[Update 1/23/25]: Kendrick Lamar will be joined by frequent collaborator SZA when he headlines the Super Bowl LIX Halftime Show at New Orleans, LA’s Caesars Superdome on February 9th, 2025. In a promo clip shared on Tuesday, SZA announces her appearance by running up behind Kendrick on a football field set and dousing him with a celebratory cooler full of lemonade as his 2024 track “hey now” plays in the background.
Plenty has happened for both Kendrick Lamar and SZA since the rapper’s Super Bowl headlining gig was announced in October 2024. Following the initial announcement, New Orleans-native rapper Lil Wayne was vocal about his disappointment that he was not offered the halftime show in his home city. “That hurt, it hurt a lot,” he said in a statement posted on Instagram. “It broke me, but I’m just trying to put myself back together.”
Lamar went on to release his sixth studio album, GNX, on November 22nd. The feeling of immediacy that pervades the LP is perhaps most apparent in a line from opening track “wacced out murals” that directly references Wayne’s comments a month prior: “Used to bump Tha Carter III, I held my Rollie chain proud / Irony, I think my hard work let Lil Wayne down.”
GNX also featured two separate collaborations with SZA, “luther” and “gloria”. The prolific pair added to their joint resume yet again when SZA’s new SOS Deluxe: LANA, released on December 20th, featured a third new Kendrick collab, “30 For 30”.
Kendrick Lamar and SZA also announced an extensive co-headlining stadium tour dubbed the Grand National Tour. Due to run from mid-April through mid-June, the 21-date trek’s billing is a nod to GNX, which takes its name from the limited-run 1987 Buick “Grand National Experiment” coup, a model known by many as one of the last great American muscle cars. Find a full list of dates here. Tickets are on sale now via Ticketmaster. You can also see what’s available on the secondary market here.
Watch the announcement video for SZA’s appearance at the Kendrick Lamar-led Super Bowl Halftime Show in New Orleans below. Scroll down for more background on Lamar’s Super Bowl appearance.
KENDRICK LAMAR
SZASUPER BOWL HALF TIME SHOW 🏈
🚨FEBRUARY 9TH🚨 pic.twitter.com/gjpizURRPG
— NFR Podcast (@nfr_podcast) January 23, 2025
[9/9/24]: Kendrick Lamar, the Compton-native rapper who scored one of the summer’s biggest hits with “Not Like Us” thanks to a highly publicized series of blow-for-blow dis tracks levied between him and rival MC Drake earlier this year, has announced that he will headline the Super Bowl LIX Halftime Show at New Orleans, LA’s Caesars Superdome on February 9th, 2025.
In a Dave Free-directed clip announcing his’s appearance at the Apple Music-sponsored Super Bowl Halftime Show in 2025, the rapper appears on a football field in front of a massive American flag backdrop. While he uses a passing machine to fire off practice throws to an off-camera receiver, Lamar deadpans, “What the deal, everybody? My name Kendrick Lamar and I’ll be performing at Super Bowl LIX [59]. Will you be pullin’ up? I hope so.”
“Boom!” he adds as one of his passes seems to hit its receiver in the numbers. “I wouldn’t want you to miss it. Meet me in New Orleans. February 9th, 2025. Wear your best dress, too, even if you’re watching from home.”
While the Super Bowl LIX Halftime Show will mark Lamar’s first time leading the annual spectacle, he notably appeared during the Super Bowl LVI Halftime Show in Inglewood, CA alongside fellow hip-hop luminaries like Dr. Dre, Snoop Dogg, Mary J. Blige, Eminem, 50 Cent, and Anderson .Paak in early 2022. That edition marked the first time a rapper had headlined the Halftime Show. Read our full rundown of that performance and its significance here.
Related: Dr. Dre & His Protégés: Hip-Hop Royalty Finally Captures The Super Bowl Halftime Show Stage
Lamar also seemingly throws another jab at Drake in the announcement video. Earlier this year, after the two rappers traded dis tracks for weeks this past spring, Lamar’s scathing “Not Like Us” helped him pull away as the war of words’ consensus winner. He only added to that perception on Juneteenth when he hosted a one-off show at L.A.’s Kia Forum billed as The Pop Out during which he welcomed out a crew of notable guests including Mustard, Ty Dolla Sign, Dom Kennedy, Steve Lacy, Tyler, the Creator, Roddy Ricch, YG, Schoolboy Q, Jay Rock, Ab-Soul, and Dr. Dre. and performed four of his five Drake-aimed diss tracks—”Like That”, “Euphoria”, “6:16 in LA”, and “Not Like Us”—for the first time during his headlining set. Seemingly adding insult to injury, Lamar performed “Not Like Us”, the de facto “nail in the coffin” for the Kendrick/Drake beef, five separate times at the show.
[Note: There are plenty of explanations and breakdowns of the Kendrick Lamar/Drake feud out there online, but we think this explanation Chet Hanks gave his dad, Tom Hanks, is as good as any.]
[Screengrabs via Chet Hanks Instagram – Chet Hanks explains Kendrick/Drake beef to Tom Hanks, May 2024]
While things seemed to simmer down after that, Drake has since begun dumping large caches of music, demos, video clips, and other content in 100gb chunks. At the time of his first “100 Gigs” drop, Drake posted an Instagram story on his @plottttwistttttt Instagram account featuring a photo of former professional basketball player Rasheed Wallace and accompanying text quoting a famous 2004 interview by the Detroit Piston during the NBA Finals: “We will win Game 2.” Many fans took the eventually deleted post as both an admission of his defeat in the rap beef du jour and a forecast of his intentions to come at Kendrick once again in the future.
Related: Kendrick Lamar Brings ‘The Big Steppers Tour’ To New Orleans [Review]
In the video announcing Lamar’s Super Bowl performance, as the American flag towers behind him, Kendrick throws a bit more “sweet chin music” at Drake, his Canadian rival. “You know there’s only one opportunity to win a championship. No ’round twos.’ Let’s get it!”
Watch the full announcement video for Kendrick Lamar’s Super Bowl LIX Halftime Show below.
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