Why We’ll Miss Michael
Last Sunday morning on Meet the Press, host David Gregory asked Presidential advisor David Axelrod whether or not Obama planned to make any public statement about Michael Jackson's death. Axelrod explained that the President had reached out to the Jackson family privately. What current pop star's death will merit discussion about an Oval Office response? Probably not Lady Gaga's.
There is much that will be missed about Michael Jackson, but the Axelrod/Gregory exchange made me think about something specific underlying our collective grief: MJ was the last pop star we will all share. He was the last one to garner so much genre-, race, and class-transcending popularity that it feels appropriate for his death to register as a tragedy of Presidential importance. We have lost a common bond.
Changes in the music industry will ensure that bond stays broken. Due to increased genre fragmentation, the proliferation of illegal downloading, and the ongoing extinction of brick-and-mortar record stores, music simply doesn't sell like it did during Jackson's '80s heyday. For instance, last year's biggest selling album was Lil Wayne's Tha Carter III, which moved 2.88 million copies in the U.S. Josh Groban's Noel was 2007's top seller. It sold 3.7 million. By comparison, 1982's Thriller sold 28 million copies. Five years later Bad sold eight million. 1991's Dangerous, at seven million, was considered a mild sales disappointment.
But it wasn't business that made Jackson a cross-cultural icon--it was, of course, his music. At their best (think of "Billie Jean" or "Bad"), the songs were as catchy as the flu and funkier than a Bonnaroo port-a-potty. Their playful melodies made them approachable enough for the parents while their innovative production and stealthily paranoid sentiments made them radical enough for the kids. If you didn't like Michael Jackson, the problem wasn't with him.
Now, though, with the music world splintered into different radio formats, and blogs and websites making it easier for people to burrow into the hermetic hole of stuff they already enjoy, it's hard to imagine anyone again approaching Jacksonian levels of appeal. The conditions just aren't there.
I think that's unfortunate. Having a pop star we can all watch and talk about and listen to makes music feel more vital. Michael Jackson was living proof that music meant something--to me, to you, to everyone. That proof is gone now. And now we are all living a little further apart from one another.
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But the truth is his memory will fade and his influence will wane. This will happen if for no other reason than sooner or later those who revere him will also pass away.
What will remain and be continued as the generations pass are the values, beliefs and cultures we get from our family, close friends and other strongly influential people.
Michael Jackson was just a man. A man with human frailties like we all have and certainly worthy of remembering. But so are the mothers of this world, the big sisters and brothers and all others who work every day with courage and dignity to provide for those they love.
Courage is not always heroic action in the face of danger. Courage is also getting out of bed and doing it all over again. Let's remember the courageous in our own personal lives.
Merry we meet and merry we part until merry we meet again. Blessed Be.
always...
Michael was family, icon, and loved by many, he will be missed. I pray for comfort, strength, and great memories of his legacy he has left behind. I feel for the pain he must have endured to cause him to have to take strong drugs to help him rest. We loved him, but the Lord loved him best and now he is in a better place for eternal rest.
You maybe away from us Michael, but not forgotten and will always be a part of our lives, in our hearts, and memory.
God Bless The Family!
Let's see...the cons outweigh the pro's two to one. It appears he's not worthy of all the paise given.
Listen, if this persons death effects you so drastically, then YOU obviously are the one without a life. Find something WORTHY of your respect, faith and adoration. This guy certainly wasn't it. He was just a person, not a God, and to worship him as some of these posters apparently do is shameful and weak.