Stones slam Super Bowl censors

The Rolling Stones have said that the decision to censor two of their songs during the Super Bowl halftime show on Sunday "ridiculous" and unnecessary. The band's spokesperson Fran Curtis was reacting to a comment by a National Football League spokesperson, who said that the band had agreed to being muzzled. Reuters reports that the the line "you make a dead man come" in the song 'Start Me Up' was cut short, as was a refernence to "cocks" in 'Rough Justice'. "The Rolling Stones were aware of our plan which was to simply lower the volume on his microphone at those two appropriate moments," NFL spokesperson Brian McCarthy told Reuters on Monday. "We had agreed to that plan earlier in the week. The Stones were aware of it and they were fine with it." But the Stone's representative argued: "The Rolling Stones thought the censorship of their songs by the NFL/ABC was absolutely ridiculous and completely unnecessary," though they were aware of the plan before the show. "The band did the songs they were supposed to do and they sang all the words," Curtis said. "There were many many conversations back and forth and the band clearly was not happy about it." Reuters reported that ABC Sports said any alteration of the lyrics was done by the NFL and its production company.