Fergie breaks Super Bowl’s female ban

BUZZ WORTHY

Janet Jackson’s wardrobe malfunction put such a scare in Super Bowl organizers that they stopped choosing women to headline the halftime show.

The split-second flash of flesh took place in 2004.

For the remainder of the decade the most-watched intermission on the planet remained a platform reserved for men who were middle-aged and, in some cases, geriatric.

* Paul McCartney in ’05.

* The Rolling Stones ’06.

* Prince ’07.

* Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers ’08.

* Bruce Springsteen and the E-Street Band ’09.

All turned in solid sets.

But Prince’s, which closed with a chills-inducing “Purple Rain” featuring one of the greatest guitar solos ever broadcast on live television, ranks as the only performance that really teemed with energy and brilliance.

And then, The Who were so woeful last year Super Bowl planners finally decided to book a band actually in its prime with -- wait, wait -- a person capable of a Ms. Jackson-style slip up.

The Black Eyed Peas are one of pop’s music mightiest forces.

They also happen to feature a most curvaceous frontwoman in Fergie.

She shot to super stardom for singing lead on the ’05 smash “My Humps.”

“My hump, my hump, my hump, my hump, my hump, my hump,” goes the ridiculously simple, yet impossibly catchy chorus, “my lovely lady lumps.”

The Black Eyed Peas’ Super Bowl set list had not been confirmed by press time. But should Fergie perform “My Humps” and show too much of one of her “lovely lady lumps” it’s a safe bet the ban on women performers will be reinstated.

But the singer sounds like she’s taking the necessary precautions.

As a man, I’m not exactly sure what those precautions are.

But I’ve been told by women friends they could require such extreme measures as using duct tape.

Ouch!

“It is a challenge because you want to give a little sex appeal but you don’t want to get into any trouble,” Fergie said Thursday at a Super Bowl press conference in host city Dallas. “So we’re very particular on the wardrobe. There will be no more malfunctions.”

That’s good to know.

The halftime show really shouldn’t be the exclusive domain of Rock and Roll Hall of Famers.

Or men.