I wish I would have written this before Friday, but, seriously, I've always felt Michael Jackson was overrated. I'm not saying he wasn't a star; sure, absolutely, he was a star. But was he really this great influence on music that the media and others are claiming he is? Maybe he influenced dance, maybe he influenced folks on how to be a completely whacked-out celebrity head case, but his influence on music? Not so much.
Do you have any Michael Jackson music on your ipod? Okay, maybe you do, but do you have any music because you genuinely feel it's great music or do you have it because "Beat It" reminds you of high school? I love pop music but I have exactly one song with MJ ("ABC"). That means I have as many songs by Hanson as I do Michael Jackson. Yes, he sold a ton of albums,but that doesn't mean I need to hear any of it again. It feels, well, dated to me. Yeah, the videos were awesome, but we're not doing those much anymore. And how many of those albums did he sell because of the videos? I think we all forget how much MTV ruled the world in the mid-80s.
He was a celebrity. He was a media event and played that as much as he could. He clearly did not have a normal life. He was obviously out of his mind and may or may not have committed various crimes. He was interesting to the media, but not because of his music (unless it was because he couldn't make or sell albums at the same rate these days.) The media was there because most stories about him involved the phrase, "oh, you're not going to believe this one."
I go back to, yes, he was an influence on dance and mixing the dance with the pop music. He set the bar high for the number of records sold, but, no, not an influence on music.
As I walked to work this morning, Leonard Cohen sang "Hallelujah" to me, and I thought that if I had to choose between all of MJ's music (yes, including the Jackson 5) and this one song, this one song wins, every day of the week.
2 comments:
Your feelings about MJ noted, the Leonard Cohen song somehow seems even more appropriate, all around. There are contradictions everywhere, and hypocrisy, and then there is basic human emotion. You seem to have captured all of this with your post. Kudos.
I am totally Michael Jackson'd out by this whole media frenzy after his death. It doesn't even make sense to me after all the negative press in recent years.
I'd vote for Hallelujah too!
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