I was 5 years old and it was my big sister's 10Th birthday.
We had all woken up full of excitement as we prepared to welcome a bevy of friends, guests and entertainment to celebrate my sister's first decade on earth.
Part of that excitement was the knowledge that there would be ample opportunity to dance to the music on what would become the best-selling album of all time.
Thriller.
An album with songs like Beat It; Billie Jean; Wanna Be Starting Something and of course the track that shared the same name as the album title. This is the earliest I remember my relationship with Michael Jackson starting.
This was a few years after the release of the album of course but in mid-eighties Lagos, Nigeria this was still the hottest and most played musical album ever. Combining funk, disco, soul, soft rock, R&B and pop (I lifted that straight from wikipedia), Thriller was not only a musical phenomenon but a dance extravaganza for us little kids who were born with soul and style in our little bodies. (If I do say so myself)
And I guess you could say the same about the Man himself.
King of Pop, Wacko Jacko, Peter Pan, whatever he was called, there was almost universal acclamation that this was a gifted genius. A gifted tortured genius but a genius all the same. I do not need to point out here how he revolutionized the music industry and became the biggest music star the world had ever known, all this has been covered much better and much more eloquently than I ever could. Not just his genius and his impact, but his slide into notoriety and the court cases that drew as much media attention as any of his world tours.
Fast forward to the "Bad" album and I remember my cousin Moyo and I ad-libbing to the song with the same name and pestering our mothers for black leather outfits with lots of silver rings on it. (We never got them). "The Way You Make Me Feel" tweaked open the door to the world of adolescence and Smooth Criminal ensured I would stay in it for a decent period.
Just in case there is any doubt, I am once and for all time a die-hard Michael Jackson fan. And it was always very hard for me to watch the way we devoured him with our adulation and attention. This was a man who was a victim of his own success. In every sense of the word!
Performing since the age of 5, a hit No 1 at the age of 11, forced to grow up in full glare of the world, brought to us by a media that fed fat on our insatiable appetite for more and more of him. Like my father-in-law said to me when I spoke to him a day after Michael's death, Michael Jackson was a gift to the world. His own happiness and mental well-being were secondary to his true purpose on earth. Which was to entertain and enrapture us.
And this I think captures what a lot of his detractors missed. There is no way it is possible for such genius to spring forth from a normal psyche. His non-existent childhood and unique experiences contributed directly to the sheer awesomeness of his being. Such genius ALWAYS has a price. Ask any genius.
And so this is to toast the man who would make 6-year old Ladi spring from his bed first thing in the morning and attempt the Moonwalk. (Constantly startling my brother who shared a room with me.) To the man who never actually grew up to become a man and remained (emotionally) at the age of pre-adolescence. The man who broke all barriers and had cross-over appeal no matter your race, origin or musical taste.
Like one of the articles on the Time Magazine website said, it didn't matter what you thought of him, when MJ wore those skinny black pants and white socks and did the Moonwalk, he was the coolest man on the planet. And we all wanted to be him. And for one glorious night 3 years ago, I was him!
Adieu MJ
PS
I have bought his entire musical collection.
