Michael Jackson (1958-2009), the King of Pop, the Gloved One, was an American singer of pop, R&B and rock music. He sold 750 million records worldwide – only Elvis Presley and the Beatles can even hope to match that – and had the number one album of all time, “Thriller” (1982), which sold 65 million. Janet Jackson is his sister.
He was American, he was black, he was universal. Even Imelda Marcos, she of the many shoes, cried at his death.
He was famous also for his dancing, making moves that no one thought possible, like the moonwalk.
His number one songs on the American R&B chart:
- 1969: I Want You Back (Jackson 5)
- 1969: Who’s Lovin’ You (Jackson 5)
- 1970: ABC (Jackson 5)
- 1970: The Love You Save (Jackson 5)
- 1970: I’ll Be There (Jackson 5)
- 1971: Never Can Say Goodbye (Jackson 5)
- 1974: Dancing Machine (Jackson 5)
- 1979: Don’t Stop ’til You Get Enough
- 1979: Rock With You
- 1982: The Girl is Mine (with Paul McCartney)
- 1983: Billie Jean
- 1983: Wanna Be Startin’ Somethin’
- 1983: Somebody’s Watching Me (with Maxwell)
- 1985: We Are the World (as part of USA for Africa)
- 1987: I Just Can’t Stop Loving You (with Siedah Garrett)
- 1987: Bad
- 1988: The Way You Make Me Feel
- 1988: Man in the Mirror
- 1988: Another Part of Me
- 1992: Remember the Time
- 1992: In the Closet
- 1995: You Are Not Alone
This does not even list the songs that “merely” made it to the top ten, like “Thriller”, “Ben”, “Got to be There” and “Black or White”.
On top of all that he made music videos into an art form in their own right, thus making MTV’s name. The strange thing is, MTV did not want to play him at first because he was black!
He was on stage by age six, on television coast to coast by age 11. Everyone loved his music, even white people, even then.
But growing up so famous meant he never had a proper childhood. That is why Elizabeth Taylor was one of the few who understood him. Even worse, his father was cruel. In some sense he was never a boy and yet always a boy.
He bought a place north of Los Angeles and called it Neverland Ranch, after the Neverland of Peter Pan. He put in a zoo, a roller coaster and a Ferris wheel. He invited children over, many of them dying of cancer.
Some of the children stayed over night and, sadly, some parents took advantage of that to spread ugly stories about him to take him to court for his millions, in 1994 and 2005.
Nothing was ever proved, but he had become so strange by the early 1990s – he had a pet llama and doctors were slowly turning him white – that many believed it.
He married, twice, first to Lisa Marie Presley, daughter of Elvis, and then Debbie Rowe. He had two children by Rowe, Prince Michael (1997) and Paris Katherine (1998). They divorced and he had a third child by an unknown woman, Prince Michael II (2002), better known as Blanket.
Hoping to make a comeback, Jackson sold out 50 shows in London for 2009, but then died suddenly just weeks before the first show.
See also:
- In memoriam: Michael Jackson
- songs
- Elizabeth Taylor
- Quincy Jones – the producer for “Thriller”
- colourism
- beyond black
Abagond:
I cannot believe I am writing this. I am 48 year old college educated professional woman with two adult children. I feel almost weird to feel so sad at person’s death whom I don’t even know personally. But at the same time, I feel as if I do know him like he was my brother or more importantly the first guy I ever fell in love with. I remember when he started and from the moment I saw his face and heard his voice, sae him move — oh my God, so sensual and effortlessly sexy, I fell in love. I bought every Right On magazine I could buy with my $.50 allowance every two weeks and I kissed his picture every night before I went to bed. I had it bad!!! I was only about 8 or 9 years old and for the next 20 years, I followed his career — it was like we grew up together. Everyone including my ex-husband knew I had a “thing” for Michael Jackson. When he changed his appearance, I was so disappointed and hurt because I always felt he was beautiful all along. But like with anyone you love, you just overlook the changes that lives takes through and the ramifications and still love that person. I am understand somewhat of the self-hatred he must have felt to have gone through such extremes. Myself as a dark complexioned black woman who now refuses to perm her hair know what it feels like to not be accepted sometimes. I KNOW he was not guilty of the horrible crimes they tried to pin on him. He was naive and is actions were inappropriate, but it was no way that anyone could convince me that he would physically or sexually harm a child. There are plenty of haters in this world and he had lot of hatred directed towards him because of his magnificence. I cried like a baby on Thursday and am still recovering. I love him and always will. May God be with him.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Shame 😦
LikeLike
Not speak ill of the dead, you say?
You can speak ill of the dead if they have done “ill” while they were alive. And there isn’t anything much more “ill” than molesting a kid.
To those who claim Michael Jackson was exonerated of the crime of sexual molestation of a minor, I would ask a simple question; would you allow your teen or pre teen son to spend a night at Jackson’s home unchaperoned?
I thought so.
Perhaps if you are eager to bestow such an honor on your son, you too wish to use your child for a gigantic payday as apparently some parents over the years did with their children, allowing them to stay with Jackson and being paid to keep quiet about abuse.
As for Jackson’s impact on the world, it says something truly awful about us that so many people would become rabid fans of this man of little talent. As a child with “The Jackson Five,” Michael had a nice little voice and was very cute shaking his hips like an adult (The sexualization of children Michael’s age when he performed with his brothers is another article entirely.). But as an adult, Jackson’s voice – OK for pop but no great shakes for any other milieu – was thin as a reed with an annoying false vibrato and a squeaky “hiccup” that supposedly drove female fans nuts.
His “dancing” was unique but repetitive. And I find it incredible that some would actually compare him to people with genuine talent like Gene Kelly or Fred Astaire. It goes without saying that neither of those two giants had to grab their crotch on stage to excite their fans.
Gregiry Hines was a superior dancer. Just about any Motown artist of the 60’s and 70’s was a superior singer. Michael Jackson, the total entertainment package, was a good showman but hardly an earth shattering talent. The outpouring of tributes to him today is a fascinating exercise in wishful – perhaps delusional thinking. Proclaiming anyone “King of Pop” and waxing lyrical about how his talent impacted the music world is a misnomer. It wasn’t Jackson’s “talent” that affected future pop artists but rather his “style” – a completely different kettle of fish altogether. It certainly was original but worthy of the kind of encomiums we are reading and hearing today? Not hardly.
In short, he was not a “no-talent” but rather a performer of limited gifts who, through savvy marketing, a recognition of trends (such as producing music videos that went far beyond concert performances that was standard fare for most MTV selections), and an eccentric personality, hit the world of pop music at exactly the right moment in history.
A comparison to Elvis Presley is useful here. Presely was also a performer of limited ability but hit America at exactly the right time in history when his shockingly unique style (and having Tom Parker, a man ahead of his time, managing his career), brought unusual success. Elvis was also a great showman and his later career was sustained by his aging female fans who never tired of watching him grind out the old favorites on a Las Vegas stage.
Perhaps it is the nature of pop music today to elevate these performers to heights undreamed of by real talents like Sinatra, Garland, Sammy Davis, Jr., and others whose pop stylings will last forever – even beyond the lifetimes of their fans. I say this not out of spite because I genuinely enjoyed Thriller, Billie Jean, and Beat It as well as other pop music of the day. Although limited in their artistic success, performers like Jackson reflected their times perfectly as all good pop music does. But does this mean that we should elevate Jackson to an artistic pedestal. Not hardly.
I sympathize with many in Jackson’s family today. Losing a brother or a son is always a tragedy. But I don’t sympathize with Jackson’s rabid fans. Losing oneself in the doings of someone who is deliberately manipulating your emotions is a form of narcissm. I suppose like most, I will mourn Jackson’s passing as I have many icons of my youth who have left us. Farrah Fawcett, who also died , elicits the same yearning in my heart to return to what in my misty memory were simpler times when responsibilities were few and I had the optimism and confidence that the whole world was before me for the taking.
I really wish the media weren’t making such a big deal of Jackson’s death. Other, more vital stories like Iran, health care, and the continuing power grabs of the Obama administration are given short shrift. But covering Jackson means a big audience so one can hardly fault the media for trying to cash in. They’d be crazy not to milk the story for all its worth.
In 100 years, will historians be amazed at the popularity of people like Jackson? Hopefully by then, we will have outgrown our compulsion to place these people on a mountaintop and all but worship their every move.
LikeLike
abagond i’m glad you made a page about michael because he’s the greatest. as for ken, what makes you think that michael can’t be compared to greats like the beatles and elvis? hell he was bigger than the both of them. he broke racial barriers that no other black artist could reach. every artist you can think of looked up to michael because of how he dance, how he gave it it’s all on stage and didn’t hold back. not only that he gave back to people that needed help and i don’t believe for a fact he touched little boys and i still don’t believe it. the media made michael look like a bad man and everyone to hate him but he kept coming back, proving to everybody that he’s not going nowhere. his thriller album is still the best seller of all time and elvis or any other great before his time can reach that. he made people love his music instead of the color of his skin and if it wasn’t for him, we wouldn’t have all the other singers like usher, chris brown, omarion, ciara, even janet. sure the media shouldn’t make a big deal about his death but it came such a shock to everyone because he was suppose to have a tour in london. he brought dance and broadway to music videos and now you have many artists that is doing the same thing. to me he is the king of pop, who did everything he could to be the best he could be. he was important in my life and i was sad to found out that he died. i feel nobody can reach the success of michael because what he did was unbelievable.
LikeLike
michael jackson will always be a superstar
LikeLike
ken that was way too long. I think michael jackson was one of the world’s best performers period. He was able to reach people and get them excited, he may not have had an operatic voice, but it was unique and he certainly was gifted. I’d like to see you go out there and do what he did…also Fred Astaire modeled himself off of Bill Robinson so he wasn’t exactly that original either.
LikeLike
I would ask a simple question; would you allow your teen or pre teen son to spend a night at Jackson’s home unchaperoned?
I have been asking that same question since I was 12, when the first accusation was made. I’ve been a fan of Michael since age 5, but I didn’t know him. He was, for all intents and purposes, a stranger. Why let your children stay unattended at a stranger’s house, superstar or not?
LikeLike
ditto peta, i wouldn’t but i also wouldn’t let my kid stay at any strangers house
LikeLike
He sold 750 million records worldwide – only Elvis Presley and the Beatles can even hope to match that.
Quite a few parallels (sometimes depressing) between Elvis Presley and Michael Jackson culminating with the possibility that heart failure due to excessive consumption of prescription drugs was ultimately the cause of their deaths. That and MJ was once married to Elvis’ daughter.
He was famous also for his dancing, making moves that no one thought possible, like the moonwalk.
Although MJ certainly made it famous, he was not the first to do the Moonwalk:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moonwalk_(dance)
He was American, he was black, he was universal. Even Imelda Marcos, she of the many shoes, cried at his death.
Universal? No doubt, has everyone seen the Filipino prison dances to MJ’s music?
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=12643181
LikeLike
He was a musical genius. His moves where effortless, he transcended generations and races and he had something that cannot be defined.
There is no way that his talent could be denied.
LikeLike
I don’t believe that Michael Jackson was a pedophile either. The saying, “never judge a book by its cover” couldn’t be more applicable in this context- the real “crazies” are seemingly conventional. Ted Bundy, Craigslist Killer, OJ Simpson, next door neighbors, high school teachers. What do you think Abagond?
Anyone who calls MJ overrated doesn’t know what he or she is talking about, lol. Even children in remote villages of the Third World know who Michael Jackson is. Can’t say the same for the Beatles or Elvis (Talented and huge as they were, I admit).
LikeLike
I doubt he was paedophile. You have to be some kind of evil to do that and, strange as he was, he did not strike me as being evil otherwise. I think he had a hard time drawing a line between being a boy and being a man.
Elizabeth Taylor, who understands him far better than anyone commenting here, stood behind him and I believe her.
No one leaves their children alone at night with a man they do not know and trust. So you have to wonder about the motives of those who did. And if a rich man did molest your son, would mere money from him satisfy you? It would make you even angrier.
LikeLike
Ken:
Only time will tell, of course, but given how universal Michael Jackson’s appeal was in his own time, I think he will outlast Judy Garland.
Also: I think even Gregory Hines would admit to Michael Jackson’s great dancing talent. Did he say something to the contrary?
LikeLike
Ken and some others on this site are obviously haters of the worst kind – I guess the truth hurts. The truth is that he was never convicted of child molestation and I am sure with all of the handringing people who would have loved to have locked him up and thrown away the key because he burst their little bubble of what great is (although I cannot deny the greatness of Judy Garland, Elvis, the Beatles, Frank Sinatra, etc. they did not have the universal and cultural appeal that Michael has and always will). You say his dance moves were repetitive, I agree. They are repetitive to all of the artists that have came behind him and tried to imitate him. And of course, you could not just put try to minimize Michael, you would have in some way include President Obama. You need to check yourself and not allow your bitterness and jealous to blind you to the truth.
LikeLike
Yeah Aba,
Michael was a known check writer. He used money to make his problems go away. If I could pick that up about him from reading countless depictions of him (via people who knew him), then how in the world couldn’t two families who spent over a year with him not know that?
It was all about money, pure and simple.
R.I.P. MJ.
LikeLike
I don’t think that one can support, objectively, a thesis that Michael Jackson’s body of work does not represent a significant milestone in the genre of popular song & dance performance. Suggesting that his was less significant that that of Fred Astaire or Gene Kelly is akin to suggesting that, say, the guitar work of Jimmy Page was less significant than that of Les Paul or Chet Atkins.
To a couple of specific points, Jimmy Page, like MJ, has a few signature riffs that one hears throughout his ouvre. This does not diminish the significance of his impact on his genre, nor does the fact that the rock music of Led Zeppelin was considered shocking, obscene or even demonic by older generations of listeners. Similarly, the fact that MJ’s dance moves incorporated some signature MJ-created dance moves, or sometimes included crotch grabs, does not diminish the fact that MJ pretty much single-handedly created a sub-genre of song & dance, one that has formed the template for popular rhythm-and-blues based song & dance (such as it is — there is a good argument that “song & dance” no longer exists in this day and age of Auto Tune) used to this day.
In fact, there are more similarities than differences between the careers of Astaire and MJ. Like Astaire, MJ began performing at a very young age. Like Astaire, MJ became known for innovation in his craft, both in terms of innovative, exciting, even daring new dance moves and in terms of creating choreography geared more to film — in Astaire’s case, musical movies; in MJ’s, music videos — than to live performance. Like Astaire, MJ was known for the precision and thorough integration of his choreographed dance routines. Like Astaire, MJ was known for his work ethic. Those gravity-defying dance moves, performed while singing, came only after hundreds of hours of foot-bleeding practice and hard work. Like Astaire, MJ’s work was focused on popular entertainment.
Granted, Astaire’s career spanned a longer time frame and thus his influence was felt by a larger number of people. Keep in mind, though, that in Astaire’s day the movie industry was heavily integrated both horizontally and vertically and its control over popular entertainment was very strong. Thus, a product like Astaire could be re-packaged and re-sold many, many times. In contrast, MJ’s ascendance took place in the nascent years of MTV, which was the beginning of the demise of the popular music industry’s vertical and horizontal integration. Video, and then increasingly affordable digital production and reproduction, has eviscerated the music industry’s stronghold on the creation and distribution of product, such that nowadays the one-hit wonder is far more common — and is virtually dictated by the market realities facing the industry — than the beloved veteran repeat performer. At the same time, our popular music industry in general has become increasingly focused on youthful performers. Teens and even pre-teens now dominate the genre.
As to whether I would allow my child an unchaperoned sleep-over with MJ, I would not allow my child an unchaperoned sleep-over with any single man. That does not go to whether MJ actually molested any boys. The truth of that issue will probably never be known. I personally do not believe that he did so. His large cash settlements do not resolve the issue. Rather, they speak to a highly private, very conflict-averse individual who allowed himself to be pimped and extorted rather than go through the public process of a trial. There were many parasites orbiting within MJ’s entourage who knew this.
As to the issue of our culture’s obsession with our popular media stars, I happen to agree that it distracts from important issues. This appears to be a pretty much universal fixture of human cultures, to the extent that most cultures adhere to a structure involving a formal royalty. American culture, lacking a formal royalty and being not particularly fervent about religion, creates ad hoc royalties, mostly within a genre of popular entertainment — Michael Jackson, Brett Favre, Paris Hilton, Michael Jordan, etc. Similarly, perhaps the most universal factor of human cultures, throughout history, religion and geography, is that we figure out ways to narcotize or intoxicate ourselves with various fermentations, extracts or distillates. This suggests to me that an element of the human condition is a desire for an escape from reality.
As to the media, keep in mind that it is a business whose goal is to make a profit. Period. “If it bleeds, it leads” will continue to be their motto so long as it sells advertising. The media has ignored the insidious shift in power from Congress to the Executive that has been taking place gradually through multiple administrations since Eisenhower, but accelerating a great deal with Bush43 and now Obama. One should not expect to look to them for insight or guidance. Having been involved from time to time with items reported in the media, by my experience “wildly inaccurate” is about the best they ever seem to achieve. Given their profit motive and their carelessness about accuracy or truth, one would be well advised to ignore them.
LikeLike
“The truth is that he was never convicted of child molestation and ”
RIGHT – cause rich guys never get away with committing crimes because they pay people off and can offerd top legal dogs who can twist and chew things until they no longer resemble what they started out being…
LikeLike
we shouldn’t be up here trashing michael but instead we should be celebrating and looking back all the positive things he’s done in his past. besides that boy, jordan chandler, who said michael molested him, lied about it and only did it because his father told him to do it and wanted his money. how sick. i understand that he’s in the spotlight 24-7 and he will get talked about just like every other celebrity, but in michael’s case, they should’ve left him alone and the media was going too far with it and basically ruined his career. now that he’s gone they want to be positive and say nice things he’s done but when he was alive, all they did was trash him non-stop, even when he said he wanted to be left alone. that’s a damn shame.
LikeLike
Michael Jackson you are the best. Loved you since I was three.
Rest in Peace brotha.
🙂
LikeLike
for comment number 3:
GET YOUR OWN MATERIAL YOU MORON, PLAGIARISM WILL BITE YOU BACK IN THE A S S
LikeLike
blatant plagiarist Ken merely copied and pasted his comment from a right-winged website. That just proves that Michael haters can’t even get their simpleton minds to come up with their paragraphs. Long live Michael Jackson – THE GREATEST MEGASTAR IN THE HISTORY OF MANKIND
LikeLike
Good catch!
Comment #3 by “Ken” comes from a piece by Rick Moran at American Thinker:
http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2009/06/michael_jackson_world_famous_p.html
LikeLike
his birthday is coming up. he would’ve been 51.
LikeLike
He has always been my favorite musical artist. Too bad he got so many bum raps. The most egregious were the false child molestation accusations. There were also the claims he lightened his skin. In fact, a story has come out that his son may be suffering from vitilligo as well:
http://abcnews.go.com/Health/Wellness/michael-jacksons-son-suffer-loss-pigment/story?id=11064783&page=1
LikeLike
Awesome singer, incredibly gifted in so many fields.
BTW, Abagond, contrary to what many believe, he was turning white due to vitiligo. I see people with vitiligo almost every day in India. it’s a bad skin disease and many(like one of my mother’s friends) prefer de-pigmenting the unaffected part of the skin over being patched for life.
LikeLike
Michael Jackson would have turned 60 years old today. RIP.
LikeLike