Adam Levine "spoke to many people" before deciding to perform at this year’s Super Bowl halftime show.
The 39-year-old singer will take to the stage with his band Maroon 5 at the event this weekend, but after the news was confirmed earlier this month, they received backlash due to the current controversy surrounding the NFL due to the #TakeAKnee movement to protest racial inequality.
Many people called on Maroon 5 and the other confirmed performers – including rapper Big Boi and Travis Scott – to pull out of the show to support the movement, and Adam has now said it took him a long time to decide to accept the performance offer.
He said: "No one thought about it more than I did. No one put more thought and love into this than I did … I spoke to many people, most importantly though, I silenced all the noise and listened to myself, and made my decision about how I felt."
Adam insists Maroon 5 will make sure people’s voices are heard through the ‘Sugar’ hitmakers’ performance.
He added: "They will be [heard] – that’s all I want to say because I don’t want to spoil anything. And once again, I like to think that people know where I stand as a human being after two decades doing this. I’m not a speaker. I’m not a public speaker. I do speak, but it’s through the music. My life’s work and what I put out into the universe has been positive and hopefully inspiring … So, what I would say is, you know, we are going to do what we keep on doing, hopefully without becoming politicians and continuing to use the one voice we know how to use properly."
The ‘Voice’ star also admits he did take the controversy into consideration when approaching the performance.
Speaking to ‘Entertainment Tonight’, he said: "I think we wanted to make sure we were able to speak once again through the music, so yes, absolutely, once we processed these things, it took a lot of looking inward and introspection and I thought to myself, ‘What is my greatest tool, you know, what is the thing that I can use to express myself … the best way for the band to express themselves, and how are we going to do it this year? What do we owe ourselves, what do we owe the people?’ And that is what we did, and I am beyond proud of the finished product, and literally never, never been more excited in my entire life to present this to the people because I believe that it’s truly a reflection of all of us."
Maroon 5 marked their performance at the Super Bowl with a $500,000 charity donation to Big Brothers Big Sisters of America, as part of the NFL’s #InspireChange social justice campaign, a commitment to help create positive changes for young people in communities across the US.
Adam Levine spent time deliberating over Super Bowl halftime show
