Michael Jackson Makes Us All Look Bad
Musically, I don’t give a shit that Michael Jackson’s dead. Had he never sung or recorded a note I doubt my life would be any the worse, and as a bonus I would never have had to grit my teeth through those shitty Jackson 5 numbers that were forever being played in godawful student nightclubs during my youth. So, erm, yes. Not that fussed, although I accept that a lot of people are fussed and I am not criticising them for their reaction, assuming it’s from a purely musical perspective. As a friend of mine recently reminded me – I have no idea how similar revelations about, say, Bob Dylan might affect my perception of his music. Confusion, I think, is the only word that springs to mind.
Michael Jackson was barely about the music, though. He was about the circus: the madness, the latent racism, the paedophilia, and that bizarre combination of Messiah Complex and twisted self-loathing.
I have never understood why black people weren’t more offended by his desperate attempts to deny that he was one of them. He turned himself into a simpering, brittle white girl and I personally have heard very, very little condemnation of the racism that seems to me to embody. Then again, maybe he wasn’t racist exactly, maybe he was just plain nuts.
For a society that villifies paedophilia to the extent that both British and American society do, I am pretty amazed at how little impact Jackson’s dalliances in that vice seem to have tarnished his image. I have done some very, very superficial research and there seems to be no concrete proof around that he actually did commit acts of extreme sexual assault, although little doubt that he definitely transgressed at the minor end of that sliding scale, so I guess it is possible that he was so spectacularly, childishly naive as to believe that sharing a bed with little boys and plying them with alcohol could possibly be interepreted generously, and that he never actually did anything beyond weird. Possible. Just.
It seems, however, perfectly valid to read about the chain of events surrounding his various court cases and interpret them in the following light: that he paid twenty million dollars to ensure that his rape of young boys never made it as far as the courts. Because of confidentiality orders and the difficulties of actually establishing the truth in such cases, I guess we’ll never know.
But this is where Jackson’s ghoulish face becomes something of a mirror held up to our own society, because given the aforementioned hysteria surrounding the barest suspicion of paedophilia, this whole thing obviously stinks of double standards. Parents, even after it began to sound suspiciously like he actually was interfering with the boys he invited to his crazy ranch, would still shunt their little darlings into harm’s way. As I said, it’s possible he was actually much more innocent than it would appear, but fuck me you wouldn’t make such a high stakes bet with the rest of your own child’s emotional life, would you?
So in a world where you’d expect him to be run out of town by an angry mob as if he were a Newport paediatrician, how did Jackson escape? And how the hell did he continue to have young lads fed to him like some sort of mythical kiddie-fiddling dragon creature? Well I can only assume it is the human animal’s remarkable instinct to spinelessly capitulate to people in positions of power and influence – the same pathetic instinct which causes us to worship celebrity in its own right, irrespective of its being linked to any sort of perceptible worthiness or talent which might render it legitimate.
Jackson got a remarkably easy ride for what looks for all the world like full-blown paedophilia and was definitely at bare minimum a compulsion to indulge in wildly inappropriate behaviour involving young children. This was both before and after his death and and it reflects pretty fucking dismally on society that this should be the case. It reflects even worse when you compare it to the hysterical over-reaction we tend to get in the other direction when the accused person has the naivety not to have taken the precaution of becoming ludicrously famous beforehand.
Is it that Jackson’s evident insanity reveals that we all secrectly know that paedophilia is actually a malfunction of the brain which needs to be treated as a disease, rather than some manifestation of inherent evil in the motivations of the individuals it afflicts? And that maybe we embark on our paedophile witch-hunts out of some ugly combination of a predilection for mob-violence and a desperate need to elevate ourselves by viciously destroying others? Just maybe. Because it was pretty clear, I suppose, that if Jacko was a paedo then it was because he was sick, not evil. Or was it just because his fame turned us into a society of simpering sycophants who would excuse anything of the rich and famous, partly because they can buy the justice system, but mostly just because they are rich and famous?
Either way, our reactions to the man and his mores doesn’t show us in a very good light at all.
From his perspective, however, I suppose you could just about argue that his death was probably, in balance, a good thing. He was artistically spent and his soul had been devouring itself for years, a horrifying act of self-mutilation which he displayed to us all whenever we cared to look, in the form of his deformed and frankly cadaverous face. When I saw that he was dead I was frankly relieved for the man. Not because he ‘deserved to die’ in any sense, simply because I could see no evidence that had he lived any longer, be it another five years or another forty, that his life was going to do anything other than get steadily worse until even if he wasn’t actually dead yet, he quite probably would wish himself so.
Fairport Convention – Crazy Man Michael
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cough…..great song mind
I always think it’s strange how Michael Jackson hasn’t been on receiving end of the same aort of public revulsion as Gary Glitter has.
I suspect it may be down to the fact that Jackson has been presented in the media as some sort of deity or royalty; “The Prince Of Pop”, whereas Glitter seemed to be considered a bit down-market, a bit of a clown, even at the peak of his popularity.
Either way, I think we can rest assured that Glitter won’t receive this kind of public adulation and commemoration when he eventually shuffles off his mortal coil.
The thing you say about paedophilia being a sickness and not evil is definitely an interesting question. On my year out before uni I briefly worked at the branch of the Probation Office in Bradford that was partly involved in rehabilitation of sex offenders into the community. These guys were old and had mostly done their time a while ago. One of the sessions they would do with a trained therapist involved producing flow charts of their thought processes leading up to one of these acts. I got to type up these charts.
It was terrifying. The entire thought process, when taken outside context, seemed entirely logical. It was only when you remembered what the end result of this process was, that it became completely morally unacceptable. But these men just didn’t have that final level of reasoning, the ability to step out of the thought process and see the act from outside. The therapy was mostly about teaching them to do this. Whether you want to call that a form of mental illness, whether it’s delusional or just faulty reasoning would need someone far more qualified than me to work out. But it was something that’s chilled me signficantly whenever I remember it, and that was nearly ten years ago now.
I can see how mouse brains would have seemed more appealing, after that.
NineBall – I am not a big Jackson fan, musically, but even I would concede that he was orders of magnitude more talented than Gary Glitter – just watching him dance can tell your that. That must have a lot to do with it.
http://www.canceltheastronauts.co.uk
If you’ve not seen this you should. I was no jacko fan, but even I appreciate this.
I saw that actually. It really is a fucking inspired piece of writing. ‘Still-quite-black Michael Jackson’.
“Had he never sung or recorded a note I doubt my life would be any the worse” – really? I could prolly have lived without him too (except for Off The Wall, that record’s amazing), but I’m pretty sure there are umpteen bands I really rate that wouldn’t sound that way had the (really freaky) Jackson Dad decided he wanted all his offspring to become, say, accountants.
Love, hate, indifference, whatever – the man was unquestionably a titan in music for forty years.
Oh, and a nonce, obv.
I think Euan was referring you to Matthews cover of ‘Beat It’, Matthew.
I did always tend to believe the idea that MJ was some sort of monumentally naive manchild.
You’re right that it’s odd that he wasn’t more vilified after the initial furore died down. Each time.
I suppose it’s sort of easier to think of him as someone whose emotional development had stalled in late childhood, and genuinely didn’t think there was anything wrong with hanging out with kids, rather than as some sort of evil child molester.
Christ knows what his die hard fans thought. Presumably they didn’t think he was crazy or a sex beast. Just a really sweet dancer.
I seem to have done something wrong and lost my little rocket. Sob.
Michael – depends what email address you use to sign in. Use yours, and no rocket ship, use info@canceltheastros and Bob’s yer uncle.
Alex, you’re right of course, I know. I guess I just meant to say that my lack of emotional commitment to his music probably plays a large role in my indifference towards his death.
But as Neil Meursault has again reminded me, no-one on Earth knows what it was like to be him. He was a showbiz star from the time he had his first ever memories, and pretty much no other single person on Earth has ever had to experience that sort of perspective on life.
Being a child star has destroyed a pretty considerable number of people. It should be fucking banned. Get your damned child out of the media spotlight before we take the damn thing off you, you mad fuckers.
Does this include the Williams Brothers? Their Dad was pretty damned determined that they were going to be good at tennis, to the point of Jacksonesque mania.
I disagree with a lot of this Matthew. The reason he was never villified as much as Gary Glitter was because the allegations were never proven. He was, in fact, acquitted by a jury, people who spent a helluva lot more time thinking about the facts of the case than any of us have. Yet you still feel able to say “definitely at bare minimum a compulsion to indulge in wildly inappropriate behaviour involving young children”? That’s a big leap, and not one that can be made by asserting that he was weird, generally, therefore.
And I won’t accept any “no smoke without fire” argument either – you cannot extrapolate guilt from the prosecution of a rich black man in America! (Even if he has had plastic surgery to look white).
From what I’ve read, Michael Jackson never had a proper childhood, so he remained stuck in a childish ego state throughout adulthood. You meet these people sometimes, who behave entirely and always like children – I know a girl who is 19 going on 9 – usually because they had some traumatic experience during childhood that they were never able to properly move on from. So MJ built a home called Neverland (!), he had portraits of himself painted as Peter Pan (!!), he had a fairground in his garden (!!!), and he invited kids around to play because he never had any friends when he was a kid.
He said this when he was 23 – “Even at home, I’m lonely. I sit in my room and sometimes cry. It is so hard to make friends, and there are some things you can’t talk to your parents or family about. I sometimes walk around the neighborhood at night, just hoping to find someone to talk to. But I just end up coming home.” Is that not heartbreaking? After the Jackson 5 and Off The Wall, just before Thriller, millions of fans, no friends.
So yes, I think he was incredibly naive. I think he was seriously developmentally challenged (and if you’ve seen that recent interview on CNN with his dad Joe, you’d understand why – because he’s a sociopath!). If you remember, I think it was the Bashir interview, when he’s asked about sex – and MJ kinda whimpers, giggles, puts his hand to cover his mouth, looks away. Like a wee boy, he’s embarrassed just to hear the word! He barely knew what it was. His kids are white FFS!
Anyway. His musical legacy we’ll leave for another time (suffice to say I disagree with you there too).
“Yet you still feel able to say “definitely at bare minimum a compulsion to indulge in wildly inappropriate behaviour involving young children”? That’s a big leap, and not one that can be made by asserting that he was weird, generally, therefore.”
It came out unchallenged in court, as far as I am aware, that he fed young boys wine, calling it Jesus juice, and shared a bed with them. That is the basis on which I say ‘wildly inappropriate’ because I think that behaviour, irrespective of whether or not anything else happened, was wildly inappropriate.
I don’t think many other people could have managed to pull off that kind of behaviour without getting themselves into considerably more trouble than he did. I didn’t mention Gary Glitter, and I don’t think it’s that great a comparison.
And as you say, I think it’s fairly clear that even if he was a paedophile then is because he was sick, not evil, as I said, but this raises a lot of questions.
Is the general public excusing him because he’s famous, which doesn’t seem an outlandish statement to make. Or are we simply being sensible with him just because it’s so obvious that he wasn’t evil, he was just mental, in which case why do we get up the burning torches for everyone else who faces similar, or lesser, accusations? Because they are less famous? Because we can’t understand that they might be sick too? Because they are weaker than us and therefore easy targets for our self-righteous mob instinct?
Going back to the title of the post, either way, Michael Jackson makes us look bad. He himself, for various good reasons including all the ones you mentioned, was just mentally ill. We, on the other hand, think we are not. And yet our collective reaction to Michael Jackson highlights, for me, an awful lot of very unpleasant questions about human society.
Ally, I have no real sympathy for the man himself, but I am not sure we are actually disagreeing all that much aside from that.
1. “The jury of eight women and four men ranged in age from 21 to 79; eight were parents and six acknowledged they were fans of Jackson’s music” …. “Investigators described finding smut in Jackson’s bedroom, magazines like Hustler Barely Legal, with both the singer’s and accuser’s fingerprints.” ….from MSNBC
2. “Prosecutors introduced into evidence sexually explicit pictures of naked boys as well as magazines with titles like “Barely Legal,” featuring female models who appear younger than 18.” from the New York Times
3. “Mr. Jackson kept in his bedroom a lifelike mannequin, which someone had lewdly defaced with a marker, of an 8-year-old girl said to be a relative.” from the New York Times
4. “Bastone has reviewed transcripts of police interviews and grand jury testimony in the case.
The boys say Jackson plied them with alcohol, and their account was credible enough for the grand jury to couple each of the four molestation charges with a charge of administering an intoxicating agent. “They’re quoting brands of booze,” says Bastone. “Skye Vodka. Bacardi Rum. Jim Beam Whiskey.”
Sneddon will also try to boost the boys’ credibility with evidence seized during the searches of Neverland. “They found things in a lot of places,” says Bastone. They scored some excellent material.”
The material probably can’t convict Jackson on its own, but it confirms salient details of the boys’ stories. For example, investigators reportedly found a briefcase full of pornography.
“It’s no crime to own it. But the fact is that the kids said it was there,” says Bastone. “And they found it where they said it was supposed to be.” from CBSNews
That’s enough for me to consider this person as having intent to engage in sexual acts with children/young people. And no, calling him “mentally ill” does not suffice. That’s all I have to say on the matter.
If it’s not a mental illness, Tart, what is it?
I don’t mean ‘give him some pills and send him to cub scouts’ mentally ill, I mean quite clearly his brain was not wired in the normal manner. But then, I’d say that of most psychotic or sociopathic criminals – what is it other than a simple misfiring of the brain?
That’s no excuse, and isn’t some sort of plea to avoid punishment, more that if you can’t accept that they see the world in a fundamentally different way to you or I, then how can you hope to treat them, or even just to effectively prevent them causing damage future?
You can’t lock them all up because I doubt there’s a clear dividing line between people who are clearly dangerous and people who are not – there never are in nature.
…..it’s a sexual preference….saying it’s a mental illness gives the illusion that there is cure….just lock the fuckers up, beat them up once in a while, and throw away the key cos there is no cure.
Redneck Tom
“Parents, even after it began to sound suspiciously like he actually was interfering with the boys he invited to his crazy ranch, would still shunt their little darlings into harm’s way. As I said, it’s possible he was actually much more innocent than it would appear, but fuck me you wouldn’t make such a high stakes bet with the rest of your own child’s emotional life, would you?”
Amen, I tried to make this point to one of those die hard Micky J fans. She went mental at me before bursting into tears.
“Love, hate, indifference, whatever – the man was unquestionably a titan in music for forty years.”
Fuck right off. He made noises, danced backwards & sang over other people’s compositions.
“titan”? My black arse.
I heard a BBC correspondant who had visited the Neverland ranch a few years ago state that alongside the toys, treehouses, games and other childlike indulgences around the house, Jackson had installed statues of naked pre-pubescent boys in the hallway.
The journalist said she had difficulty equating their presence with the image Jackson was promoting of himself as as a childlike Peter Pan figure, and I share her opinion that they suggest something more sinister.
In this case, coupled with the anecdotal evidence Tart supplied, which is already in the public domain, I think there’s far too much smoke here for there to be no fire at all.
Whether or not Jackson fits the current generally accepted stereotype the tabloid press would offer us for a paedophile is a different question; and while the nature of activity that Jackson actually indulged in with the the young boys he had to stay can now only be speculated about, it remains there is certainly something sinister about the whole situation.
Yes, I think we have to agree that he behaved inappropriately at the very least and was a supremely fucked up human being. His forays into facial reconstruction, his massive debt, his outbidding of McCartney for the beatles back cat all show that this was no saint.
I think that because it wasn’t proven in a court of law a certain ambiguity remains that differentiates him very slightly from Gary Glitter, even if there seems little doubt in reality that he was guilty, some will choose to reserve benefit of the doubt until that is legally proven (others will have little faith in the US justice system).
I can see why people prefer to unambiguously despise Jackson and all he stood for and all he did. I can see why that would be easier, because it puts you clearly in the morally superior side to the deluded fans who still claim he was a paragon of virtue despite all evidence to the contrary.
However in my opinion, despite the monster he became, Jacko made some brilliant music. Whether he wrote all of it himself really doesn’t matter, neither did Elvis, yet if you appreciate the skills of vocal and physical performance at all, you can’t honestly deny the talent and star quality of either when they were at their peak. Unless of course you are blinded by the negative aspects of his behaviour – in which case might you not be equally as deluded as the mad Jacko fans, choosing to see only the negative whilst they choose to see only the positive?
I read somewhere he changed his face because he didn’t want to grow up looking like his father. Yet ironically it seems that he focused too much on the superficial and instead grew up continuing the cycle of child abuse (in perhaps a different form to his father). And I agree that superficially changing his race is hugely disturbing and damaging, whatever the psychological motivations.
C’mon admit it Matthew, you secretly love Beat It!
Mr. Dyran, give it a few months after the circus leaves town later today &, like I said before, all those families & kids who have been paid off will start finding themselves book deals & Oprah interviews.
I mean, come on, be serious. There have been far too many documented coincidental caches of evidence suggesting some form of sexual deviance towards children dogging his entire adult life (as far back as pre-Thriller).
The problem is MJ lived in a world of no consequences, due to money/sycophants/public idolisation (based on media manipulation)/etc. This led to MJ’s bulletproof persona & in turn led to his very odd public experimentation with minors (Culkin, Jordie, Feldmen).
There’s evidence of sexual abuse of Wade Robson and Brett Barnes, who met Jackson after writing him a fan letter in the early ’90s. Witnesses have testified under oath that Jackson touched, kissed, hugged and inserted his hand into children’s pants. Jackson was also charged with molesting Gavin Arvizo, plying him with alcohol & conspiring to hold him & his family captive.
The judge in the case: “I am going to permit testimony with regard to the sex offences and alleged pattern of grooming leading up to the sex offences.”
Whereas I understand there’ll be the odd bit of copycat money-hungry accusations from idiot parents, I genuinely don’t think many (screwball or otherwise) parents would consider putting their child through the public wringer in such a way for the sake of money or notoriety.
Conclusion? He was fiddling kids. No two ways about it.
“Whether he wrote all of it himself really doesn’t matter, neither did Elvis, yet if you appreciate the skills of vocal and physical performance at all, you can’t honestly deny the talent and star quality of either when they were at their peak.”
You are seriously not comparing Elvis & Michael Jackson are you? Jesus Christ!
DC, I don’t think it’s that outlandish a comparison. Both became massively famous because of a remarkable talent, both ended up completely fucked because of “living in a world of no consequence” which was a direct result of that massive fame and financial success.
I’m guessing you disagree with the “remarkable talent” part though
Titan is just a matter of preference, isn’t it. He influenced music which for the most part I don’t particularly like all that much, so I don’t feel I can particularly judge. But I do like some of his songs quite a bit, considering, and the people who work in that area of music hold him up as such a legend that I kind of feel I have to take my cue from them.
I prefer him to Elvis, whose performances of other people’s songs do little to nothing for me.
The point about ‘no consequences’ is a good one as well, and come back to the point about elevating celebrity worship to some sort of bizarre fetish, like we have.
How is Amy Winehouse not more rigorously prosecuted for so obviously having plenty of drugs most of the time? How was Jacko allowed to go so publically and so obviously mad, when anyone else would have been locked up for their own good? What did Kate Moss have to do to be searched on suspicion of possessing drugs – snort a line off a copper’s helmet? And how many people do Lindsay Lohan or Paris Hilton have to hit with their cars whilst drunk and/or high before they are given the kind of prison sentence that anyone else would get under those circumstances?
No wonder he indulged his predilection for little boys so recklessly, to whatever extent – he grew up in a world where he was never accountable for anything he did, and nor was anyone else with any sort of fame.
Nice try but no cigar Milo
Elvis was a phenomenon. He changed public perception/appreciation of music, full stop. He changed musicians’ perception of music right around the world. He changed the way musicians were allowed to be filmed & how they could act on TV. He changed music on TV. He became the very reason we have a lot of the bands & their music we have today.
MJ made noises, danced backwards & sang over other people’s compositions.
He did absolutely nothing of any worth whatsover for black music — Qunicy Jones takes that credit for the composition/etc. – whereas the likes of Prince contributed staggering leaps forward.
MJ is a total fraud by comparison.
Sure, both Elvis & MJ are conduits of other people’s talents to an extent, but Elvis could play guitar & piano & wrote music.
There are later life comparisons (tanking career, pills, dying in the shitter), but these details have nothing to do with the making of both men.
I fucking hate Prince.
To paraphrase an earlier and unrelated comment: emotionless bawshank.
I find it really difficult to appreciate the legendary status of musicians whose music fails to make any sort of emotional connection with me whatsoever. I know this is a blind spot of mine, not a fault of Prince’s, but I listen to it and hear nothing at all.
Thing is mate Prince influenced all the contemporary incarnations of Rap, Hip Hop, Soul, RnB, Funk, Rock, Dance, Disco, Pop etc. etc. etc.
Personal taste doesn’t come into it.
It’s a widely acknowledged fact.
“I find it really difficult to appreciate the legendary status of musicians whose music fails to make any sort of emotional connection with me whatsoever.”
I have to say I have the same problem with the Beatles, which I have always felt a bit embarrassed about!
becky – don’t feel embarrassed by that. i’m with you. no connection whatsoever. same applies to elvis, the stones and prince and michael jackson for that matter.
I largely agree with Drunk Country about Prince, although there are only a dozen or so of his songs that I particularly enjoy, and they’re not really the famous pop hits.
Prince is a remarkable talent as a musician (a true multi instrumentalist), a songwriter, performer (his stage presence and dance moves rival those of Michael Jackson, don’t they? Maybe Jackson would eventually win a “dance-off”, but not by much) and musical innovator.
Jackson wasn’t a songwriter (of any worth), musician or musical innovator. He picked up the phone when he wanted any of that in his music.
Or more likely in the case of the “classic” albums, Quincy Jones put all that in place and then picked up the phone to Michael when they were ready for him to come and screech over the top of it all.
In relation to Elvis Presley, you have to take into account the environment they first appeared in. There was nothing to compare Elvis to when he first arrived, he broke the rules and the conventions. He first ploughed the road which allowed all other forms of to follow.
Michael Jackson’s musical legacy, what there is of it, is all but meaningless in comaprison.
to paraphrase a comment i made on a different media pertaining to a different issue (but which still holds up well with regards to this debate)
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR
RRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH
NineBall – exactly. ON the fucking nail.
I also want to point out that at the age of, what, 7 (was it?) when Jackson was being forced into a band against his will Prince was already playing piano & writing music.
Prince’s 2nd album more or less created the Minneapolis sound back in the ’70s. His third album defined it. His Fourth & Fifth albums re-defined it for the ’80s. Then there was his Sixth album: Purple Rain…
Whether you liked his music or not, recognise his influence or not, he shat all over Jackson.
why do people have to be right all the time?
i kinda like the music of Elvis, MJ and Prince…..is that ok?
Shut up Chutters. You like Passion Pit ferchrissakes!
RCC, I don’t think it’s a matter of liking or not liking.
I ranted about Presely’s influence, but I should have made it clear that I don’t really like his music. I certainly don’t own any.
Like I said, I only like a dozen or so Prince songs, which isn’t many considering how much stuff he’s put out.
And I actually do like a couple of Jackson songs, in a pass-me-by-without-bothering-me kind of way. Billie Jean and Wanna Be Starting Something are great tunes, for example.
But debating the influence they’ve individually had on music over the years is completely different, and whether I like them or not doesn’t matter in the grand scheme of things..
have you lot goner wildly off topic as always. no way!
Again, on the nail Dyran.
I don’t necessarily like all of Elvis’ output, but I recognise his influence; same with MJ (I happen to think Man In The Mirror, The Way You Make Me Feel, amongst a handful of others, are genuinely good songs). As for Prince, I don’t believe he’s really done a single decent thing since The Gold Experience (his earlier BatDance/Man OST is just fucking dreadful & heralded the decline in quality control).
Euan, Jackson’s dead. Move on.
can someone flush the toilet please, i’m sick of this shite
Oh be quiet you big Northern babby. This is what it’s all about! It’s a blog! It’s opinions! Passion Pit are shite!
don’t cough on me you lurgy infected so and so!!!
Toad will you please quarantine DC.
Passion Pit….one of the albums of the year…..FACT!!!!
Opinion, Chutters. Opinion.
You know I love you you great big Geordie Fozzie Bear you.
Actually, just an aside, but why o fucking why are blogs asking people/doing their own ‘Best 10 Albums of 2009 …so far’ lists? Pointless fucking waste of time.
Michael Jackson is dead?
Drunk Country is funny.
Couple things though – ‘titan’ is the only word I could think of that meant ’sold squillions of records and influenced shitloads of artists’. Because, like it or not, he did. Prince did it more/better, except was more musically talented and considerably more priapic, bless the dwarfish little pervert.
Elvis can fuck right off though, the redneck cheeseburger munching hip-swiggling cunt.
All those genres you mentioned mean little or nothing to me, DC, so while you’re welcome to call Prince a legend if you want, I still think his music is rotten and for all I can accept the fact that what you are asserting might well be true, I just have nothing like the knowledge of any of those genres to be persuaded in any meaningful sense whether one way or the other.
And I find him personally odious, which doesn’t help.
i never said i was open to fucking him!
well, I respect your position & agree to differ.
back to MJ: the memorial; is fucking hilarious & frightening at the same time. Expect a full reaction in this week’s show, & I’m not pulling punches.
It’s not that I’m disagreeing with you exactly. I can’t, really. It’s more blank incomprehension.
C’mere & gimme a hug…
Many musicians have done things which I find utterly distasteful. I wish Siouxsie Sioux hadn’t worn a swastika, though I am repapred to concede that if she did think like a Nazi, the band later played benefit gigs for the Italian Communist party. I wish that Bill Wyman had not slept with an underage girl (Mandy Smith), that Elvis Costello hadn’t made that stupid remark about Ray Charles (though Ray Carles forgave him), that that many hip-hop artists and reggae artists (amongst many genres, to be fair) would not make homophobic remarks, that pete Townshend hadn’t been so bloody stupid where he was looking on the internet…where do we draw the line? Paedeophilia as a concept makes me and most, if not all people on here bloody uncomfortable.
I respect Jackson for the music he produced, even if he had faded from greatness. I think as a person he’d suffered a horrendous life, and yet behaved in a way that was suspect as best, unforgiveable at worst. I’m trying to separate the two in my mind.
As for the ‘tribute’ which makes Priness Diana’s funeral seem quiet, the less said the better, probably.
Regarding Prince…a genius for his first decade of recording, patchy subsequently.
Favourite comment so far from the many grauniad threads – “He’s not the messiah, he’s a very naughty boy”
thank you so much for putting into words one of the strands that makes up my white-heat headache regarding Michael Jackson – a headache i’ve battled for years and might leave me frothing at the mouth since little of what I manage to say on the topic tends to be taken seriously as if i am the boy who cried wolf – or trying to point out that the emperor’s new clothes are in fact his birthday suit but this time no-one believes me. I began to worry I was alone. thanks again for this.
Well I sure hope none of you guys are lawyers (!?) if anyone thinks the possession of an entirely (not barely) legal pornographic magazine is somehow relevant evidence in a child sex abuse case. So, shit, I guess we’d all better check our HDDs for little titties then? That’s exactly the kind of straw-grasping nonsense American prosecutors come up with when they know they don’t have a strong case – paint him as a sexual deviant of any kind (he buys porno!) and it’s only a small step to paedophilia. Child-sized mannequins I don’t know about, but there’s certainly enough room in the case for reasonable doubt, and that’s why he wasn’t convicted and why nobody’s dwelling on it now.
Anyway, I think the point Matthew was making underneath this all – about celebrities generally getting away with more than regular people by dint of their fame – is a good one. (R. Kelly is really the one we should all be up in arms about – he was acquitted of pissing on a 12 year old girl despite the… video of him clearly pissing on a 12 year old girl! I’m happy to accept that as relevant evidence.) Also, it seems to me we often expect less of famous people, in that the slightest kindness shown by them is often blown out of proportion. One of the family’s lawyers was eulogising last week about how kind the Jackson family was and used as his prime example – when he went to visit them, and there wasn’t a chair for him, so Janet went into another room to get him a chair! Yeah, totally normal thing for a host to do, but he seemed to think it was the sign of an extraordinarily kind heart or something. Clearly Jacko wasn’t the saint he’s been painted as by some, but those people are crazy. And, because every-other-person in the world was a Michael Jackson fan, obviously he’s going to have a lot of crazy fans too. And a few witty, intelligent, good-looking, opinionated-but-fair fans too eh Matthew?
MUSICALLY – the best album any Jackson ever released is obviously Control. And yes, Prince outstripped MJ in practically every way, but I think you can say MJ was one of the most influential pop stars ever even though it wasn’t particularly because of musical innovation or whatever (like you’d say about Prince). In the same way as Oasis were by far the most influential British band of the 90s, because they were SO popular, MJ’s been influential simply because everyone on the planet knows who he is and can sing one of his songs. It doesn’t matter what you do, that kind of fame is influential. It’s just a different kind of “influence” than most of us music geeks are used to talking about (how many people can sing a Pavement song, cmon now). But, songs like Thriller and Beat It and Billy Jean and Bad and Man In The Mirror and Smooth Criminal and Don’t Stop Til You Get Enough and Rock With U… aren’t songs like this why we like pop music? Isn’t their ineffable genius the same as The Beach Boys’ and Blondie’s and The Smiths’ and Kate Bush’s and and WHOEVER wrote the bloody song!? Yes, yes it is.
I’ve said too much.
Actually, I think you’ve said it very well. It’s always a fucking novel with you, mate, no wonder you’re a writer. But this is long, but good.
I was indeed talking about how drastically differently we behave as a species depending upon the fame of the person we were accusing of [insert heinous crime here].
I also agree with you about his influence on pop music: it doesn’t really have to be down to who wrote the songs, otherwise all classic folk performers are out the window.
What I do disagree with is the extent of his dubious behaviour. The point about owning suspicious porn is a very good one – it means, on its own, nothing – but I get the impression, in an entirely non-rigorous and non-absolutist sort of way, that there was a bit more going on than that.
Either way though, nicely expressed, for a man who clearly wrote that comment after coming home from the pub.
But if you ever call Oasis influential in my company again I may have to stab you.
Well…Oasis were influential, it’s just that they influenced loads of average, shite, rubbish bands to make records our lives would be better off without hearing. It started with Northern Uproar and went downhill from there. Added to which their own work has been fairly non-essential since about 1997, give or take the odd track. Though much less painful listening than Nickleback.
So what if I gave children drugs and wine. drugs ah alright ken! I never finger banged a fucking child though yah sick cunts wi just just got blootered and listened to the grateful dead and played miss packman, fuck all to do round my way. I didnt know that little cunt was out to get my stash. YOu dont think I made no good music do ya?? listen pal my music lives on… your music (and I know your all musicians) is all pish whiney indie shimdy folky pooptube toss. So fuck youz all.
Mathew-just happened to be searching the web and came across your post. What a “hot ass mess” you must be. Talk about self loathing? Only someone with no self esteem or regard for human life would post something a twisted and obviously uninformed as you have in regards to MJ. So you knew him personally huh? You had to have in order to come to the conclusion and inform an opinion such as the one you have formed. Ignorance is the most severe for of self abuse there is, and to put yourself in judgment of someone else rather they be a homeless unknown individual or a media named superstar. I sure hope that in these months that have followed since you posted this twisted mess you have stepped back, try to inform yourself or just simply educated yourself as to why it is never a good idea to sit in judgment of others. If not let me help you “judge not least ye be judged” that sums it up. Have a nice, non famous, self riteous,predisposed to judgments, self proclaimed, non faith having life.
P.S.
Please don’t ever try to wonder why black people or any other group or race does not think or agree as the so called majority or yourself does…because you will never get any where assuming that they do not…as a matter of fact try not thinking at all because it seems to have side effects that are very unpleasant for you.
Why thank you, I am indeed hot.
This blog is populated by redneck hillbillies! Go watch some Nascar you fucking Bufords!