Kid Rock‘s headline performance at The All-American Halftime Show has ignited a fresh round of controversy, with viewers and critics questioning whether the outspoken star lip-synced during his heavily politicized appearance.
The two-song set aired yesterday, February 8, and was presented by conservative activist group Turning Point USA as a crybaby-ass counterprogram to Bad Bunny‘s official Super Bowl LX halftime show. Marketed in advance as a more MAGA-aligned alternative, the bill also featured Brantley Gilbert, Lee Brice and others, with Kid Rock positioned as the marquee attraction.
Rock opened the broadcast with an abbreviated version of his late-’90s breakout hit “Bawitdaba,” before closing with a cello-assisted cover of Cody Johnson‘s “‘Til You Can’t.” A studio recording of the latter has since been released digitally.
While the cover drew relatively mild reactions, it was Rock‘s performance of “Bawitdaba” that quickly became the lightning rod online. Viewers flooded social media with criticism, accusing Kid Rock of relying heavily on backing tracks, with some claiming his vocals were barely present at all.
Additional criticism also emerged around the second song, with allegations that parts of the performance were mimed onstage, though much of that scrutiny focused on the backing musicians rather than Rock himself. Appearing on The Ingraham Angle today, February 9, Rock forcefully denied the lip-syncing claims, insisting the issue was technical rather than performative.
When host Laura Ingraham noted that many online comments said “Bawitdaba” seemed “out of whack,” Rock responded: “It was out of sync. And actually, just to have some fun with the haters — I can’t answer all the trolls, but it’s gonna be some fun,” he said. “My DJ, who actually raps that song with me, he was not lit up.”
Lemme stop right there – what does out of sync mean in this context? Because sometimes Kid Rock has the mic up to his mouth and everything’s fine, and other times he’s got it by his hip and the vocals are still going. If this was out of sync, then all the vocals would be wrong consistently. That’s not the case.
Rock explained that his DJ will be joining him in Nashville to recreate the performance live. “He’s coming to Nashville tonight, flying in, and we’re gonna do that live in my living room and I’m gonna post it tomorrow to show people exactly how this works,” he said.
Pushing back against the accusations, Rock framed the backlash as politically motivated. “If it would have been a lip syncing like people are trying… you know, the left is trying to throw me under the bus again, the mainstream media and social media tries to amplify it,” he argued.
Ah yes, the goddamn left! Making Kid Rock lip synch his own songs! What a bunch of bastards with frankly incredible power.
According to Rock, a pre-recorded performance would have been far easier to present cleanly. “It would have been super easy to sync it up, if it was pre-recorded,” he said. Instead, he credited — and defended — the Turning Point USA production team while acknowledging the challenges they faced.
“I’m jumping around the stage like a rabid monkey, rapping my song, and I’m taking breaths, and my DJ is filling in the other parts of it,” Rock explained. “I even told them when I saw the rough cut, I was like, ‘You guys got to work on that sync. It’s off.’ So it was just a syncing issue that they had.”
Despite the backlash, Rock appeared unfazed and promised a direct response to critics. “I know they tried to get it right. It was very difficult,” he said. “But I’ll answer all the haters tomorrow and we’ll put ’em back in the shut up and go back to trying to report the fake news.”
I’d like to point out that the performance was very likely pre-recorded, which begs the question – if this was live, why not just line up the audio tracks? Also, read Kid Rock‘s statement again and try to find a sentence that actually explains what happened. It’s just deflection despite what you can see with your own two eyes.
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