewashed jam pop. She held its ground. ## Beyonce ![](https://static.gofugyourself.com/uploads/2016/02/GettyImages-508986484.jpg) In other words, the first item on Beyonce's Sunday To-Do List was, "Make people forget Chris Martin was the first one invited to this thing." Good on you, Bey. That'll teach anyone to bill you, or Heather Locklear, as a Special Guest Star at someone else's party. ## Beyonce ![](https://static.gofugyourself.com/uploads/2016/02/GettyImages-508987282_master.jpg) This just made me giggle. It's like she tripped into a dance-off and can't quite believe it. Actually, we do need to talk about how she got up on stage and went low, and almost fell backward on her bum. She threw in a second hop to recover before shooting back up to her feet, but seriously, IS that the closest we've ever come to seeing Beyonce bite it? Best catch of the day, frankly. I fully and sincerely applaud her for avoiding a crazy fall. I would not have had the physical wits. ## Everyone ![](https://static.gofugyourself.com/uploads/2016/02/GettyImages-508988120_master.jpg) And then Chris Martin reached up the highest out of EVERYONE just to prove he still could win something. (In actual fairness: I don't think Chris Martin cared one iota about being upstaged. If he did, Beyonce and Bruno Mars never would've been invited. They were the modern nods to past halftime shows -- there was a montage of clips from others, including a Dead Person Section set to "Fix You," which was a little ham-handed for me -- and also they represented diversity of both ethnicity and musicality, and I think he totally gets that and was just happy to be there and play a part. I TEASE, Chris. I tease. Now go take your kids out for a processed meal or something.) ## The End ![](https://static.gofugyourself.com/uploads/2016/02/GettyImages-508988628_master.jpg) That's cheesy. But I mean... it's hard to get mad at it, because the message is something we could all use a little more of in life. [Fug or Fab: The Super Bowl L Halftime ShowIt feels like an indictment of the establishment's confidence in Coldplay that it both hired Coldplay for the Super Bowl, then signed two other "guest star" recording artists to help fill up that time. Or in other words, when the beans confusedly asked, "Was that the Coldplay Halftime Show?" my reply was, "Barely." \[Photos: Getty\]![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/bf/b9/bfb99790-924d-4e41-a7e6-5e3c6e04fe57/content/images/static-gofugyourself-com/uploads/2016/02/gettyimages-508987164_master.jpg)](https://go-fug-yourself.ghost.io/fug-or-fab-the-super-bowl-xl-halftime-show-02-2016/)