Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band are scheduled to perform during halftime of the Super Bowl this year, following in the footsteps of Prince, U2, the Rolling Stones, Paul McCartney, and the infamously nip-slipping Janet Jackson. If you’re feeling some sort of déjà vu sensation, we understand — and though it somehow seems like Springsteen has already done this at least once before, it’s actually not the case. The Boss will be rocking out for what promises to be a staggeringly huge audience — last year’s audience for the big game, featuring a halftime set from Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, was in the neighborhood of 148 million viewers in the United States. The band will almost certainly kick out a couple of their biggest hits (“Born in the USA” probably, “Born to Run” almost definitely) — basically, odds are even that we’ll hear something about a blue-collar protagonist who is down on his luck. Should the Giants make it back to the Super Bowl, February 1, 2009, could become the most New Jersey–tastic moment in American history, even if Jon Bon Jovi and James Gandolfini fail to join the band onstage and trade verses on “Glory Days.”
