What an interesting week each of us has had and its time to get to the Reflections.
Music to Listen to: Smooth Criminal by Michael Jackson
It wouldn’t be right for me to do a Reflections and not have a Michael Jackson song as my choice for music.
I was going to write about the USA Soccer team coming close to winning the Confederations Cup or how Hank Basket violated at least three guy rules by his involvement with Kendra Wilkerson, review the Mars Volta Album, etc. but a lot of that can wait until tomorrow.
This whole Reflection will be dedicated to Michael. We all know about his “interesting” lifestyle and the criminal accusations, all of the bad stuff. However, I’m going to look at the positives.
The reason that I have Smooth Criminal is that its my favorite video of his. My favorite song is Beat It but the video for Smooth Criminal gets the nod.
The first album that I ever bought with my own money was MC Hammer’s Too Legit to Quit but the second one was Michael’s Dangerous.
I was just a little too young to get into Thriller but I knew all about it. In fact, Beat It is my favorite song because it had a rock and roll sound to it, especially with Eddie Van Halen doing the guitar solo. Hearing that song and Run DMC’s Rock Box heavily swayed me to like rock music more then all of the rap music my buddies was listening to.
Even before I got Dangerous, I got the Bad album and of course dug all of the songs. Bad, The Way You Make Me Feel were both classics on there.
However, I was actually moved when I heard Man in the Mirror. Even as a little kid, I would get emotional hearing that song about looking at yourself and making an impact on society.
But Smooth Criminal was the business. I still remember making my mom buy the Moonwalker movie which featured the full-length video of the song. It was on. I remember darn near busting my ass trying to do all of the dance moves, especially the spin on top of a table and the lean forward. Just watch the video from the 6:30 point on. I had that whole routine down. I would have arguments with my friends about if they doctored the video with special effects. Michael was such a hero to me that I would argue that he could do anything.
So based on all of this, I decided that when Dangerous came out, I was going to rush to the music store in downtown Brooklyn and make it happen.
I listened to that whole album on an endless loop on my tape player. Yes young bucks out there, I bought that album on tape, CDs weren’t an option at that time.
I still remember waiting in front of my TV in 1991 when all of the major networks like MTV, BET, VH1 and Fox all debuted the music video for Black or White AT THE SAME TIME. I personally watched it on Fox because it was after an episode of In Living Color. We all saw the video and were amazed by it.
The last part of the video was odd because Michael decided to do a solo dance when he was smashing windows and grabbing his crotch strongly. As a 10-year old boy, that confused me.
What didn’t confuse me was the video for In the Closet. Oh my goodness. Just watch it below for a moment.
Now, I’m an 11-year old boy watching this video and I’m noticing Naomi Campbell and thinking to myself, “OK, she’s attractive.”
That’s the PG way of saying that puberty started for your boy at that moment.
Naomi Campbell in 1992, my word.
So the rest of the album is the business as well. Remember the Time was another video that stopped the world when it premiered. Who is it is solid, the Jam video featured frickin Michael Jordan, Heal the World was a touching song, Give in to Me was excellent and featured Slash so the Guns and Roses fan in me appreciated that.
The key to the album for me was that it had elements of rock, pop, R&B, soul and everything in between.
After wearing out Dangerous, I went back and got Thriller and Off the Wall and understood the essence of him.
His music and style was so influential to everyone. All of us from ages 25-60 have tried to dance like that guy. We all have a bad impersonation of him.
He’s the only musician that I know that everyone has cosigned in liking him. Even the punk rockers who were listening to Bad Brains and Black Flag were feeling Michael.
The one thing that shouldn’t be understated is his impact on MTV. Before him, MTV wasn’t playing videos by Black artists on a consistent basis. Michael changed all of that. As a result of that, you have an entire generation of performers influenced by that guy.
I’m going to conclude with this and each of you can get back to work out there.
I said on Facebook that the reason that music is a big part of my life is because of Michael Jackson, Metallica and MC Hammer. If I had to round it out to a top-five, Aerosmith and LL Cool J would be the rest of it. The sixth man would be Eric B and Rakim.
That’s all from me. Thanks for reading my thoughts. I’ll have some more of my favorite Michael Jackson songs throughout the week.
Have a good fight and good night everyone.
Music to Listen to: Smooth Criminal by Michael Jackson
It wouldn’t be right for me to do a Reflections and not have a Michael Jackson song as my choice for music.
I was going to write about the USA Soccer team coming close to winning the Confederations Cup or how Hank Basket violated at least three guy rules by his involvement with Kendra Wilkerson, review the Mars Volta Album, etc. but a lot of that can wait until tomorrow.
This whole Reflection will be dedicated to Michael. We all know about his “interesting” lifestyle and the criminal accusations, all of the bad stuff. However, I’m going to look at the positives.
The reason that I have Smooth Criminal is that its my favorite video of his. My favorite song is Beat It but the video for Smooth Criminal gets the nod.
The first album that I ever bought with my own money was MC Hammer’s Too Legit to Quit but the second one was Michael’s Dangerous.
I was just a little too young to get into Thriller but I knew all about it. In fact, Beat It is my favorite song because it had a rock and roll sound to it, especially with Eddie Van Halen doing the guitar solo. Hearing that song and Run DMC’s Rock Box heavily swayed me to like rock music more then all of the rap music my buddies was listening to.
Even before I got Dangerous, I got the Bad album and of course dug all of the songs. Bad, The Way You Make Me Feel were both classics on there.
However, I was actually moved when I heard Man in the Mirror. Even as a little kid, I would get emotional hearing that song about looking at yourself and making an impact on society.
But Smooth Criminal was the business. I still remember making my mom buy the Moonwalker movie which featured the full-length video of the song. It was on. I remember darn near busting my ass trying to do all of the dance moves, especially the spin on top of a table and the lean forward. Just watch the video from the 6:30 point on. I had that whole routine down. I would have arguments with my friends about if they doctored the video with special effects. Michael was such a hero to me that I would argue that he could do anything.
So based on all of this, I decided that when Dangerous came out, I was going to rush to the music store in downtown Brooklyn and make it happen.
I listened to that whole album on an endless loop on my tape player. Yes young bucks out there, I bought that album on tape, CDs weren’t an option at that time.
I still remember waiting in front of my TV in 1991 when all of the major networks like MTV, BET, VH1 and Fox all debuted the music video for Black or White AT THE SAME TIME. I personally watched it on Fox because it was after an episode of In Living Color. We all saw the video and were amazed by it.
The last part of the video was odd because Michael decided to do a solo dance when he was smashing windows and grabbing his crotch strongly. As a 10-year old boy, that confused me.
What didn’t confuse me was the video for In the Closet. Oh my goodness. Just watch it below for a moment.
Now, I’m an 11-year old boy watching this video and I’m noticing Naomi Campbell and thinking to myself, “OK, she’s attractive.”
That’s the PG way of saying that puberty started for your boy at that moment.
Naomi Campbell in 1992, my word.
So the rest of the album is the business as well. Remember the Time was another video that stopped the world when it premiered. Who is it is solid, the Jam video featured frickin Michael Jordan, Heal the World was a touching song, Give in to Me was excellent and featured Slash so the Guns and Roses fan in me appreciated that.
The key to the album for me was that it had elements of rock, pop, R&B, soul and everything in between.
After wearing out Dangerous, I went back and got Thriller and Off the Wall and understood the essence of him.
His music and style was so influential to everyone. All of us from ages 25-60 have tried to dance like that guy. We all have a bad impersonation of him.
He’s the only musician that I know that everyone has cosigned in liking him. Even the punk rockers who were listening to Bad Brains and Black Flag were feeling Michael.
The one thing that shouldn’t be understated is his impact on MTV. Before him, MTV wasn’t playing videos by Black artists on a consistent basis. Michael changed all of that. As a result of that, you have an entire generation of performers influenced by that guy.
I’m going to conclude with this and each of you can get back to work out there.
I said on Facebook that the reason that music is a big part of my life is because of Michael Jackson, Metallica and MC Hammer. If I had to round it out to a top-five, Aerosmith and LL Cool J would be the rest of it. The sixth man would be Eric B and Rakim.
That’s all from me. Thanks for reading my thoughts. I’ll have some more of my favorite Michael Jackson songs throughout the week.
Have a good fight and good night everyone.
1 comment:
Glad to see you show your respects to the king of pop. But you know, I've realized that there is one HUGE flaw in American society and American culture. We respect talent over individual greatness. We respect the talented guy who crashed and burned much more than the less talented man who was strong enough to not crash and burn. Something to think about.
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