Music

Bruno Mars & Red Hot Chili Peppers ignite Super Bowl halftime show

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Bruno Mars and the Red Hot Chili Peppers perform during the Super Bowl XLVIII Halftime Show.Kevin Mazur/WireImage
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Super Bowl? Whatever. Bruno Mars showed Sunday that he’s not only a major player in the pop world, but that he can outshine the best team in the AFC.
The Broncos-Seahawks noncontest left the crowd of 87,000 at the Meadowlands in dire need of some riling up midway through — and Mars was just the ticket.
The pop star has the songs, the showmanship, the charm and the hair, and, put together, the result was a halftime show and a half.
After teasing the crowd with a drum solo, Mars kicked off with slick versions of “Locked Out Of Heaven” and “Treasure.”
As it turned out, he was just getting warmed up. Launching into a rocking “Runaway Baby,” Mars took a page out of the James Brown playbook, sliding across the stage with quick feet and syncing up with the Hooligans, his equally dapper backing band.
As he spun around and hit the ground, the crowd erupted with glee, and for at least half of them, it was the first thing they had to cheer all night.
The spectacle was a poke in the eye for the doubters who questioned the choice of halftime entertainment.
As a relatively new act with only two albums to his name, Mars felt like a risky choice for the NFL, which has leaned toward heritage acts in recent years.
While it’s true Mars doesn’t have the same wow factor as Beyoncé or the vast catalog of Bruce Springsteen, the 28-year-old has been performing since childhood and certainly knows how to put on an impeccable show. And that is worth almost as much as having decades worth of hits.
The late addition of the Red Hot Chili Peppers proved to be a smart move, too.
The Californians still have the energy of teenage boys on a sugar high, and watching them rip through “Give It Away” added an extra level of funk.
Kudos to the band for sticking with their famous shirtless look, too. Not an easy thing to pull off in 40 degree weather.
The crowd was also made part of the spectacle. Prior to the game, LED-studded beanies were distributed to everyone, and as Mars rounded off the set with the ballad “Just the Way You Are,” the darkened stadium glowed with light patterns.
It’s not often that East Rutherford, NJ, can be described as pretty, but strange things are always liable to happen on Super Bowl Sunday.
In the next few days, the singer is going to experience a well-deserved sales spike.
But as his songs rise up the chart and his Moonshine Jungle Tour sells out, Bruno Mars will probably be more satisfied knowing he gave Denver something to remember Super Bowl XLVIII by.
Peyton Manning and the boys sure as hell didn’t.