Usher Welcomes Alicia Keys, Will.i.am, Lil Jon and Ludacris During Memorable 2024 Super Bowl Halftime Performance

First came a trifecta of song: Andra Day performing “Lift Every Voice and Sing,” Post Malone doing an acoustic version of “America the Beautiful,” and Reba McEntire belting out “The Star-Spangled Benner.”

Then came the kick-off.

Two quarters later, Usher took the stage for his halftime performance for Super Bowl LVIII.

And so he did.

In an interview with Gayle King on CBS, he told the journalist that he’d talked to Jay-Z, the Super Bowl's live music entertainment strategist, who gave him a valuable piece of advice.

"He left it to me to, you know, make sure that I didn't miss the culture,” said Usher. “That's the one thing that he said. 'You know, we're doing this for the culture. I want you to play the ones that we — that we love, that we know you for. Give 'em the moments that they, you know, look forward to seeing,'" like, 'Go for the culture.' And I'm like, 'All right, I got you.'"

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Preceded by an onscreen warning that the performance was “Rated U” (“may cause singing, dancing, sweating, gyrating, possible relationship issues”) and a solemn vow that viewers should “get ready to witness a performance 30 years in the making,” Usher delivered exactly the sort of show that his fans would’ve wanted from him, including a giant medley filled with more than a dozen of his classic hits.

In rapid succession, Usher performed snippets from “My Way,” “Caught Up,” “U Don’t Have to Call,” “Superstar,” and “Love in This Club,” at which point it was time to deliver the first guest appearance of the set: Alicia Keys, sitting at a red piano, crooning her own classic hit, “If I Ain’t Got You.” In short order, however, she switched things up, and she and Usher launched into a song they’d done together in 2004, “My Boo.”

With Keys’ departure, it was back to pure Usher for a bit, as he hit on highlights of “Confessions Part II,” “Nice and Slow,” and “Burn” before it was time to tackle “U Got It Bad” and – as had been foretold by past concerts – to strip down to a bare chest. At that point, H.E.R. joined the proceedings for an extremely Prince-esque guitar solo, which was followed by a flurry of roller-skaters...and, yes, during “Bad Girl,” Usher did indeed get to show off his skating ability, if only for a few fleeting moments.

With that, it was time for a trio of tunes – and guest stars – which effectively served as the grand finale: will.i.am was there for “OMG,” Lil Jon for “Turn Down for What,” and – last but most certainly not least – both Lil John and Ludacris for “Yeah,” a song which, surprisingly, sounds pretty darned good with a marching band. (Who knew?)

Not that those last two guest stars were even remotely a surprise: a few days ago, Usher told Entertainment Tonight outright, "I would be a fool to not play ‘Yeah!' It would be foolish to make it all the way to Las Vegas, Jon is here, Luda's here and not play 'Yeah!'"

Surprising or not, though, it still made for an outstanding conclusion to a performance that undoubtedly left millions of Usher fans screaming the last song title of the set in approval.