Stupor Bowl Half Time Show 2025

 The Sheeks Stupor Bowl Half Time Show Report

This post was originally just a FB post meant to be a bit of whimsy. Now I wonder.

When I wrote this, I intended to be humorous. I mean, I was amused by my thoughts and lack of understanding. It's okay if you laugh. Kind of ironic, like the material itself. Layers.

First, let’s just report what I saw and thought as I watched with my white boomer hat firmly on my head. I am reporting my reactions as I remember them from the first time I viewed the show.

For your reference, the time stamps reflect this version of the video of the performance:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KDorKy-13ak

Samuel Jackson. Huh. I like him.

So, there’s Kendrick Lamar. He’s shorter than I expected. I was intrigued by the car. Kind of a cliché. For a while I was mostly caught up in trying to figure out how many people were coming out of the car and how they were getting in. Clearly, there had to be an access point below the car but I can’t see it. Pretty good scenic work to keep it obscured.

And then we’re at the heavy breathing and bouncing (time 1:34). That’s cool.

I start to realize that I don’t know this guy’s music at all. It’s hard to know what’s happening without some context. I hear words but they have no home in my brain to hang out in. Interesting to watch, though. I am not the target audience  

And, Uncle Sam is back! (Time 3:00) Strong counterpoint. “tighten up!” Meaning?

It’s flag time. Kendrick looks really small in the middle of that sea of human flag pieces. Like, really small. And kind of normal. What does his jacket say? “_U BU” Maybe. I can’t tell. He keeps covering the letters with his arms. Now I really don’t have any idea what he’s saying. The silver chains are also kind of cliché. I am obsessed with the meaning of the jacket.

We’re moving. I like the camera moving away as he follows. More interesting images. And that’s over.

Guy on the lamppost. Interesting. It’s an “L”. And there’s another something before it. “_LU BU”.

I really am not the target audience. I am distracted a lot from here on forward as I keep thinking about how different half time shows are received differently because of a lack of familiarity with the artist. 

Samuel’s back. And we’re in a little box. Sort of. Good energy here. A little dialogue with the ladies. He says he’s going to slow it down.

I wonder who this is? (Time 8:00) That was kind of short.

And we see the back of the jacket. “POLAND”? She’s back. 

Samuel “That’s what America wants”. This piece is easier to follow vocally. Seems like a lot of commentary that, again, I don’t really have context for.

It’s over. Huh. Interesting.

And that’s how a white boomer with no idea who Kendrick Lamar is experienced this show.

First thing I do is try to google what his jacket says. Fixation.

Of course, having read the commentary today, I now know a lot more. Viewing it again, the irony, symbolism, critique, and subtext start to bubble up in ways that I can start to appreciate. It clearly would require spending some time with the music. 

I enjoyed it the first time, even though my understanding was pretty much limited  to sensory responses and the identification of imagery. I couldn’t really interpret anything because there was too much content and artistic intent that I didn’t have in my head.

I think the key difference between my experience watching this as compared to someone who has a relationship with the music is that my analytical brain was constantly engaged as I tried to puzzle out what was happening. If this were Prince or someone of my musical heritage, I would have been able to engage my emotional brain more and just respond to the performance organically.

Watching it again as I wrote this, I like it even more. A lot more. I am intrigued to learn more about his body of work. I am not generally inclined to listen to this genre recreationally as it seems to me more like listening to poetry. You can’t really do it casually. At least, not initially. Clearly, once you know a song (or a poem) you can listen more casually because your sub-conscious fills in around the gaps. If you don’t have that familiarity, then rap requires a lot of effort to absorb – I think.

This is probably one of the smarter half-time shows produced for a Stupor Bowl. More than we deserve, really. It’s encouraging that the general critical response seems to be supportive.

I’m not going to bother to do the actual analysis of what the show was about. That would be stupid since I’m clueless without other folks’ knowledge. You can read that all over the internet. Y'all know me enough to know how I feel about validating counter culture messaging, so from that perspective, good on him. 🙂

Also, he seems to have some legit mad skills.