Bush Plays Halftime, Montell Jordan Sings the Anthem as Raiders Host Bills on Sunday

LAS VEGAS

Sunday afternoon at Allegiant Stadium is getting a full concert bill to go with its football game. The Las Vegas Raiders announced on October 15 that rock band Bush will perform at halftime of the team's Week 6 matchup against the Buffalo Bills, while R&B singer Montell Jordan will perform the national anthem and then return for an additional performance at the first-quarter break, according to the announcement on Raiders.com, which BVM Sports also carried. Kickoff is set for 1:25 p.m. PT on CBS, per the NFL schedule listings, in a game the Raiders have designated with their Crucial Catch theme. For a fan base that has watched two straight losses, the team is making sure the building itself delivers a show regardless of the scoreboard.

Bush arrives with the kind of catalogue that halftime stages are built for. The London-formed band — Gavin Rossdale on vocals and guitar, Chris Traynor on guitar, Corey Britz on bass and Nik Hughes on drums — has sold more than 25 million records, earned a Grammy nomination, passed 1.1 billion streams and strung together 28 consecutive Top 40 hits, including eight No. 1 singles, according to Raiders.com's announcement. Songs such as "Glycerine," "Machinehead" and "Comedown" have been radio staples for three decades, and the band is touring behind its tenth studio album, "I Beat Loneliness," released in 2025, which Raiders.com noted has already produced the band's eighth No. 1 at U.S. active rock radio, "The Land of Milk and Honey." A halftime set in a stadium that has hosted a Super Bowl and will host WrestleMania-caliber crowds is a natural room for a band that has played festivals from Woodstock '99 to Download.

Montell Jordan's assignment is the more unusual one, and arguably the more fun. Singing the anthem is a one-song job; the Raiders are bringing Jordan back after the first quarter for a special in-game performance, Raiders.com announced, which gives the crowd a second dose of one of the most durable party records ever made. Jordan's "This Is How We Do It" spent seven consecutive weeks at No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 after its 1995 release, his debut album went platinum, and across a career of seven studio albums and fourteen singles he has sold more than 10 million records and won a Grammy, according to the team's announcement. In a building full of fans who grew up on that song — and in a city where it still opens dance floors nightly — the first-quarter break may produce the loudest singalong of the afternoon.

The third act on Sunday's bill is the one locals know best. The Raiders House Band returns for its sixth year, the team announced: a 15-piece all-star ensemble led by trumpeter David Perrico, built from Las Vegas musicians whose resumes include work alongside Celine Dion, Santana, Beyonce, Rod Stewart, Andrea Bocelli, Shania Twain and Diana Ross, per Raiders.com. The house band is the connective tissue of a Raiders gameday — the sound between the anthem and kickoff, between quarters and after scores — and its return keeps a distinctly Las Vegas institution intact: an NFL stadium with a standing orchestra of Strip-grade players.

The football, of course, is the harder sell this week, and the entertainment announcement landed in the middle of an honest-to-goodness on-field problem. The Raiders are 3-2 after opening with three straight wins, but they have lost two in a row, capped by a 45-17 defeat at New England in which Las Vegas surrendered 371 passing yards, according to game coverage summarized this week. The ground game is the glaring issue. Through five weeks the Raiders rank 28th in the NFL at 82.0 rushing yards per game with only two rushing touchdowns, Raiders Wire reported, and running back Ashton Jeanty managed just 27 yards on 10 carries against the Patriots, though he added 50 receiving yards on three catches, Bleacher Report noted. Bleacher Report, citing ESPN's Dan Graziano, also reported that Jeanty has been playing through ankle and foot issues and that the team has internally discussed giving him a rest week at some point — while head coach Klint Kubiak said Wednesday that Jeanty would suit up against Buffalo.

That context explains why Sunday matters beyond the setlist. Buffalo comes to Las Vegas fresh off a 37-34 overtime win over the Los Angeles Rams on Monday night, a game in which Josh Allen threw for 210 yards and ran for 121 more, according to game summaries this week. The Raiders' path, as Raiders Wire laid out in its keys to the game, runs through getting the run game moving against a Bills defense that has allowed 108.2 rushing yards per game, and through a pass rush that has to keep Allen contained rather than merely hurried. A home crowd that has been given a rock concert, an anthem moment and a first-quarter singalong will arrive loud; whether it stays loud into the fourth quarter depends on whether Las Vegas can give it a game worth matching the undercard.

Practically, Sunday shapes up as one of the fuller afternoons on the Allegiant Stadium calendar: gates and the Modelo Tailgate Zone beforehand, Jordan at the anthem and again after the first quarter, the House Band throughout, Bush at the half, and a Raiders team trying to stop a two-game slide against one of the AFC's early pace-setters. Fans heading down should plan around the usual Russell Road and stadium-district congestion for a 1:25 p.m. kickoff. Follow the rest of the weekend's Las Vegas sports picture on Previously Sports, browse the newsroom for today's other Vegas stories, and see our coverage of Allegiant Stadium's role as a voting super site and Kelly Clarkson's Allegiant return.