Michael Joseph Jackson (August 29, 1958 - June 25, 2009))

I'm sure the news/blogposts/tweets/soundbites/talkingheads/etc. regarding the news of MJ's death is probably already past the saturation point, so I hesitated to write anything substantial about this at all. But when I stop and think about where I've been in my life up to now, and where I'm trying to go (career-wise at least), I don't think I can go without saying something about the man that I owe my entire musical existence to. I'm not going to waste my time waxing poetically about what a cultural and musical force and icon he's been, or how the title "King of Pop" has not yet passed (nor probably ever will), or about how he represents the genuine worth and intrinsic value of pop music when so much of modern pop music is in such a bad way right now. I'm not going to talk about any of that because I know somebody else can and will do it better. I just want to say what he's been for me.

Now I'm not going to claim for a second that I'm the biggest Michael Jackson fan, or that I know every word to every song, or that I know all about his superstar trajectory. Because none of that would be remotely true. But what I can say is that he was the first thing I was ever a "fan" of, the first thing I ever took interest in that wasn't a result of parental/sibling/peer influence. As a kid, while everyone else was playing T-ball, I was watching Transformers and listening to Michael Jackson. The very first cassette tapes I ever owned were Michael Jackson tapes. I was four years old. Bad and Thriller. That was the only music I listened to, the only music that I wanted to listen to, the only music that I knew existed and the only music that I needed to exist. It was music that I actually chose for myself. My entire musical lexicon was Michael Jackson. Hell, my cultural lexicon was Michael Jackson. I distinctly remember coloring in my BraveStar coloring books at my house on South Stough Street just after we moved in, while listening to "Billie Jean," having absolutely no idea what he was talking about when he sang "she said I am the one, but the kid is not my son" (admittedly that lyric is pretty straight forward, but I was pretty slow as a kid, and didn't realize that someone named Billie could be a girl), but wearing out the tape listening to it over and over again regardless. First, that straight forward drum beat, then that fat-as-hell bassline slithers in, then a signature Jackson "chk-ah-shsh," and I don't care who you are, you were moving some part of your body to the rhythm whether you wanted to or not.

And MJ was pretty much all I had ears for until about 5th or 6th grade, before being influenced by my peers and that awkward pubescent desire to be like everyone else, buying albums by the likes of Spin Doctors and Ace of Base. But even then, MJ remained my "guilty pleasure." I remember my friends would watch MTV all afternoon waiting for the"Black and White" video to come on. They loved to make fun of it, thought it was stupid and funny when (during the Statue of Liberty human-morphing-into-other-human part) the fat Asian guy turns into Tyra Banks. I remember waiting all afternoon for it to come on, as well. But that was because I thought it was one of the best songs I'd ever heard in my life. Also, I desperately wanted to be Macaulay Caulkin.

Everything sort of got weird for MJ after that. An odd marriage. More and more face surgery. Disturbing allegations regarding his private life. But the MUSIC, it would just not stay out of my life. My freshman year at the University of Iowa I got called down to the Quad for using Kazaa. I got in trouble for downloading and the University's administration had to point out which copyrighted work was illegally downloaded as well as reprimand me. The song? "You Rock My World." At the time, I felt a little guilty about it, but it soon became my favorite Michael Jackson song EVER, also maybe my favorite video ever. It was at that point that I sort of realized there was no escaping it.

Do you remember the first time you saw him dance (watch the last five minutes of the "Black and White" video, linked above for a refresher)? Primal. Sexual. Effeminate but some how more masculine than anything you've ever seen? Do you remember the first time you saw him moonwalk, those highwater pants hiding any possibility of it being some sort of elaborate optical illusion? The feeling that you were actually witnessing someone defy the laws of physics? Then do you remember you and all your friends trying to do it, but mostly just walking backwards?

I remember all of that. I remember wanting to wear just one glove in the winter. I remember wanting to wear button up shirts so that I could leave them unbuttoned and stand in front of a fan. I remember wanting to grow my hair long and semi-curly, and tie it in a loose ponytail.

I guess in the end I'm really trying to say that I'm grateful. Michael Jackson's music profoundly informed my musical leanings at the early age four. Twenty-two years later, and I'm still digging into his extensive catalogue, and twenty-two years later, his music is still what moves me most. I was a child of the 80s, and I feel like there was a lot of shitty music that I could have become infatuated with. But by the Grace of God, it was Michael Jackson that I loved. It's Michael Jackson that I love.

Thanks for everything.

Rest In Peace.