Watch Flea’s Bass-Solo National Anthem Before Kobe Bryant’s Final Game
Sean M. Haffey/Getty Images
Last night, Kobe Bryant ended a 20-year, five-championship NBA career by somehow scoring 60 points in the Los Angeles Lakers’ 101-96 victory against the Utah Jazz. (The Jazz evidently did not play a whole lot of defense.) That’s an iconic ending to an iconic run, and the Lakers found a memorable way to send him out. For the game’s performance of the National Anthem, they brought in Red Hot Chili Pepper and Atom For Peace Flea to play a Hendrixian all-bass instrumental version of “The Star-Spangled Banner.” I’m not sure, but this may be the most Los Angeles thing that’s ever happened. And Kobe almost made it to the end of the song. Watch the weird, impressive performance below.
During the game, the Lakers’ scoreboard showed a video that featured some heavyweight musical luminaries giving Bryant their best wishes:
Musicians bid farewell to Kobe.#ThankYouKobehttps://t.co/WFpYB0Bsob
— Los Angeles Lakers (@Lakers) April 14, 2016
And there were also some big music types in the building last night:
At the God's last game pic.twitter.com/eucluEFOFX
— KANYE WEST (@kanyewest) April 14, 2016
— KANYE WEST (@kanyewest) April 14, 2016
Q, Jay & Kendrick in the building for Kobe! #ThankYouKobe pic.twitter.com/CtUHeYQGln
— NBA (@NBA) April 14, 2016
Meanwhile, the Golden State Warriors became the greatest NBA team in history last night, winning their 73rd game of the season. And yet everyone is still talking about Bryant this morning. That is some hall-of-fame attention-hogging.
