Do not pillory Maroon 5 – they are the perfect group if you are too tired to feel anything | The music

WWell, it was hardly Prince who played Purple Rain under a torrential rain, as if he had been baptized by God himself – it was Adam Levine who sang Moves Like Jagger without his hat . The Maroon 5 halftime show on the Super Bowl is considered one of the worst of the event 's history: "Benin and computer – generated, smoothed to the point of. incomprehensibility, "said the New Yorker, while the New York Times called it" an inessential performance of a group that could have lost some moral authority if it had moral authority to lose. "

But Maroon 5 must have been bland. Many people did not want happy appearances, in solidarity with Colin Kaepernick and his gloomy protests for a knee; others might have hoped for a surprise punishment of the ceremony by a guerrilla statement. But the Super Bowl is so essentially conservative that it distorts any hint of ribaldry. Janet Jackson's nipple, MIA's major, has become perceived as a pure evil by those slightly cheeky moments filtered through the gauze of American values ​​that surrounds a Super Bowl stadium. Any political message would have been blurred by the context of the event itself. The only solution was to deploy Maroon 5: the most drastically harmless group in the history of American pop.

Attacking the Los Angeles pop rockers as "smoothly," is to miss the whole purpose of their work. These are songs with music that negotiate a Costa drive-in, or the wedding of a family that hates itself. When real life becomes too real, inject sonic anxiety into Maroon 5 and wrap yourself in amazement.

In these contexts, their often well written songs are deeply satisfying. Moves Like Jagger is a synthetic anti-funk masterpiece: its very nature and its lack of danger, as well as its brilliant ringing melody, are at the heart of its perverse appeal. She will be loved is just as perfect: in the middle of the road as a sleepy pheasant, her big dumb choir is ideal when Coldplay feels a little too emotionally involved. Cold, one of his recent zany attempts to woo the United States for rap, shows how easy it is to mix melodies to whistle happily when they buy duty-free alcoholic beverages.

Levine posted a series of words on Instagram after the Super Bowl, starting as a canvas print of Matalan ("Sharing Her Smile") and culminating with "Stand Kneel Overcome Love Listen". The implication that Kaepernick's kneeling protest is morally equivalent to defending the national anthem is offensive; the tone of "can not we all hear" is deaf to the political and social realities of the United States. And yet, its bromides have something rebaduring, just as we need noise and beauty, but also Maroon 5, the ideal group when you are too tired to feel.