like the rest of the world, i was surprised to hear that michael jackson has passed away. mostly because i thought he'd live forever in a hyperbaric chamber of some sort, or become part robot or something amazing like that. so to hear that he's passed away just seems unreal. i mean after all, he didn't seem like a mere mortal.
and now you may not believe it (although i don't see why not), but the Thriller album is one of my faves and is actually one of my oldest possessions. my grandparents (or parents, or both, i can't remember who), gave it to me for my 5th birthday. and i listened the shit out of that record. my best friend davita and i used to play it non-stop on my dumb 7" (but somehow it fit a 12") child's record player. in fact the vinyl is so worn that certain tracks (mostly billie jean, pyt, and thriller) will barely play, and there are crazy scratches from where we'd listen to one song, and then drag the needle back to the beginning to start it again. i am also pretty sure we had choreographed moves for most of the songs, and i know we did the thriller dance over and over.
needless to say, we were HUGE fans. in fact, we actually watched the Moonwalker movie (even though it makes no sense) more than once -- and that was when we were old enough to know better. i am pretty sure i tried to hide this fact from the world, but here it is now: i have seen moonwalker, repeatedly.
and while the world has definitely lost a huge pop icon -- seriously how many more pop icons of this caliber are there? do you even think we'll see new celebrities of this size? -- i don't know if we'll really feel it. i mean, have any of you listened to anything since then? we'd probably just tear him apart and say that he'll never be as good as he used to be. so maybe it's for the best. let's just hope the guy can finally get some peace.
so mj, i have no idea who will now dance on the floor in the round, but thanks for all those great tunes.
ps. for the record, annie told me that thriller makeup would be in poor taste, but i don't know how to listen to good advice. it's not meant to be.