Thursday, June 25, 2009

And then there were four ... Goodbye Michael


The Jackson Five were a pretty big deal when I was young. Michael sang like an angel back then, one of my favorites of his was "Ben", although in retrospect it was kinda wussie ...

He had the greatest selling album of all time with Thriller, and yes, I own a copy of the vinyl and one of the CD. It's really very good, although I must admit it smells of all the things I dislike about 80s music these days. But at least he did it pretty much better than anyone else.

The sad thing about Michael is that he was obviously a tortured soul ... and he was tortured in the media for it. Entire web sites are devoted to the most crude jokes you can imagine about him and his alleged predilection for young boys.

And now he's gone. Dead at 50, just as he was preparing and rehearsing for his comeback tour, which had sold out in short order. It's really a very sad day for the world ... he was one of its greatest artists. He revived the group dance music video ... and his moonwalk invented a whole new array of wicked dance moves, imitated by many but never really exceeded in my opinion. I could watch that kind of dancing for hours ...

I was hoping to end this entry with something really clever, based on one of his song titles. And in searching this site with his entire song list, I found exactly one song that is a perfect fit ...Gone Too Soon. No matter what you think of Michael Jackson ... you absolutely must agree that he was a great entertainer ... and on that note, let's finish with the final two verses from Gone Too Soon...

Born to amuse, to inspire, to delight
Here one day
Gone one night

Like a sunset
Dying with the rising of the moon
Gone too soon
Gone too soon

No comments: