Thursday, June 25, 2009
Music / Crickets Rest in peace, Michael Jackson.
Posted by Miles Raymer on Thu, Jun 25, 2009 at 9:03 PM
I got a text from one of my friends: "Do you believe Michael Jackson died?"
Of course I didn't believe it. Or more correctly couldn't. Or more correctly can't.
Michael Jackson doesn't just up and die, right? Michael Jackson doesn't just have a heart attack and get driven in an ambulance to a hospital to die. It's too normal, maybe even too human.
The idea of Michael Jackson as a mythological figure isn't anything new. No one gets as universally famous as he did without attaining something close to demigod status. The many eccentricities that he personally confirmed only fed rumors of other, weirder eccentricities that may or may not have been real--and his unwillingness to definitively address them led the public to consider every tale equally true. In turn that made Jackson seem all the more mythological.
In the 80s and 90s certain countercultural types liked to riff on the concept of a Church of Elvis, but when you get right down to it, Elvis's mythos is too tame to support a church--even a fake church. Aside from the interior design at Graceland and the massiveness of his pill habit, there wasn't much supernatural or bizarre about the guy. As far as kinks go, girls in white cotton panties barely even registers. And who wouldn't like a deep-fried peanut butter and banana sandwich?
But Michael Jackson, on the other hand, has barely been recognizable as a human being for decades now. Even before he started looking like an alien, he seemed to act like one. You had to wonder what kind of person has a chimp for a best friend, fathers secret children that he hides behind veils, and frolics in a personal amusement park fraught with dangerous psychological implications ("Neverland") while dressed as an implausibly fabulous military dictator--which why not, because he was richer and more powerful than any banana republic autocrat.
He was too bizarre, too far off the map. It's telling that, though Jackson denied it, the rumor about him sleeping in a hyperbaric chamber never really went away. No one could quite believe that he was human.
Maybe it's because he was so inhumanly good at what he did. A lot of people literally couldn't believe the moonwalk when he debuted it. They thought it was a special effect. And while there were many Elvis wannabes who were better at being Elvis--or at least better at the singing and dancing and acting parts, if not the je ne sais quoi--no one was a better Michael Jackson than Michael Jackson. Countless people have been emulating him for decades now, and nobody's ever done it better.
The first person I thought about after I accepted the news was this Michael Jackson impersonator I remember performing every weekend in this one little alleyway in downtown Ann Arbor. He didn't really do the costume thing too seriously--no sequined military jacket or anything--but he had obviously studied Michael's movements so deeply and practiced them for so many unimaginable hours that every one of his moves, even simple gestures, was uncannily Michael-like. You could watch him for hours, literally. He was there all day--every Sunday, I think it was.
I don't know what to call that kind of devotion except religious. That impersonator's obvious spiritual dedication and the physically demanding form his worship took were like something out of a medieval monastery. He probably had more in common with holy men on the other side of the globe than with those of us who stopped on the sidewalk to watch him for a minute. I wonder how many more guys like that are out there, and I wonder what they're feeling tonight.
Comments (12)
Showing 1-12 of 12
like
dislike
I remember one day when I was working upstairs at Shaman Drum books I heard music playing down on the street and looked down to see "Michael" in the small traffic island at State and Liberty busting moves left and right. The spot was barely big enough for one person to stand (and dance) on, and traffic swerved frighteningly close on all sides. But he never flinched, he might as well have been dancing in his bedroom. I sat there on the window ledge watching for a good ten minutes. It was one hell of a show.
Agreed. And I think this is one case where the cliche truly applies. Jackson, if his biography is to be believed, and his outward appearance (as a reflection of his interior existence) taken into account, is definitely in a better place. R.I.P, easy as 1,2,3...
He was like a ghost while he was here. :( Ghostboy Shoulders rolling, Hands flat like fins Slicing air, in defiance Of everything But the beat-- A boy from Gary Never stopping The hoping, it’s there The wide-eyed wonderment Thrilling us We couldn’t stop wanting More of you And you opened yourself Because someone asked, And you were earnest in reply And pure And pale like a geisha A face constructed, Crumbling skin like the surface of the moon You could walk on And we watched, It *was* the watching, And the clucking of tongues, And the mean words That drove you away I’m convinced we killed you, Michael. Fifty years a dream, or a life, You were like a ghost that was a boy When you were here, And it seems unreal Because of everyone You were the one That seemed like you’d never go, That it would never happen to, That you’d never stop, A pretty young thing Forever alive In our souls.
Didn't care for the tabloid stuff but the dude did make some of the best music in the 80's. Thriller and Bad are truly essential albums. RIP.
A few years back I met a professor named Seth Clark Silberman who was hosting a conference at Yale on MJ in the media. Among the fascinating things he told me were: MJ had the pics taken of himself in the hyperbaric chamber and had employees send them to tabloids, he also spread the word about buying the Elephant Man's remains, all as a lead-up to the "Leave Me Alone" video. He'd also spoken with several people who had heard his real, several-octaves-deeper speaking voice. If this is to be believed he had a huge, self sabotaging hand in creating his weirdo alien myth.
The rebuilt nose? The aberrant behaviour? The disappearing money? Jacko could've given Steven Tyler instructions on how to throw it all away with excessive "use" of Bolivian marching powder. Believe it. But, oh what a talent. So sad to see it wasted. Nice piece, MR.
i dont believe how people keep talking about micheal jacksons death. its seems like people only begin to care about someone when they hear that they died.what about all of the soldiers in iraq that die everyday fighting for our country?peoples minds are all messed up..what is wrong with America??!!
Latest in Bleader
-
Blackhawks deep-sixed
The Blackhawks lose their sixth straight game
- Feb 9, 2012
-
Mart kills Art Chicago
Merchandise Mart cancels Art Chicago
- Feb 9, 2012
-
More I Saw Yous!
Missed connections from Reader readers
- Feb 9, 2012
- More »
Author Archives
-
This week on the B Side
Bye-bye to Megaupload and some LA-bound Chicagoans, hello to new music from Calez and Rockie Fresh, and more
- Feb 2, 2012
-
Three Beats: Alex White and Righteous Love repay a favor from God
Plus: Drummer Ben Billington goes solo with the synthy Quicksails, and MC ShowYouSuck throws another one-man pizza party
- Jan 5, 2012
-
A winter mix from Molly Soda
Tunes from a local Tumblr-er
- Jan 11, 2012
- More »
