Music review : Michael Jackson and kids tribute: He wasn’t alone. His longtime competition Prince sought to re-connect in a similar fashion, forming the New Power Generation with rapper, Tony M. Released just one month before* Dangerous*, the purple one’s Diamonds and Pearls* *exists as a companion piece, documents of blurring eras. As ’80s pop gave way to ’90s hip-hop, they sought to find their place in the re-configured landscape. Except while Prince predictably constructed his own insular unit, Jackson looked outwards to Riley, the hottest producer of the moment. Meanwhile Jackson’s sister Janet had recently delivered a hard-stomping R&B-pop classic in 1989’s Rhythm Nation 1814. Its influence on her older brother was so great that he even asked Jimmy Jam & Terry Lewis to produce Dangerous. Out of loyalty to Janet, they turned him down. According to his engineer, Bruce Swedien, Michael was searching for something “very street that young people would be able to identify with.”
On the afternoon of June 25th, you couldn’t walk across the street without hearing “Billie Jean” or “Don’t Stop ’til You Get Enough”. Everyone heard the news and they turned to the guy’s discography. Since a great deal of the population didn’t own the records anymore – or, as many of you born in 1984 probably experienced, were forbidden to listen to ’em around the early ’90s – places like Best Buy and/or iTunes witnessed a spike in sales. Within a month, any financial troubles Jackson had left behind were a thing of the past. What’s more, much like the rest of the population, record companies re-discovered his talent again, too. Big whigs signed contracts, projects were penciled in, and products were shipped left and right. Admittedly, and looking back, it’s one of the most impressive comebacks a musician’s ever had – if only it weren’t laced in so much tragedy. Then again, death’s also tricky.
Bad (1987): And now, we get to the heavy hitters. Bad is one of the defining albums of my childhood – one of my earliest memories is “proving” to my parents that I knew every word of the title track by singing it at the dinner table. Equal parts rock, pop and soul, Bad may have suffered from the Thriller curse in the 80s – pundits recognized it was good, but not AS GOOD as one of the best albums ever made, always an unfair criticism – but the album’s cavalcade of hits, and its influence on pop and R&B at the time, cannot be denied. Bad may not have aged as well as some of MJ’s other top-shelf releases but that doesn’t make it any less groundbreaking. Forgotten Favorites: “Speed Demon,” “Just Good Friends,” “Another Part of Me”.
Michael Jackson family: Mocienne Petit Jackson’s (Michael Jackson’s daughter) books are now available in french! For our dutch readers: We komen meer te weten over de vele traumatische ervaringen van de hoofdpersoon, haar depressies en talrijke worstelingen om alle ellende te verwerken en achter zich te laten. De schrijfster geeft ons duidelijkheid door middel van verschillende flashbacks. Mocienne blijft het reilen en zeilen van Michael Jackson voortdurend volgen. Zo komt zijn – vermeende – kindermisbruik voorbij, komen de vele rechtszaken die er rondom zijn persoon hebben plaatsgehad aan bod, zijn twee mislukte huwelijken, zijn metamorfose, de geboorte van zijn drie kinderen en – last but not least – zijn voortijdige dood. Mocienne komt langzaam maar zeker tot de verbijsterende conclusie dat de maffia een grote en destructieve rol in zijn (én haar) leven heeft gespeeld, waarbij dient te worden aangetekend dat zijn familie, en in het bijzonder zijn moeder en vader, in dit opzicht veel te verwijten valt. Tot op heden heeft Mocienne geen enkele medewerking van de familie Jackson gekregen om een DNA-test te doen, teneinde te kunnen bewijzen dat zij wérkelijk Michaels dochter is. Lees het boek hier Michael Jackson Books.