Looking At The Man In The Mirror

 May 16, 1983. The event was on NBC and was a TV special honoring the history of Motown. ''Motown's 25th'' was billed as just that, a celebration of twenty five years of solid and legendary music coming out of Detroit. Motown based its core image on soul music, with a healthy dose of blues music aimed at both black and white audiences. Motown was a raging success, the counterpart to the ''British Invasion'' from England. Some very marvelous acts sprung from this company, headed by the brilliant showman Berry Gordy. He had Smokey Robinson, The Supremes, The Temptations, Aretha Franklin, James Brown, Stevie Wonder, and, a little known act from Indiana. They were called The Jackson Five. These brothers played and sang from all of the joyful energy of the young. And, the ringleader of the group, the one who got the sighs from the girls and the boys on the dance floor grooving their booties, was a shy, introverted young man with an incredibly strong voice for someone so young. He was, of course, Michael Jackson. Throughout the early and mid-1970's, the Jackson Five had an incredible string of hit singles that blasted from radios and record players all over the world. With success comes intense fame and money. Also, intense scrutiny. That a bunch of child performers are onstage with a dominating stage parent behind the scenes is a familiar story. Joe Jackson, the boys father, was a pop Svengali. He pushed and prodded, cajoled and threatened, boasted and preened, his sons to greater glory. Whatever his record as father you want to trod out and criticize, he did fulfill his ambition: to have his sons be rich and famous and admired........ The public did not choose its favorite Jackson brother like it had chosen its favorite Beatle. Michael Jackson was the focus, the drawing card, the magnet onstage. Not only was he blessed with a beautiful singing voice but he also had the moves. Dance moves that seemed to come so effortlessly to him. Truth be told, he did not have the vast collection of dance steps that all of the masters, like Fred Astaire, had. No, his sprung from the soul, the connection of dancing from one's central nervous system. It was a joyful body release from the gospel heavens, the exhilaration of dancing in the moonlight. Your eyes and ears were borne together when watching him......... Because of all of his publicity on being the star attraction of the Jackson Five, Michael Jackson soon began doing solo albums. This is not abnormal for a child performer when maturity comes forth. Just as he entered his twenties, Michael and the legendary producer, Quincy Jones, formed a bond in the recording studio and came up with the brilliant, ''Off The Wall' album. This album trumps his follow up release, ''Thriller'', in every way except sold copies. Combining the, then fashionable, disco sound with his roots in R&B and soul, Michael Jackson became more than a kid star. He blossomed into a mature and potent artist that would have long-lasting impact. Already, the seeds were planted for his greatest triumph.......And, we know that would be ''Thriller'', still the highest selling album in recording history. It was this release in late 1982, combined with his appearance the following May on the Motown special, that propelled him past ordinary stardom and made him pass into legend....... The Michael Jackson that the public viewed that night was performing poetry in motion. His outfit was worth the price of admission. He wore a fedora hat, black sequin jacket, and a glove. In time, this look would be ridiculed and used as an example of how far-gone he was from reality. But, on this night, it was revolutionary. Commencing with the opening notes of his current number one song, ''Billie Jean'', Michael Jackson riveted the viewer with his voice, look, and attitude. The audience in the theater could do nothing else but jump on its feet, a willing partner to what was happening on stage. While Michael sang, he threw out a new dance move that blew everyone's mind. He went on his toes and preceded to walk backwords in a straight line, almost like a chicken doing a carnival trick. This stunning move brought the house down. After he finished his song, Michael Jackson left a stage a historical figure........ He also left the stage a fractured human being. The fame he had experienced as a child was unreal. But, at least, he had his brothers around him to help carry the load. Now, some ten years later, his immense fame exploded into heights only reached by a few. With this fame, came changes in his already fragile being. He did the bizarre things that we all remember. He reportedly bought the bones of the ''Elephant Man'', who was a circus freak. He slept in an oxygen chamber. He build his own ''Peter Pan''-type ''Never NeverLand'', which he aptly dubbed, ''NeverLand''. He bleached his face white [ despite his denials that he suffered from a skin condition, those closest to him maintain he wanted his skin to look more white ], married Elvis's daughter in a truly creepy publicity stunt for both of them, and, most alarming, he began to have intense relationships with small boys........ This last item would haunt Michael Jackson to his dying day. At first, it was explained that, because he did not have a normal childhood, he was reverting to all of the things that kids do when they play together. Sleepovers. Pillow fights. Water gun fights. Tickling each other into hysterics. All of these things are practiced by very young boys but, certainly not by adult men. This behavior from a grown man in his twenties and thirties can only be described as being obscenely inappropriate. Sexual feelings are in the grown up that are not in the young child. Someone should had talked to Michael that he was courting danger with this type of behavior. Perhaps, someone, unknown to us, did approach the subject with him. Obviously, he ignored it. In time, it was bound to explode in a scandal. And, it did........ In 1993, Michael Jackson was brought up on child abuse charges by a ''playmate'' of his. The boy, wisely shielded from the public knowing his name, alleged that he was touched in his private parts by Jackson on several occasions. He also claimed that oral sex had been performed on him by Jackson. Michael Jackson railed against the charges. He was innocent, he claimed, the victim of an extortion plot by the boy's family. Exactly what did, in fact, go on can never be identified because Michael Jackson paid the kid off for his silence and dropping the charges. Rumors had the amount in the several millions. Was his behavior appropriate with kids has always been open to debate. Was he the harmless friend, the kids protector against the bad adults in the world? Or, was he, as veteran child abuse experts believed, the archtypical child predator who used his enormous power and fortune to buy his way out of going to jail? The verdict is in the mind of those involved in debating the issue. But, one fact does standout: Michael Jackson continued to have young boys as his ''playmates'' for many years after. By then, he had his own kids........ Like most things in the complicated life of MJ, the origins of how his kids were conceived are a fuzzy mystery. He had a woman, out of the blue, be the mother of his kids. The rampant speculation was that the kids were artificially inseminated. That is fine, many parents go this route when experiencing difficulty conceiving a child. But, as soon as the kids were born--- and, they are beautiful kids----- the mother was thrown offstage, like a prop no longer useful, and handed over all custody rights to Michael. This implies, again, vast money being exchanged, also known as a business deal. But, most disturbingly, it also left the raising of two small children in the hands of a questionable person with a growing history of bizarre behavior with kids.......... Throughout the 1990's and 2000's, Michael Jackson made more music. But, maybe, because of his seedy private life played out in the public eye, the quality of his music suffered. He still had his legion of followers that worshipped his every move and forgave [ or, overlooked ] his behavior. But, the mainstream was turning away. While his album sales would be the envy of anyone in the business, each album was greeted with less acclaim and less sales volume by the public. As the years sped by, Michael Jackson was losing his fame and fortune. The money spending, always outlandish, was now choking him so much that he was forced to sell out many of his assets, including the Beatles songwriting catalogue, the most valuable source of revenue in show business history. And, finally, when 2009 dawned and he announced a tour of the world come summertime, the ticket sales were highly disappointing. There was still heavy interest in him, but, more from the Freakshow viewpoint instead of a genuine musical icon......... Death would come to him before he started this tour. On June 25, 2009, Michael Jackson was found barely breathing in his bedroom. He was rushed to the hospital but he could not be saved. He was gone to that NeverLand that he always wished he could have lived in........ When he died, there were the inevitable comparisons of his life and Elvis Presley's. Both achieved a fame that went beyond superstardom. Both were, at heart, little lost boys who let prescription drugs ruin their bodies and minds [ Michael Jackson's death was ruled an accidental overdose ]. Both lost control of reality and themselves as a person. Both were supremely talented but deeply flawed human beings. And, both, finally, could not be reached because they were also the victims of the people around them, the people who, supposedly, cared for them, but were, in fact, enablers who did nothing to save them. Like Elvis, Michael Jackson has his music and legacy that will go on without him. But, also like Presley, it is severely tarnished by the excesses of bizarre behavior.........