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Springsteen Used Recorded Tracks at Super Bowl

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Jennifer Hudson and Faith Hill didn’t act alone. Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band also performed to backing tracks during their Super Bowl performance last Sunday, Super Bowl producer and Grammy Awards audio supervisor Hank Neuberger told The Chicago Tribune.

“The Super Bowl performances are all on tape,” Neuberger said. “There is no way you can set up a full band in five minutes with microphones, get all the settings right, and expect to get quality sound.The Super Bowl has been doing that for years with virtually all the bands.”

According to Neuberger, Springsteen’s vocals were the only part of the performance that was not pre-recorded. After all, he is the Boss — not Ashlee Simpson. (Springsteen’s label PR had no comment for SPIN.com by press time.)

“It’s not fraudulent, it’s the opposite of fraud — it’s not like Milli Vanilli,” said Neuberger, referring to the pop/dance duo who won a Grammy 1990 for Best New Artist only to have it withdrawn after it was discovered they didn’t sing on their album.

“There were too many variables keeping the instruments in tune while playing outside in cold weather,” he continued. “You can’t control the environment, so the smart decision is to record the performance and play along with it… It’s too big of an event to risk something going wrong. Television and music are not always a happy marriage.”