Usher heard all the chatter after his electric performance during the Super Bowl Halftime Show in Las Vegas. While many acknowledge how incredible he was on stage, people on social media had a lot of thoughts about that hug he gave fellow R&B legend Alicia Keys.
Even though Keys’ husband, Swizz Beatz, has since tried to tamper down all of the discussion surrounding the hug, it’s still been all the talk.
But on Monday, the man in the middle of it all finally spoke out and addressed his actions with his “My Boo” collaborator. During an appearance on “The Breakfast Club,” Usher stated, “In no way should anything done there be viewed as bad or perverted or anything like that. It was literally about having fun because of a song that me and Alicia made many years ago. And we celebrated because of the legacy of it. And no disrespect to anybody or anything like that.”
When asked if he and Alicia have since laughed about the reactions to their performance, Usher said, “Absolutely we laughed about it. It’s crazy how people focused on that. It’s all about how you present things, man. But it’s all love.”
During the same interview, the King of R&B addressed some of his other “questionable” actions during live performances, including the time he infamously slapped his head on Nicki Minaj’s butt during the 2014 MTV Video Music Awards.
Again, Usher simply stated there was nothing malicious or disrespectful about his actions, saying, “That was Jamaican culture. You gotta go to Jamaica, you know what I’m saying? That was just a moment that was fun. And by the way, that was me playing my bass so I would have probably bumped my shoulder or my hand, but I had my bass in my hand so I just bopped off her body a little bit.”
Fortunately, the “Confessions” artist understands his place in current culture and doesn’t take anything said about him on social media too seriously.
He even spoke on the classic “Tom, Sarah and Usher” episode from season 2 of “The Boondocks,” telling Charlamagne, “I hit Regina [King] about that. They’re crazy. It was funny but I guess that’s the truth of the other side of what happens. That’s the Usher effect, I guess.”