THE WHO Confirmed for Superbowl XLIV Halftime Performance

MUSIC NEWS - The NFL confirmed today during Thursday's game between the Oakland Raiders and Dallas Cowboys that The Who will headline the Bridgestone Super Bowl XLIV Halftime Show on CBS Sports at Dolphin Stadium in South Florida on Sunday, February 7, 2010. The Bridgestone Super Bowl halftime show is one of the most anticipated musical events of the year with more than 151 million viewers in the USA watched last year's show. The Super Bowl and halftime show will be broadcast worldwide in more than 230 countries and territories.

The Who join an esteemed list of recent halftime acts that includes Bruce Springsteen & The E Street Band, Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, Prince, the Rolling Stones, and Paul McCartney.  Driven by singer Roger Daltrey (currently wrapping up his solo USA tour) and guitarist and songwriter Pete Townshend, the band's two remaining original members, The Who gained fame in the mid-1960s and were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1990. 

Many of the classic songs the band will perform are a few of those included on their upcoming Greatest Hits collection, releasing December 22, 2009 via Geffen/UMe. The release will be the largest single-disc "best of" collection from The Who in more than ten years and is the first to span the group's entire recording career to date, from 1964 to 2006. The 19-tune Greatest Hits (order below) brings together some of rock's most important, influential and incandescent touchstones, along with an essay by renowned music critic Dave Marsh.

The Who stands alone in rock music as one of the most explosive live act ever to appear on stage, propelled by the most staggeringly brilliant rhythm section in all popular music, layered with deafening power chords and thunderous vocal fury, The Who transcended its original billing as "Maximum R&B " to become one of the most musically inventive and structurally innovative bands of all time. Together, the four divergent personalities of The Who produced a hurricane. Each of them was a pioneer. Wildman drummer Keith Moon beat his drumkit with a chaotic elegance; stoic bassist John Entwistle held down the center with the melodic virtuosity of a solo guitarist; raging intellectual Pete Townsend punctuated the epic universality of his songs with the windmill slamming of his fingers across his guitar strings; and Roger Daltry roared above it all with an impossibly virile macho swagger. They exploded conventional rhythm and blues structures, challenged pop music conventions, and redefined what was possible on stage, in the recording studio, and on vinyl.