Rihanna’s Tremendous Bowl halftime present was loads of issues, clearly. Her first public present in seven years. Probably the most-watched being pregnant announcement in world historical past. Effectively-received total, however not with out its detractors.
And, after all, it was the tip of the multi-platinum artist’s years-long holdout from music’s largest stage over the NFL’s therapy of Colin Kaepernick.
Rihanna made headlines in 2019 when it was reported she had turned the league down due to Kaepernick. She later confirmed her stance in an interview with Vogue, taking a high-profile torch to the league:
I ask Rihanna if we will talk about politics. “How deep you wanna get?” she says. “Nonetheless deep you’re prepared to go,” I say. She indicators that I could proceed, and I ask if it’s true that she turned down the Tremendous Bowl halftime present in solidarity with Colin Kaepernick. “Completely,” she says. “I couldn’t dare try this. For what? Who positive aspects from that? Not my individuals. I simply couldn’t be a sellout. I couldn’t be an enabler. There’s issues inside that group that I don’t agree with in any respect, and I used to be not about to go and be of service to them in any manner.”
Rihanna wasn’t alone in doing so, as Jay-Z was believed to have turned the NFL down for comparable causes up till he signed a partnership with the league and began working as a producer for the halftime present.
So what occurred to make Rihanna go from “I used to be not about to go and be of service to them in any manner” to posting a giant soccer on her social media in September?
It is arduous to think about Jay-Z, who gave Rihanna her begin on his Def Jam document label, did not play a task in Rihanna’s choice, however the singer went into element in an interview with British Vogue revealed Wednesday. Merely put, she mentioned she believed the affect of a singer like her performing the halftime present outweighed the affect of her holdout, and could not deny she was intrigued by the problem:
So what modified? “There’s nonetheless loads of mending to be achieved in my eyes,” she says now, “but it surely’s highly effective to interrupt these doorways, and have illustration at such a excessive, excessive degree and a constant degree.” This final level is essential for her. “Two Tremendous Bowls back-to-back,” she says, referring to final yr’s headliners, Dr Dre, Snoop Dogg, Eminem, Mary J Blige and Kendrick Lamar, “you recognize, representing the city group, globally. It’s highly effective. It sends a extremely robust message.” There’s one other key distinction this time as properly. “After all,” she says, turning into visibly moved by this thought, “elevating a younger Black man is likely one of the scariest tasks in life.” It’s made her re-evaluate all the pieces. “You’re like, ‘What am I leaving my children to? That is the planet they’re gonna be residing on?’” She shakes her head. “All of these issues actually begin to hit otherwise.”
On high of the duty, she felt emboldened by motherhood too. “It’s this understanding that you are able to do something,” she explains, “even issues that appear the craziest, like, ‘I’m going to say sure to the Tremendous Bowl in the course of postpartum?’” She nonetheless can’t imagine she agreed. “What the heck am I pondering? However you’re geeked on a problem like that as a result of you recognize what your physique simply did. You are feeling this sense of ‘Nothing is unimaginable.’” Not that the nerves aren’t jangling; after all, she had no clue when she accepted that she could be pregnant once more by the point of the efficiency. “It was nearly like an out-of-body expertise,” she says of the day it was introduced. “I’ve not been on stage in seven years,” she says. “Seven years! From zero to Tremendous Bowl? That’s psychological.”
Rihanna additionally reportedly mentioned she was approached a couple of weeks earlier than she was introduced because the performer, however she really missed the deadline to just accept the gig. Given her star energy and the affect of her saying “sure,” you may see why the NFL did not make it a tough deadline.
The tip end result was a present outlined by Rihanna’s bulging catalog of No. 1 hits, a vertigo-inducing set of rising platforms and a small military of dancers (“So. Many. Dancers.” as Rihanna put it to Vogue). Rihanna additionally broke custom by not bringing out a single visitor star, because the “shock visitor” she hinted at earlier than the Tremendous Bowl turned out to be child No. 2 along with her associate ASAP Rocky.
