Rihanna’s Super Bowl halftime show is rock-solid, although not spectacular
Who would the special guests be? Jay-Z? Drake? A$AP Rocky? The answer to that was: Nobody at all.
Most of the bets being taken about Rihanna’s Super Bowl halftime show during the Eagles-Chiefs game in Glendale, Ariz., on Sunday night were about what songs she would play, and, in particular, what song she would open up with.
It turned out that the smart money in the show that marked her return to the spotlight seven years after the concert tour for her 2016 album Anti- ended was on “B— Better Have My Money.”
The second question was: Who would the special guests be? Jay-Z? Drake? A$AP Rocky?
The answer to that was: Nobody at all. Rihanna, who was backed by a band led by Philadelphia bassist Adam Blackstone, doesn’t need anybody else to put on a fully focused, hit-packed, first-rate, 13-minute performance that was rock-solid if not spectacular.
That was true even if her performance was less energetic than it might have been since the night’s biggest surprise that she was — as she confirmed to Rolling Stone — pregnant with her second child, just nine months after giving birth to a son with A$AP Rocky.
Other notable takeaways from the 12-song show: She chose to include both Kanye West’s “All of the Lights” and Jay-Z’s “Run This Town” in her set, without calling on the rappers to assist her.
She dared to wear red — Chiefs colors — risking alienating the Eagles’ bleeding-green fan base.
And while making her way across the field during the performance, the pop superstar and head of her own Fenty fashion and beauty empire stopped to check herself in the mirror and adjust her makeup.
That quickly she confirmed that, yep, she’s still Rihanna, one of the pop world’s most commanding superstars, with a song catalog that’s ready to be taken back on the road whenever she sees fit to make a fully committed return to music-making and touring.
And with that, she carried on, finishing out her set in crowd-pleasing style with her first ubiquitous hit, “Umbrella,” and the closing “Diamonds,” assuring her fans that “We’re beautiful, like diamonds in the sky” while the stage carried her back up into the heavens, once again gone after such a long wait for her return.