- Registrado
- 25 de Dic, 2017
I know way too much about the subject of Michael Jackson, so I will sperg for a bit here.
There’s more to Michael than Just losing Quincy.
Prior to Thriller, Off the Wall has become the best selling album by a black artist, but he wasn’t mega famous by any stretch. He was still famous of course but was still a member of the Jacksons. When Thriller came out it was the perfect storm. It was the end of 1982, Disco had died, it has mixed of R&B, hair metal, and even Sinatra style swing creating the poppy feel that would define the genre for decades to come, and it shot Michael into mega stardom.
Then just a few months later the Motown 25 performance happened which debuted the moonwalk and showed his dominance as a solo performer, then Billie Jean, Beat It, and thriller’s music videos came out throughout the year and got massive play on MTV and blew him up further. Leading to his 8 Grammy wins, which unheard of at the time.
In less than two years Michael went from being the most popular member of a band that had lost its spotlight to the Most famous person in the world. Then the following year his head catches fire at a Pepsi commercial which lead to a life of wigs and pain killers, he embarked on a pity tour with his brothers they got fucked over by Don King, his skin started blotching from vitiligo which forced him to bleach the rest of his skin to even it out, etc etc.
The 4 year gap from Thriller in 1982 to Bad in 1986 was filled with an insane amount of stuff, far more than what you’d expect from a single musician, and you really notice it in when you listen to Bad.
Take Michael’s previous output into full consideration. Usually it would go 3 Jackson 5 albums 1 solo album, that’s why we have Got To Be There, Ben, Music and Me, Dear Michael, and Farewell my Summer Love(unreleased until 1984 due to the Motown split) all in between regular Jackson 5 albums. Most of the songs on these albums were designed to fit seamlessly into the Jackson 5 stage show. This was a standard practice back in the day to maximize off of a band. Do a main album, then give the lead a few solo albums to double dip. Even Off the Wall, which released between the Jacksons albums Destiny in 1978 and Triumph in 1980, was meant to feel like the same disco funk you’d find in a late era Jackson’s’ concert. There are good songs in these albums, and I could rave about a lot of them, but you can tell that they’re still your standard double dip solos.
Initially Thriller had that intention too, but was also meant to usher in a new sound for the 1980’s. This is most evident if you listen look at the Victory Tour itself.
The set list is made up of 12 songs and 3 medleys. If the 12 regular songs, 8 are from Michael’s solo albums, and 4 of those are from Thriller. But, the two least Jacksons-y songs in the set list, Beat It and Billie Jean come at the finale. This was not just done to hype up the end, it was also done because they don’t fit the sound the way the others do. Wanna Be Startin’ Something is very much a disco song and works perfectly with the older Jacksons discography. Human Nature wasn’t disco, but was a slow ballad that also fit well with the others. With this in mind, you can tell that only Thriller, Beat It, and Billie Jean Don’t fit the “Jacksons” sound. Did you notice something about that line up? They’re the middle of the album and both end the first side and begin the second side of the record. Deliberately placed to be a new sound that could continue the act, but they had the adverse effect of making Michael himself far more hip than intended. These 3 songs eclipsed his brothers and made the Jackson’s’ song list feel dated by comparison.
Now fact in all of this and look at Bad. Bad is the first album made specifically to be a solo album for Michael without any influence or intention for it to be connected to the Jacksons. It aims to achieve in even greater sound difference, and it’s also an album that incorporates an insane 4 years the man had leading up to it. Bad is the true album Michael used to define himself as a solo act and also an album deliberately trying to be new and fresh for the 1980’s at all times. Gone are all the disco, soul, and R&B melodies that filled the previous two albums, or you have more hair metal and rock, you’ve got more in your face pop, and you’ve got more attitude. This shift in the difference you’re describing, but it has nothing to do with losing Quincy. Quincy was on Bad. This was just Michael having a late break out album to define himself as different from his childhood band. He even changed how he sang to add more texture and grit in his voice. And noticeably, during the Bad Tour, Heartbreak Hotel was the only Jacksons song to remain in the proper set list(the 1987 shows in Japan and Australia used the victory tour set list with a few added songs), but the only off the wall songs were Workin’ Day and Night and She’s Out of My Life. The Bad Tour and every other tour onward had a more hard pop/rock heavy set list, which was the style of music Michael made from Bad - History.
Invincible is the interesting album because it’s more of a R&B album with no rock songs at all on it. In many ways, Invincible is the closest to a thriller follow up in terms of style, but this was mainly because the heavily textured singing he had been doing royally fucked his voice during the Bad tour. Seriously. Listen to him sing Wanna Be Startin’ Something during the victory tour and then listen to him sing it during the History Tour. You understand immediately why almost all of the history tour was lip syncing
But there, my sperging about his music is done
