Never work with kids or animals.<\/p>\n
I grew up watching sports with my mother.\u00c2\u00a0 My father might go to a Super Bowl party to mix whiskey sours and tell jokes, but if you asked him how many yards for a first down, or how many plays until you turned the ball over, he’d be flummoxed.<\/p>\n
At first we watched the Giants via some UHF channel in New Haven.\u00c2\u00a0 All snowy, brought in by rabbit ears.\u00c2\u00a0 No one went to the game.\u00c2\u00a0 It was sold out.\u00c2\u00a0 And expensive.\u00c2\u00a0 And how good could a seat be, in a stadium built for baseball?<\/p>\n
We tuned in for Allie Sherman.\u00c2\u00a0 Just like Jews wince when a member of the tribe commits a faux pas, we support anybody who achieves fame, especially as a member of the jockocracy.\u00c2\u00a0 I remember telling my father I wanted to be a professional baseball player.\u00c2\u00a0 He wouldn’t even humor me at age 7.\u00c2\u00a0 You had to be a lawyer.\u00c2\u00a0 You had to have a job where you thought.\u00c2\u00a0 You didn’t want to get left behind.<\/p>\n
But isn’t it interesting that ballplayers make all the money these days.\u00c2\u00a0 To the point where you can end up OWNING the team.\u00c2\u00a0 Wasn’t that way back in the sixties.\u00c2\u00a0 You had a job in the off-season.\u00c2\u00a0 Oftentimes selling automobiles, or working at a beer distributorship.<\/p>\n
The very first Super Bowl was a farce.\u00c2\u00a0 As was the second.\u00c2\u00a0 We wanted a game, but we didn’t get one.\u00c2\u00a0 As for the third?\u00c2\u00a0 I was busy ski racing in Northern Vermont.\u00c2\u00a0 When I heard over the radio on the way back home that the Jets had won, I couldn’t believe it.\u00c2\u00a0 I can still remember the road we were on, what the light was like…<\/p>\n
And I caught so many Super Bowls thereafter.\u00c2\u00a0 And then gave up.<\/p>\n
Not only because my sixties values told me this was a heinous sport wherein one hit could ruin you for life, but because the games themselves were lopsided.\u00c2\u00a0 Football ain’t like baseball.\u00c2\u00a0 No matter how much you believe, your team doesn’t come back in the fourth quarter with two minutes left.<\/p>\n
And while I lived without television, in the hinterlands, the Super Bowl became a cultural institution, a tribal rite, a chance for everybody to get together on a winter day, eat and watch commercials.<\/p>\n
That’s another thing we’ve got to thank Steve Jobs for.\u00c2\u00a0 Before the 1984 Apple ad commercials were just expensive, they weren’t art pieces, they weren’t statements.\u00c2\u00a0 But since that time, the Super Bowl is not only a competition between the two best teams in the NFL, but the ad agencies inhabiting Madison Avenue.<\/p>\n
Most impressive ad?<\/p>\n
The Hyundai one featuring the Smashing Pumpkins.\u00c2\u00a0 A brand we pooh-poohed that is now respected.\u00c2\u00a0 Their Genesis is a Lexus for a much cheaper price. And their ad kind of sucked, but it featured Billy’s band, right at the beginning of the show, before we were either so high on alcohol or sugar that it was difficult to pay attention. This is the power of Irving Azoff.\u00c2\u00a0 Before Irving, the Pumpkins were forgotten.\u00c2\u00a0 Now, with only half the band intact, they’re being featured in front of all America.<\/p>\n
Best ad?<\/p>\n
The Doritos one, with the snow globe.\u00c2\u00a0 I liked the dude throwing it into the vending machine more than his compatriot throwing it into his boss’ nuts.\u00c2\u00a0 Supposedly it was fan generated.\u00c2\u00a0 The lunatics have taken over the asylum!<\/p>\n
As for Audi…\u00c2\u00a0 Referencing their number one competitor, BMW?\u00c2\u00a0 Wow.\u00c2\u00a0 That used to be a taboo.\u00c2\u00a0 And someone else did that too, but I don’t remember what company it was!<\/p>\n
As for Bud and its Clydesdales and Coke…\u00c2\u00a0 They’re so busy playing it safe, wary of offending a single viewer, that their spots are too bland, offending no one, they don’t inspire.\u00c2\u00a0 Unlike Pepsi. But seeing Dylan in that ad did bizarre me.<\/p>\n
And Sully!\u00c2\u00a0 Why the hell was he at the game?\u00c2\u00a0 Great water landing, but now you’re at the Super Bowl?\u00c2\u00a0 As for General Petraeus…\u00c2\u00a0 I never would have let him on TV.\u00c2\u00a0 Viewers on Al Jazeera will no longer be afraid, knowing our troops are commanded by this pipsqueak.<\/p>\n
And the game?<\/p>\n
I wanted Arizona, but I bet on Pittsburgh.\u00c2\u00a0 Emotions are one thing, but money is another.\u00c2\u00a0 Still, I wanted Kurt Warner to prevail.\u00c2\u00a0 But the Cardinals couldn’t move the ball on the ground, and Pittsburgh was eating the turf up.\u00c2\u00a0 Until just before halftime.\u00c2\u00a0 It was too early for Warner to throw a pass into the end zone.\u00c2\u00a0 The Cardinals DESERVED to lose!<\/p>\n
And then came Bruce.<\/p>\n
I was stunned he started out with "Tenth Avenue Freeze-Out".\u00c2\u00a0 But he did go straight into "Born To Run".\u00c2\u00a0 Was he bad?\u00c2\u00a0 No.\u00c2\u00a0 But it played like a commercial.\u00c2\u00a0 I’m surprised Jon Landau didn’t make a deal where you could point your remote at the set and buy a ticket right there.\u00c2\u00a0 It was kind of like seeing an ad for Ringling Bros.\u00c2\u00a0 But even the elephants don’t work it that hard.<\/p>\n
As for the new number…\u00c2\u00a0 For a minute, I thought he wasn’t going to play any.\u00c2\u00a0 It fit in.\u00c2\u00a0 It just didn’t move me.<\/p>\n
And then came "Glory Days".\u00c2\u00a0 Far from my favorite number (on that album, it’s "Downbound Train"), it was quite good.\u00c2\u00a0 Because the Boss lightened up, he stopped selling and started performing.\u00c2\u00a0 And Silvio Dante evidenced rock and roll.\u00c2\u00a0 And when the two sang together, when they shucked and jived, I told myself THIS was a Bruce Springsteen show.\u00c2\u00a0 THIS was what it was all about.\u00c2\u00a0 But we used to keep the essence secret.\u00c2\u00a0 You used to have to go to the show to know.\u00c2\u00a0 Didn’t MTV teach us that television exposure kills acts?\u00c2\u00a0 But no one can give up that chance, to have everybody see you and make all that money right now.\u00c2\u00a0 Remember when Trent wouldn’t go on Letterman after that mud-slinging Woodstock?\u00c2\u00a0 Despite Dave imploring him? Trent’s still got his cred, Bruce is now just another commercial production.\u00c2\u00a0 Grossing in excess of $200 million on the road last year.\u00c2\u00a0 When is it enough?<\/p>\n
That’s what’s wrong with our whole business.\u00c2\u00a0 It’s not about music, but money.\u00c2\u00a0 We’ve jacked up the price and played to the last row, trying to get every last idiot to come, to the point where the essence has leaked out.<\/p>\n
But at this point, just after halfway through the enterprise, one had to see Springsteen was the highlight.<\/p>\n
And then suddenly, the Cardinals came back.\u00c2\u00a0 There was a safety.\u00c2\u00a0 A seemingly uncatchable toss into the end zone.\u00c2\u00a0 We had a GAME!<\/p>\n
Just when we thought we had another Super Bowl blowout on our hands, the drama of human life entered the stadium.\u00c2\u00a0 That’s what Costas says sports are, a metaphor for life.\u00c2\u00a0 Everyone counts you out, you’re a bum, a failure and then you show them OTHERWISE!<\/p>\n
It was riveting.\u00c2\u00a0 There was tension.\u00c2\u00a0 There was investment.\u00c2\u00a0 One was on the edge of his seat.<\/p>\n
Ultimately, there was disappointment, when the Cinderella story was squashed.<\/p>\n
There was everything present in a great rock show.\u00c2\u00a0 But it wasn’t scripted.\u00c2\u00a0 It unfolded, warts and all, right in front of us.\u00c2\u00a0 Springsteen faded, his performance just another unmemorable commercial for a product.\u00c2\u00a0 In this case, a concert ticket as opposed to a snack food, but what’s the difference?\u00c2\u00a0 Selling is selling.<\/p>\n
Football works because the rules don’t change.\u00c2\u00a0 But the rules in rock and roll changed long ago.\u00c2\u00a0 Which is why sports still flourish and rock is fading.<\/p>\n
Bruce made a mistake.\u00c2\u00a0 He was upstaged by the game itself.\u00c2\u00a0 Springsteen gave it his all, but the game was better, it stole our hearts.