Usher’s Super Bowl Performance Is Being Compared to the Avengers in These Hilarious Tweets
Jason Pham
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Justin Bieber, Alicia Keys, and more. Usher’s Super Bowl performance can be described in one word: “Yeah!” The Grammy-winning singer took the stage at the Super Bowl LVII Halftime Show on Sunday, February 11, 2024.
Usher started his Super Bowl performance in an all-white outfit, which consisted of a white cape, a silver top, and bedazzled white gloves as he performed his 1998 single and one of his first hits, “My Way.” His Super Bowl performance continued with him singing “Caught Up,” “U Don’t Have to Call,” “Spotlight” and “Love in This Club” before introducing his first surprise guest, Alicia Keys, who sang “Ain’t Got You” at a red piano in an all-red outfit.
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Usher joined Keys on “I Ain’t Got You” and stripped off his white cape, revealing his silver top underneath as they continued by singing “My Boo.” Usher’s Super Bowl performance then went on with him singing “Confessions Pt. 2” and “Burn.” His second guest, H.E.R., then came out playing the electric guitar while performing “U Got It Bad.”
Other songs included “Bad Girls” and “Deja Vu.” Usher’s fourth guest was will.i.am who performed “OMG” followed by Lil’ Jon who performed “Turn Down For What.” Usher’s Super Bowl performance ended with him doing a costume change to a black and blue glittered look as he sang “Yeah!” with Lil’ Jon and Ludacris.
Usher Super Bowl performance reactions
During Usher’s Super Bowl performance, many viewers took to X (previously known as Twitter) to react to him taking off his shirt in the middle of him singing. “Me when Usher took his shirt off,” a user tweeted.
Another user tweeted, “This is so important to me as someone who had the shirtless centerfold of Usher from Teen People magazine taped to the ceiling of her bottom bunk at summer camp.”
Others also reacted to Usher having so many guests join his performance. “Usher adding Lil Jon and Ludacris to the Halftime Super Bowl show,” Complex tweeted with a video of a chef accidentally setting his stove on fire.
Another user tweeted, “usher, lil jon, and ludacris being together again literally felt like the avengers assembling for the first time in a decade.”
“justin bieber while usher was performing #halftimeshow,” a user tweted with a video of someone snoring.
“Justin Bieber fans after Usher didn’t bring him out for the #SuperBowl half time show #SuperBowl2024,” another user tweeted of The Boys‘ Homelander crying.
Most viewers, however, just commended Usher on his performance, which confirmed him as one of the greatest artist from the 2000s. “Usher opting to execute a set that focused squarely on a bygone era of showmanship is why he’s in a league of his own. The mic was on. No track. A skate sequence. Fluid choreography. He took his time onstage and it was exquisite. #Usher #SuperBowl,” one user tweted.
Another wrote, “Usher came and did EVERYTHING he said he was gonna do!!!!!! The undisputed KING of R&B, and the BEST male performer of his generation!!!!!!!!!! PERIOD!!!!!! #HalftimeShow.”
Usher — who has nine number-one songs on the Billboard Hot 100 including “Yeah!,” “U Got It Bad,” “U Remind Me,” “Confessions Part II,” and his first number-one hit, “Nice and Slow” — was announced as the 2024 Halftime Show performer in September 2023. “It’s an honor of a lifetime to finally check a Super Bowl performance off my bucket list. I can’t wait to bring the world a show unlike anything else they’ve seen from me before,” he said in a statement at the time. “Thank you to the fans and everyone who made this opportunity happen. I’ll see you real soon.”
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Jay-Z, who owns Roc Nation, a producer of the Halftime Show, also added in a statement, “Usher is the ultimate artist and showman. Ever since his debut at the age of 15, he’s been charting his own unique course. Beyond his flawless singing and exceptional choreography, Usher bares his soul. His remarkable journey has propelled him to one of the grandest stages in the world. I can’t wait to see the magic.” Read on for more details on Usher’s Super Bowl performance, including his setlist and guests.
What was Usher’s Super Bowl performance setlist?
What is Usher’s Super Bowl performance setlist? See Usher’s full Super Bowl setlist below.
- “My Way”
- “Caught Up”
- “U Don’t Have to Call”
- “Spotlight”
- “Love In This Club”
- “Ain’t Got You” (with Alicia Keys)
- “My Boo” (with Alicia Keys)
- “Confessions Pt. 2”
- “Burn”
- “U Got It Bad” with H.E.R.
- “Bad Girls”
- “Deja Vu”
- “OMG” with will.i.am
- “Turn Down For What” (Lil’ Jon)
- “Yeah!” with Lil’ Jon and Ludacris
In an interview with Apple Music before the Super Bowl, Usher explained why it was hard for him to come up with a setlist for the Super Bowl.
“I gotta do it in 13 minutes,” he said. “That makes it a bit difficult.” He continued, “It’s definitely been a challenge to squeeze 30 years into 13 minutes.” Usher also acknowledged fans’ “fantasy lists” of dream songs that he took into account when planning for his Super Bowl Halftime Show set list. “I was very mindful of my past, celebrating my present — which is here in Las Vegas — and thinking about where we’re headed in the future,” he said. “That was really the idea.”
When planning his set list, Usher also explained that he considered both songs that fans knew him for as well as tracks that celebrated the journey of “life, love and emotion” of his music. “I thought about a few moments that were special in dance. I thought about some things that I had created here in Las Vegas like skating and doing things that I had not done on stage up until this point to be able to share that with the world,” he said.
Usher continued: “For everybody that heard about my show in Las Vegas, you’ll now get a chance to see some of what I did here. But you’re going to get the best of it because it’s before 60,000 people in this room — and hopefully 180,000 people, 80 million people for the world to see.”
Who were Usher’s Super Bowl performance guests?
Who were Usher’s Super Bowl performance guests? Usher’s Super Bowl Halftime Show guests included Jermaine Dupri, Alicia Keys, Lil Jon, Ludacris, H.E.R, and will.i.am. Keys sang “If I Ain’t Got You,” while Lil Jon performed “Turn Down For What.” H.E.R. performed a solo on the electric guitar as Usher changed outfits. A source previously told TMZ on February 9, 2024, that Usher contacted Bieber about performing at the Halftime Show with him, however, it didn’t work out. Usher discovered Bieber at 13 years old and has been a mentor to him throughout his career, along with Bieber’s manager, Scooter Braun.
In an interview with The Huffington Post before the Super Bowl, he thanked Jay-Z for giving him the opportunity to perform the Super Bowl Halftime Show. “I’m very fortunate to have gotten that call from Jay-Z that it was time, and of course, I was ready, and I am ready for it,” he said. “I can tell you that you should expect a celebration, a celebration of life for those people who are not able to be here with me for this performance. I’m going to be celebrating for them. … We’ll be celebrating for the 30 years of a career that I stand on. I’ll be celebrating because music has been this connective tissue between me and people, because for every experience that I’ve had, I put it into music and maybe that gave us something to cry to, that gave us something to be vulnerable and transparent to.”
He also told the “Club Shay Shay” a week before the Super Bowl that he was almost in a music supergroup with Jay-Z, Diddy, and Pharrell Williams before plans fell through. “You gon’ hate me for this one,” he said. “JAY-Z, Pharrell, Diddy, and me was supposed to be a group. Yeah, that’s crazy. You gon’ hate me for that I know,” he said. Usher and Pharrell are featured together on the song “U Don’t Have to Call”; Usher and Jay-Z are featured together on “Hot Tottie”; while Usher and Diddy are both on “I Need a Girl (Part One).”
He continued, “We was talking about it and having secret meetings about it, talking about music and how we gon’ flip it. The business of it. And somehow man, we just got distracted. And it never happened. That’s the one that I actually wish would have happened.”
Usher tickets to his Past Present and Future tour are available on Stubhub.
