Last night, conversation with one of my best friends turned, as it often does, to music. The topic at hand was, of course, Michael Jackson. Specifically, the vocal & performative subtleties of the Bad era.
It's a little known fact that Michael capitalized on his acquisition of the Beatles' catalog for Moonwalker, recording a fantastic cover of "Come Together," which reinterprets the classic by substituting Lennon's Abbey Road-period sexy funk with the almost disturbingly abrasive sexuality of Bad-period Jackson. The original is a track defined by its nuances, & the tightly-wound surface under which Lennon moans and wails with beautiful subtlety. Michael uses the track to introduce a new dimension of his persona. This is the first incarnation of a Michael we'll see in 1992, grabbing his crotch and breaking car windows in the banned, extended version of the "Black or White" video (watch it here). Michael never leaves his natural range except in his ornaments, leaving us with the sexy, raspy tone of a voice that, despite clear evidence of strain, is still fresh enough to rock. That's the key with "Come Together." Michael isn't giving you straight pop or a rhythm & blues hybrid track. In terms of production, this is a pop track, but that voice ain't pop. Put it together with the video & we've got a goldmine:
That guy will fuck you senseless and never call you. Ever. I'd deconstruct it further, but I think the proof is in the pudding.
Now, compare it with "Dirty Diana," Michael's (somewhat creepy) No-Means-Yes number 1 from 1988.
This is the other side of the hypersexualized Michael we receive in the late 80s. There's nothing about this track, or the video, that isn't contradictory. It's that same raspy pop star-cum-rock star voice, the same Mick Jagger meets Robert Plant meets James Brown stage presence, but it feels like Michael's giving it away with some very real hesitation. The look on his face in a lot of those close-ups is saying "please don't touch me," but the two stars of this video are his crotch & ass. & at 4:10, when he rips off his t-shirt, the message is fairly clear. The video is littered with arched backs, guitars as phallic symbols, & gyrations that sort of make me want to cross my legs. And this violent sexuality is weirdly complicated by the content of the song. Rock Star meets Groupie, Groupie wants to fuck, Rock Star's got a lady at home, Rock Star says No (over & over) & finally gives in to the Groupie's advances. What's so interesting about the song, though, is the undertone that tells us Michael is essentially being raped by Diana. One of the layers of the track sounds like Michael weeping & moaning in resistance. This isn't your typical groupie-fucking narrative, and that's why you know it's Michael Jackson.
The key to mid-period Michael Jackson is this Look But Don't Touch message. I'm not going to take that assertion where many critics do, because I'm not concerned with the controversies surrounding Neverland Ranch.
This is an especially fascinating moment in Michael's career, not only because of the contradictory nature of his performances, but because of the increasing femininity of his image. His skin is smooth, his body is lithe like a ballerina's, and his face is beautiful. Like a woman's. And here's the irony: Michael begins looking like a woman after moving as far away from his androgynous falsetto as possible. He was a sex symbol in the early 80s, but the majority of his recordings featured the beautiful gender ambiguity of a high tenor that only Michael could pull off. The moany hiccups of "Billie Jean" are replaced with guttural sounds from the throat in the Bad period. By Dangerous, the two styles will be blended into an even more confusing androgyny, but for now, we're dealing with a clear departure from the iconic image forged in 1983. & somehow, he manages to accomplish his masculinization while feminizing his appearance. Genius.
As a child, there were few things that could keep me in front of the television. Most of them were Michael Jackson videos.
I wasn't allowed to watch MTV until I was in middle school, so my music video consumption was limited to the offerings of VH1. Luckily, Michael Jackson was a regular on both stations, and VH1's dedication to airing the cinematic full-length versions of his videos offered me extended exposure to his image. It was on VH1 that I first saw Moonwalker, the feature-length film composed of long-form music videos from the 1988 release Bad, which were held together by what, in retrospect, was a terribly weak narrative. To this day, I'm not sure I understand it. Something about drug lords, precocious children & Michael's ability to morph into a sportscar. It was bizarre, but I loved it.
My favorite segment from the film was the video for "Leave Me Alone," a beautifully animated exploration of Michael's disdain for the tabloid press & invasive paparazzi. Looking back, that video's statement on Michael's position as a walking spectacle still resonates. As a little girl, I saw it as an embodiment of Michael as I imagined him: larger than life, endlessly colorful, exciting, fantastical. Now, the image of a gigantic Michael, dressed in his iconic middle-period Ringmaster jacket, breaking the scaffolds of a rollercoaster that's been built around him is more powerful than any of the video's other imagery. In a way, it breaks my heart to see his self-awareness so clearly and paradoxically presented on film.
Michael, a modern-day Gulliver in Lilliput, is the center of a spectacle that has grown beyond its original intentions. The very composition of the video, its absolutely overwhelming detail, parallels this distraction, drawing the viewer's attention away from the song and toward the images, the animated representations of tabloid myth & Jacksonian legend. The song & its associated images are a desperate and blatant call to the world outside to step back from the circus. Throughout the video, Michael's literally along for the ride, floating through the absurdity in a rocket with Bubbles the chimp. At one point, he's nothing but a sideshow attraction, dancing with the skeleton of the Elephant Man, a ball & chain attached to his ankle.
With all of this commentary in mind, the fact of the form becomes even more powerful. Here we have a brilliant artist begging, literally, to be left alone - by upping the ante & taking his spectacular persona to an entirely new level. Let us not forget the context in which Michael released the video: a feature-length film that was, essentially, a monument built to himself. No matter how lost Michael becomes in the chaos of his persona, he still towers above it all, the illustrious master of a three-ring circus. That Michael in the rocket? Not the same guy who breaks the rollercoaster. It's that paradoxical bipolarity of his persona -- the paralyzing shyness & spectacular showmanship, the playful child & the King of Pop, the man & the myth -- that defines Michael Jackson as a cultural figure.
It was after Bad & Moonwalker that the circus grew to epic proportions: the allegations of child molestation, the almost freakish changes in his appearance, the strange public outings. "Leave Me Alone" (along with the vast majority of Michael's body of work) was swallowed into a sea of tabloid stories and legal documents. The art, for the last 15-20 years of his career, was secondary to the spectacle. So many of us forgot what drew us to Michael Jackson in the first place -- that voice, those moves, that electric on-stage persona -- and focused only on the circus.
Now, in the wake of his death, we've all been inundated with iconic images from his 40+ years as an entertainer. People are sharing stories of their favorite Jackson moments, dancing and singing together in honor of his impact on our lives. People who would never have considered themselves fans while he was alive have crawled out of the woodwork to sing his praises. The icon still towers above us all, but that little man in the rocket is gone. It's for him I'm mourning. I only have to wonder, after revisiting this watershed moment in his career, if I'm 20 years too late.
