Super Bowl
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Adele is sticking up for Taylor Swift. The British songstress, 35, told her Weekends With Adele audience in Las Vegas on Saturday (Feb. 10) that the pop superstar, 34, has made the NFL “more enjoyable to watch” and defended the singer against those criticizing her attendance at Kansas City Chiefs games in support of boyfriend […]
Drake‘s on Taylor Swift‘s team for the 2024 Super Bowl. He appears to have bet more than a million in cryptocurrency that the Kansas City Chiefs will defeat the San Francisco 49ers on Super Bowl Sunday (Feb. 11).
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“I can’t bet against the swifties,” Drake wrote Saturday on Instagram, where he posted a screenshot of a $1,150,000 bet on Stake. Should the Chiefs win, his estimated payout is $2,346,000.
Drake has an endorsement deal with Stake, an online crypto casino where users bet on sports games and play traditional casino games.
Swift (and many of her fans) will be cheering on the singer’s boyfriend, Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce, at the big game on Sunday. She’s wrapped her fourth Eras show in Tokyo and is expected to make it to Las Vegas to support Kelce while she’s on break from her tour until Friday, when she plays Melbourne, Australia.
The Embassy of Japan assured Swifties that the pop icon will have time to attend the Super Bowl after her Eras Tour concerts in Tokyo.
“Despite the 12-hour flight and 17-hour time difference, the Embassy can confidently Speak Now to say that if she departs Tokyo in the evening after her concert, she should comfortably arrive in Las Vegas before the Super Bowl begins,” read a statement released last week. “We know that many people in Japan are excited to experience Taylor Swift’s Eras Tour, so we wanted to confirm that anyone concerned can be Fearless in knowing that this talented performer can wow Japanese audiences and still make it to Las Vegas to support the Chiefs when they take the field for the Super Bowl wearing Red.”
Swift rushed from the Tokyo Dome to a private jet at Haneda Airport right after her Feb. 10 show, the Associated Press reports, likely embarking on the long journey to Las Vegas for the Super Bowl. At her Tokyo concerts, Travis Kelce jerseys and hats were spotted among the crowd’s Swift-inspired looks.
During a press conference on Monday, Kelce gushed over his girlfriend’s exciting night at the Grammys, where she announced her next album, The Tortured Poets Department, and became the first artist to win album of the year four times.
“She’s unbelievable,” said the NFL player. “She’s re-writing the history books herself, and I told her I’d have to hold up my end of the bargain and come home with some hardware too.”
Pay attention future pop stars: Usher’s strategy for harnessing the Super Bowl’s massive audience into sellout headliner concerts is a master class in how to parlay a career milestone into a legacy solidifying tour.
The R&B icon has been able to capture the pre-game buzz around his performance at the Apple Music Super Bowl LVIII Halftime show with a carefully coordinated presale campaign for his fall Past Present Future tour. Once hardcore fans grabbed their tickets (most went on sale Feb. 9), Usher’s team started expanding the dates based on demand to make sure there will still be plenty of tickets available for the general public on the Monday (Feb. 12) after the game.
So far, there have been 360,000 tickets sold in presale for the Past Present Future tour, according to Live Nation Global Touring chairman Arthur Fogel, and dates have expended from 24 to 44 across the U.S. since the initial presale launched on Thursday (Feb 8). Billboard estimates that when the remaining tickets will go on sale Monday after the Super Bowl, the Past Present Future tour with be Usher’s highest grossing tour ever.
“The success of tour began several years ago when Usher launched his residency in Vegas, which re-established his greatness,” Fogel says. “Now he is building off that success with his current tour and the presales prove there is unprecedented demand to see him perform live.”
Ever since Usher was announced as the Apple Music Super Bowl LVIII Halftime Show headliner, his touring team — manager Ron Lafitte, agent and WME partner John Marx and Live Nation promoters Colin Lewis and Fogel — have been building an arena touring strategy that fully capitalizes on the big game’s huge audience. Last year’s win by the Kansas City Chiefs over the Philadelphia Eagles in Glendale, Ariz., was watched by more than 115 million viewers in the U.S., making it not only the most watched Super Bowl in history, but also the most popular TV program of all time in America.
Despite the huge viewership, the last five artists to play the Super Bowl halftime show have not announced headlining tours after their performance. And those who did, like Justin Timberlake in 2018 and Beyonce in 2017, didn’t have any tickets on sale so quickly after the event.
Usher wasn’t going to let the momentum go to waste, though. Days after his Super Bowl Halftime performance was locked in, Marx began plotting out an arena tour. His charge from Usher was to try and replicate the intimacy of his Las Vegas residency shows, first in 2021 at the Colosseum at Caesars Palace and then at the 2022-2023 My Way Las Vegas residency at Dolby Live at Park MGM.
“He wanted to play more multi-night runs in bigger cities,” Marx told Billboard, noting that Usher enjoyed the excitement multi-night engagements generated.
In total, Usher is playing 44 shows in 17 markets (locations for three of dates have not yet been announced). The Past Present Future tour will officially launch in Washington, D.C. (Aug. 20) and includes a four-night stop at Brooklyn’s Barclay Center (Sept. 6-10), four nights at the yet-to-be-opened Inuit Dome in Inglewood, Calif. (Sept. 17-24), three nights in Miami at the Kaseya Center (Oct. 11-14), three nights at State Farm Arena in Atlanta (Oct. 17-20), and three nights at the United Center in Chicago (Oct 28-31).
“Sales are beyond anyone’s wildest dreams right now,” Marx says, noting that even more U.S. dates could be added and that a U.K. and European tour will be announced in the future. “Quite honestly, we’re just getting started,” he adds. “Everything I’ve seen and heard has made it clear to me that people everywhere really want to be at these shows.”
This may be one of the best weeks ever in the career of country music’s cult hero Zach Bryan.
It began on Sunday (Feb 4), when the 27-year-old singer-songwriter took home his first Grammy Award for best country duo/group performance for “I Remember Everything,” featuring Kacey Musgraves. The following day (Feb. 5) he released a viral video cover of Bon Iver’s “Emma,” which showed his intense musical range, along with a strategically placed American Spirit and Bud Light can. On Tuesday (Feb. 6), the Oklahoma native dropped the video for “Nine Ball,” starring Matthew McConaughey. The next day, his self-titled 2023 album “Zach Bryan” went platinum. And on Friday (Feb. 9), at the Bud Light Backyard Tour, he launched his partnership with Anheuser-Busch during Super Bowl LVIII weekend. The company will sponsor his North American Quittin’ Time arena tour, which starts March 6 at Chicago’s United Center.
In his first live appearance since the Grammy win, Bryan portrayed every bit the gracious, grit–and-drive frontman that his fanatics crave, while endearing himself to the uninitiated who came through to see what the hype is about.
Taking the stage at 11 p.m. on the nose, after a swinging soulful set from Leon Bridges, Bryan electrified the sold-out crowd at The Chelsea inside The Cosmopolitan with his powerful growling chorus on “Open the Gate,” from 2022’s American Heartbreak.
The can-drinking crowd of cowboy hats and boots blended with the leather-jacket-clad emo-country lovers and those geared-up in Chiefs/49ers merch — just as Bryan’s brand of Americana, indie-rock country appeals to all those groups.
From there the setlist bounced between his independent roots and his commercial success. Addressing the sold-out audience for the first time before 2019’s “Godspeed,” he said, “It is such an honor to be after [Leon Bridges]. Thank you so much to Bud Light for having us. You’ve been so kind to us. I do this at every show but I am going to do it. Cheers to Las Vegas, having a good time,” raising his can to the crowd.
During “Overtime,” Bryan got everybody going with a sing-along to the rock-and-roll-driven bluegrass jam session where he took a trip around the stage and ended up with the drum kit. Then, the question of the hour popped up: “Is everyone ready for the Super Bowl?”
Bryan’s energy on stage, his Oklahoma roots — and his ambassadorship into a “new wave of country” — draws recollection to a late ’80s Garth Brooks. And while undoubtedly he is more red dirt in his genre, the showmanship, storytelling and love of varying musical styles runs complementary. It’s also impossible to not get a Bob Dylan nod from the spoken-word riffs on some of his deepest lyrics.
Moving through his recent, yet deep autobiographical catalog, Bryan openly addressed the imprint that his U.S. military background has both on his art and his psychology.
“I was in the Navy for a really, really long time and I wrote this song ‘Tishomingo’ about going home, and I hope you guys don’t hate it,” Brayn said as the stage, awash in red lighting, reminded everyone of the backyard concert vibe that Bud Light wants to evoke.
He then lit the crowd up with a string of new classics “Nine Ball,” “Eastside of Sorrow,” “Dawns” (which elicited the most audience participation of the night), “Highway Boys” and “Quittin’ Time.”
It’s not uncommon for a Zach Bryan show to get a good percentage of the backing track from the audience. Band member Reed “Two Show” Connolly’s banjo solo on “Quittin’ Time,” was one of the highlights of the night as was Bryan’s message to the “Highway Boys,” also known as the band “these guys behind me are my best friends in the entire world … been to about every state together.”
After a five-minute pause, between main set and encore, Bryan and his eight-member band returned for a double-song encore, addressing as country music’s biggest news of the week, a tribute to the late Toby Keith with “Courtesy of the Red, White, and Blue,” with the words, “America lost a really important Oklahoma boy this week,” before closing out the almost 90-minute show with “Revival.”
The event marked Bud Light’s expansion into country music and serves as the launchpad for Bud Light Backyard Tour shows throughout 2024 at country music events and festivals across the country, including Stagecoach, CMA Fest and more. In an emotional moment, Bryan shared, “I was in the Navy for eight years … we’ve donated $27 million to Folds of Honor [a nonprofit organization that provides educational scholarships to the families of fallen and disabled service members and first responders]. Starting March, part of every Bud Light sold on tour will be donated to Folds of Honor, and I am going to match it.”
See Bryan’s full setlist below.
“Open the Gate”“Godspeed”“Overtime”“Fifth of May”“Tishomingo”“Nine Ball”“Eastside of Sorrow”“Dawns”“Highway Boys”“Quittin’ Time”“Condemned”“Oklahoma Smokeshow”“Heading South”“Hey Driver”“Something in the Orange”“Burn, Burn, Burn”“Courtesy of the Red, White and Blue” (Toby Keith cover)“Revival”
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Source: Foundation to Combat Antisemitism / FCAS
The Foundation to Combat Antisemitism (FCAS) has announced it will be running a Super Bowl LVIII commercial that will feature Dr. Clarence B. Jones, a confidante of the late, great Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
Jones helped King draft his historic “I Have a Dream” speech which he delivered at March on Washington back on August 28, 1963. Now a lawyer, entrepreneur, and investment banker, Jones was also King’s legal counsel and one of his strategic advisors. Currently, Jones is the Chairman of the Spill the Honey Foundation, which was founded by New England Patriots owner Robert Kraft and acts to fight against racism and antisemitism via art and education.
The commercial’s goal is to foster unity between Black and Jewish groups in the face of hate.
“I know I can speak for Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. when I say without a doubt that the Civil Rights movement (including the passage of the Civil Rights and Voting Acts) would not have occurred without the unwavering and largely unsung efforts of the Jewish people,” said Dr. Jones in a statement. “With hate on the rise, it is as important as ever that all of us stand together and speak out. Silence is not an option. I’m glad that I have lived long enough to partner with Robert Kraft and FCAS to continue to spread the message to the widest possible audience – the Super Bowl.”
Added Robert Kraft, “The work Dr. Jones has done over the course of his entire life and career is the embodiment of FCAS’ mission to build bridges and stand up to Jewish hate and all forms of hate. In the time we have spent together and through his work, I have become a huge fan of Dr. Jones, and I am proud to spotlight all that he has done for our nation.”
Watch Kraft give Jones the news below. Super Bowl LVIII kicks off Sunday, February 11 at 6:30PM ET.
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Will she make it in time?
Taylor Swift’s last song was still ringing in the ears of thousands of fans at the Tokyo Dome on Saturday night (Feb. 10) when the singer rushed to a private jet at Haneda airport, presumably embarking on an intensely scrutinized journey to see her boyfriend, NFL star Travis Kelce, play in the Super Bowl in Las Vegas.
“We’re all gonna go on a great adventure,” Swift earlier told the crowd. She was speaking of the music, but it might also describe her prospective race against time, which was to cross nine time zones and the international date line.
With a final bow at the end of her sold-out show, clad in a blue sequined outfit, the crowd screaming, strobe lights pulsing, confetti falling, Swift disappeared beneath the stage — and her journey to the other side of the world began.
Her expected trip to see Kelce’s Kansas City Chiefs play the San Francisco 49ers in Las Vegas on Sunday, U.S. time, has fired imaginations, and speculation, for weeks.
“I hope she can return in time. It’s so romantic,” said office worker Hitomi Takahashi, 29, who bought matching Taylor Swift sweatshirts with her friend and was taking photos just outside of the Tokyo Dome.
It wasn’t immediately clear late Saturday if Swift’s plane had left. About an hour after the end of the concert, Associated Press journalists were near Haneda’s private jet area when minivans drove up and someone went inside the gate area as four to five people carrying large black umbrellas obstructed the view of the person.
At Saturday night’s concert, there was plenty of evidence of the unique cultural phenomenon that is the Swift-Kelce relationship, a nexus of professional football and the huge star power of Swift. In addition to people wearing sequined dresses celebrating Swift in the packed Tokyo Dome, there were Travis Kelce jerseys and hats and other gear celebrating the Chiefs. Some in Tokyo spent thousands of dollars to attend the pop superstar’s concerts this week.
“Romeo, take me somewhere we can be alone,” Swift sang Saturday.
She won’t find that Sunday in Las Vegas when a sold-out crowd, not to mention millions around the world, will be watching her.
If she makes it, that is.
At the end of BMW’s new Super Bowl ad, actor Christopher Walken sits down to dine at a restaurant and finds Usher at the next table. They (and a waiter) wind up saying “yeah!” to each other a few times, and for this, publishers for each of the six songwriters on Usher’s 2004 smash “Yeah!” get to split a huge sync payment — even though not another word or any melody from the song is performed during the one-minute spot.
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“We, of course, smiled, and said, ‘You bet, we’ll license this to you guys,’” says Brian Monaco, president/global chief marketing officer for Sony Music Publishing (SMP), which represents James Phillips, one of six writers on “Yeah!” “It was a full fee, like they were using the entire song.” Pamela Lillig, vp of sync licensing for BMG, which represents co-writers J. Que, LaMarquis Jefferson and Sean Garrett, adds that BMW wouldn’t have had to pay the fee if random actors were saying “yeah” in an ad, but “because Usher’s in it, they felt they probably should.”
“Yeah!” — as well as Charles Wright & the Watts 103rd Street Rhythm Band’s 1970 soul classic “Express Yourself,” which plays throughout the BMW spot — is one of many big, easily recognizable tracks used in Super Bowl advertisements this year. Dove soap licensed “It’s the Hard-Knock Life” (from the Annie soundtrack); Budweiser brought back its Clydesdales for a spot containing The Band‘s “The Weight”; Volkswagen celebrated its 75-year history in the United States set to Neil Diamond‘s “I Am . . . I Said”; and a Popeyes ad includes “Also Sprach Zarathustra” and DJ Snake and Lil Jon‘s “Turn Down for What.”
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“The majority of songs used for us this year are catalog songs,” says Tom Eaton, senior vp of music for advertising for Universal Music Publishing Group (UMPG), which represents the Band and Diamond catalogs. “They create an immediate impact.” Adds Patrick Joest, head of sync for Hipgnosis, which owns stakes in Heart‘s “Barracuda,” used in a Hyundai commercial, and “Turn Down for What”: “What you’re seeing this year is people are going for the sure shots.”
Super Bowl ads are one of the most lucrative showcases for publishers’ nearly $1.5 billion-per-year synch business each year. According to synch sources, 2024 fees have ranged anywhere from $150,000 to more than $1 million. Last fall, when Hollywood writers and actors were still striking and placing songs for TV and film was paused for the foreseeable future, the beginning of the Super Bowl song-licensing season came as a welcome relief. “It was looking a little shaky,” says Scott Cresto, executive vp of synchronization and marketing for publisher Reservoir, which has a stake in Coi Leray and David Guetta‘s “Make My Day,” used in an E-Trade spot for this year’s game. “In the last quarter, all of our top 20 synchs were ads. It definitely helped our numbers.”
UMPG (whose catalog includes The O’Jays‘ “Love Train,” used in a Coors Light spot, and Perry Como‘s “Round and Round,” for Lindt Chocolate) has 18 synchs during this year’s Super Bowl. Sony landed 14 and Warner Chappell Music had 12 (including “Express Yourself”), while BMG had five, Kobalt four, Reservoir three and Hipgnosis two. (Billboard tallies in-game, national ads that appear during the CBS broadcast.)
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For recent Super Bowls, according to Rich Robinson, Warner Chappell’s executive vp of global synchronization and media, multiple ads used original “sound-design” instrumentals, as opposed to traditional song synchs that generate robust licensing fees for publishers. This year, the pendulum has swung back to the familiar. “It feels like a return,” Robinson says. “Almost every one we’ve licensed is a version of a really well-known hit.”
Still, a minority of Super Bowl LVIII ads showcase newer songs and stars: Ice Spice‘s “Deli” (UMPG) soundtracks an ad for Starry soda and Maizie’s 2021 track “Dumb Dumb” (BMG and SMP) is in an Uber Eats spot. And prolific songwriter Ryan Tedder of OneRepublic received a request this past Monday (Feb. 5) from a T-Mobile contact and wrote a new song, “Try,” in an hour, then submitted it as a voice memo. The ad will broadcast during the Super Bowl. “He works fast,” says Sony’s Monaco.
“There’s a mad rush sometimes. It’s super last-minute,” adds Lisa Bergami, vp of creative sync for Kobalt, whose Super Bowl placements include Flo Rida‘s “Good Feeling,” used in a Veozah menopause medication spot. “Some [advertisers] have gone a million rounds and ended up going with the song they wanted at the beginning. There isn’t much of a rhyme or reason.”
Meghan Trainor serves both glowy skin and her civic duty in e.l.f Cosmetics’ 2024 Super Bowl ad. The beauty brand shared their game day ad this week on YouTube, featuring the “All About That Bass” singer sitting on the juror’s bench as a court correspondent while Judge Judy — who in this universe goes by […]
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In the lead-up to Super Bowl LVIII this Sunday, everyone has football fever, with the eyes of sports and pop culture centered on Allegiant Stadium in Las Vegas on Feb. 11. To celebrate the Super Bowl matchup between the San Francisco 49ers and Kansas City Chiefs, video-game manufacturer Arcade1Up has a deep discount on one of its NFL arcade cabinets.
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On sale for $499.99 (regularly $599.99) at Amazon, Arcade1Up NFL Blitz Legends Arcade Machine is a ’90s throwback that features some of the all-time greats of the pro football league, including Jerry Rice, Emmitt Smith, Dan Marino, Brett Favre, Jerome Bettis, Cris Carter, Deion Sanders and others.
And since it’s from Amazon, you’ll get it shipped to you for free if you’re an Amazon Prime member.
Not a member? Sign up for a 30-day free trial to take advantage of all that Amazon Prime has to offer, including access to Prime Video; fast same-, next-, or two-day free shipping with Prime Delivery; in-store discounts at Whole Foods Market, access to exclusive shopping events — such as Prime Day and Black Friday — and more.
Arcade1Up
Arcade1Up ‘NFL Blitz Legends’
$499.99
$599.99
17% off
Equipped with a 17-inch LCD screen, Arcade1Up NFL Blitz Legends features four-player action with full-size joysticks and buttons, a light-up marquee and coinless operation for unlimited gameplay. It comes with a 13-inch riser to bring the arcade cabinet up to 5-feet tall in height.
Meanwhile, the arcade machine comes with three games loaded — NFL Blitz, NFL Blitz ’99 and NFL Blitz 2000: Gold Edition — for hours of football action. It’s even Wi-Fi-enabled, so you can play against other gamers online with multiplayer options and leaderboards for bragging rights.
The Arcade1Up NFL Blitz Legends Arcade Machine is on sale for $499.99, or $100 off its list price, at Amazon — that’s a 17% savings. In the meantime, watch a brief trailer for the arcade cabinet below:
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Want more deals? For more product recommendations, check out our roundups of the best Xbox deals, studio headphones and Nintendo Switch accessories.
Saddle up, BeyHive. Those rumors about a Beyoncé cameo in Verizon’s 2024 Super Bowl commercial just got a lot more serious. Two days after first sending fans into a frenzy with a teaser seemingly hinting at the superstar’s involvement, the company has now dropped a second clip ahead of its highly anticipated Super Bowl ad […]