Michael Jackson
Perhaps more than any artist in human history, ‘Wacko Jacko’ was a product of his age.
Call it a conservative’s sin: having grown up during the eighties and nineties, I, too, have more than once been moved by Michael Jackson’s easy-listening yet over-the-top spectacular multimedia shows. Listening to dozens of fans recalling on the radio and TV since his death how, back in the days, they were always struggling to copy Jackson’s many dance moves or taping radio broadcasts of his songs, brought up lots of childhood memories of my own.
Still, I cannot suppress the feeling that something’s missing in the thousands of news items, interviews and documentaries on Jackson that were aired honoring his life. Yes, they did touch on Jackson’s megalomaniac world tours and his increasingly lavish spending on them (which didn’t contribute to artistic success, however: the HIStory tour, I am able to tell from personal experience, was a rather disappointing event). And of course, there was plenty of talk about the multitude of personal scandals, including the infamous charges of sexual molestation of minors.
But the media have generally been missing the larger point of Jackson’s life, the meaning of his rise in the seventies and eighties and his fall in the nineties. His was indeed a path of pioneers, but he was also, more than anybody, a product of his age. The discrepancy between his public life and his personal misery was obvious, and both have something to tell us in this regard.
First, Jackson completed the transformation of music into how it is understood in this modern age. In his book Culture Counts, Roger Scruton laments this evolution of the art form. Music started out, Scruton writes, as a craftman’s product, a sublime piece of art of anonymous authorship, in whose execution anybody gifted enough to handle an instrument or sing could take part. In modern times, music is all about the artist, about his vocals, his looks, his dance moves, his stage act, even his rock star life.
Even when one just focuses on the primary product — that is, the music — the artist remains irreplaceable: his music, through his recorded voice or unmistakable guitar play, will always be connected to him personally. Nobody epitomized this transformation better than Michael Jackson, who always sought to perfect every aspect of his public appearance, including even his own face and the color of his skin. Good though some of his songs were (but I wouldn’t exaggerate in that respect), the show was really all about Jackson. The sometimes outlandish megalomania displayed in his shows testifies to that.
Second, Jackson’s private life was as much of a rollercoaster ride as were his energetic live shows. While he did have an actual family, unlike many of his African American compatriots, his family life was in shambles ever since his father Joseph realized his sons would be able to make him a fortune. Having had no normal childhood, Jackson proved incapable of leading a decent adult life and starting a family of his own.
In the infamous 2003 Martin Bashir documentary, which crushed the last bit of credibility he had left, Jackson displayed an utmost inability to grasp the meaning of his own shattered childhood. While praising his own efforts to offer his offspring a supposedly wonderful family life, he almost burst out in tears (although perhaps feigned) explaining how horrible he felt seeing little kids grow up in ghettos, without a father, and instead resorting to a future in criminal gangs.
This analysis obviously hits the nail on the head, but it is ironic that Jackson doesn’t see the slightest implication it has regarding his own life. The fact that he publicly stated in Bashir’s documentary not to have any moral reservations about inviting 12-year-olds to sleep-over parties in his own house, testifies to a thorough lack of moral education. The ultimate consequence, of course, is that his children will rather likely grow up to be equally incapable of telling right from wrong.
Both in public and private, then, Jackson epitomized modern life perhaps more than anybody of his age. Today Britney Spears and Lindsay Lohan have taken his place, but it was he who led them the way. That is the meaning of Michael Jackson’s tragic life.
MICHAEL JACKSON'S SECRET DRUG EMAILS
Police in Los Angeles are investigating claims Michael Jackson used two secret email accounts to order prescription drugs illegally from websites and through doctors online.
Police believe Michael Jackson used secret email accounts to buy prescription drugs.
Detectives in Los Angeles have recently discovered the late pop legend had accessed AOL and Gmail accounts in the run up to his death in June from a suspected cardiac arrest and plan to search his personal messages for evidence he used them to acquire medicines illegally.
A source told Britain's Daily Mirror newspaper: "They could hold vital evidence with regard to Michael's death and the drugs he was using regularly. Not only did he get prescription drugs through a network of doctors, it's believed he may also have got them from illegal websites or drug cartels. The Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) has to get a search warrant first and this takes a few days."
Police are also keen to search a private mobile phone belonging to the 'Thriller' singer.
Since his death, it has emerged Michael had been prescribed a number of drugs - including the powerful sedative Propofol, also known as Diprivan - by a number of doctors.
His personal physician Dr. Conrad is being investigated over manslaughter claims.
Meanwhile, medical expert Dr. Susan Etok has claimed she was asked by the 'King of Pop' to prescribe him Diprivan and discovered a secret stash of drugs in his bathroom - which she took a sample of and gave to police.
She said: "Alarm bells went off in my head and I knew I needed to get out of there right away.
"There was a just a whole bunch, like a box with stacks of different medicines. And I took just a sample of those just to see what they were. There were just so many, and just paraphernalia such as syringes, tourniquets and surgical gloves and masks.
"It was just crazy. At the time I didn't really know what they were. I was just really shocked. There was just so much medication, just like looking into a pharmacy, and I thought, 'What is he doing with all of this?' So I took some of these medications and I took them home and I looked them up and I asked family members, and I found out that they were anti-depressants and things like that, and I just thought no, this is not right."
Dr. Etok claims to have met with the singer on March 6 at London's Lanesborough Hotel.
She told website ET Online: "He was upset about the fact the British media were very harsh on him, and how he was hurting. He kept on talking about how much he was hurting. I wasn't sure whether it was emotional pain or whether it was physical pain, and he said he needed me to help him."
Meanwhile, Michael's mother Katherine - who has guardianship of his three children, 12-year-old Prince Michael I, Paris, 11, and seven-year-old Prince Michael II, also known as 'Blanket' - is looking at sending the grieving trio to school.
The children have been taught at home their whole lives, but their grandmother is making enquiries into Los Angeles' prestigious Buckley school, which is near the family home in Encino.
The children and Katherine spent the weekend at the luxury Palms Casino Resort in Los Angeles.
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