I KNOW too well about the molestation trials etc etc, and you can go on until you’re blue in the face. That’s fine. We don’t need to debate that. This article is PURELY for those of you out there who don’t GET the effect he had on the fans. I found a hi-res LIVE video of him performing his song with the same title as Joost van der Westhuizen’s book, “Man in the Mirror.”
Just for those of you who might not yet have witnessed the vibe of fans actually FAINTING when he sings (including fainted people in wheelchairs being passed along). It’s quite hard to replicate that kind of fame. And it’s necessary for you to see it.
That’s it all we’re doing here – showcasing a level of fame that we, as humans, very rarely see..
Conrad Murray, the man who may or may not have killed Michael Jackson, has sent a message to his “supporters” on YouTube, trying to moonwalk his way out of trouble it seems.
Ja, Conrad..
You should check out the comments under the YouTube video – they’re hectic, outrageous, terrifying and hilarious at the same time.
I enjoyed this one, which has a bit of all of that in one:
“C. M. = Conrad Murray = celebrities murderer”
Hahahaha!!! Didn’t see that one coming, did you? I must say, I may well have never thought of that in a million years.
I mean it’s not as obvious as mine. S.R. = Seth Rotherham = Sick Rad!
Behindthescene published a scan from the newspaper of a Michael Jackson portrait by American painter, Andy Warhol. It seems as though it is going under the stop-hammer-time next month.
By the way, if you haven’t seen Factory Girl yet, do so. It stars Seinna Miller and is about Andy Warhol’s muse , Edie Sedgwick. It’s good and will definitely be available at DVD Nouveau.
I wasn’t aware that some people didn’t know about the accident that occured during the filming of Michael Jackson’s 1984 Pepsi commercial. I’m referring, of course, to when his hair caught on fire due to a pyrotechnic explosion. This was the start of the king of pop’s addiction to painkillers.
Check out the never-seen-before footage here:
Some people don’t dig it.
Personally I’m at my most happiest going 200 with my hair on fire. To know that I can control something that’s out of control.
We’re told several years ago America’s manager gave his group’s permission for Jackson to record the song, “A Place with No Name” despite the similarity.
America’s current manager, Jim Morey, who was also Michael’s manager in the late 80’s and early 90’s, tells us, “The band was honored that Michael chose to do their song and they hope it becomes available for all Michael’s fans to hear.”
It’s unclear when Michael recorded the song.
Pretty interesting, hey?
You what?
You want to HEAR the song?
Ok, no problem.
Here you go.
Hope you enjoyed that.
I don’t know about you, but I’m going to wear white socks with my shoes when I go out at night. At least until the end of July.
It’s interesting to note that Dirty Skirts lead guitarist, David Moffatt, sent this in. Michael Jackson is obviously one of his major influences – I had no idea. I’ve been given their latest album another listen, trying to pic up some MJ flavour…. but I can’t find it. But Dave does dance sexy – so maybe it’s that..
Anyway, he did INCREDIBLY well by sending this in. It’s a website which strings together random video clips that people send in of themselves moonwalking across the screen – all linking together to form an ETERNAL MOONWALK! It starts with Michael Jackson doing his moonwalk and when he reaches the end of the screen, the next one (sent in by the general public) starts.
IT.IS.PURE.GENIUS!
You need to see it to understand/believe it. It even measures the amount of METRES covered!
Naturally, we HAD to make our own eternal moonwalk and send it in to that website! So that’s exactly what we did next to the pool at the Cape Royale Sky Bar!
And then I made a seperate version JUST for you.
So here it is – enjoy The Dude, me and G-Man (in that order!) doing the “eternal moonwalk” next to the pool at the Sky Bar on the top of The Cape Royale , overlooking the Green Point Stadium, Table Mountain, the harbour and pretty much everything else!
Look, we had just klapped a bottle of De Grendel red..
Click here to see it as a part of the Eternal Moonwalk website.
They do these clips very well – whoever the people are that do these clips..
It’s a good concept. They take that scene from that movie about Hitler and they change the sub-titles. They always use the same scene. The last one I gave you on a plate was Hitlers eaction to the Bulls winning The Super 14 (here). Check that out if you haven’t seen it yet. It’s good.
So here’s the latest one, entitled “Hitler finds out Michael Jackson has died”
It’s pretty good. You know, if you’re into that kind of vibe.
There was no escaping talk of Michael Jackson in Russia yesterday, as Obama answered some questions about the late pop star, whilst dealing with the likes of Putin and nuclear war.
Check it out:
For those of you with broken video players [pffft!], this is what we got from politico.com:
ABC’s Jake Tapper writes that Obama “joked that he’d have to discuss Michael Jackson in order to get media coverage of the U.S.-Russian summit.”
“You know, this is part of American culture,” Obama told Tapper. “Michael Jackson, like Elvis, like Sinatra, when somebody whose captivated the imagination of the country for that long passes away, people pay attention. And I assume at some point people will start focusing again on things like nuclear weapons.”
Last night’s Michael Jackson Memorial Service in L.A.
For those of you who missed Jackson’s Memorial service last night (and those of you who wished to witness the spectacle) you can CLICK HERE and get all the main video clips, including the emotional speech by his daughter, Paris.
Here you go – another dollop of amazingness that you can tell your friends about, as they slowly but surely get closer to “the vibe.” Scared that 2oceansvibe might eat them up whole. Well, they’re right. It will! But it won’t EAT them up, as much as it will DROWN them. In love. They are scared of the love that 2oceansvibe will DROWN them in.
Shame, bloody simpletons.
You know what G-Man always says, “If being drowned in love by 2oceansvibe is wrong, I don’t wanna be right.”
So here you go – In this clip, Michael Jackson is singing at his final rehearsal from his “This Is It” tour . He is performing They Don’t Really Care About Us - which is obviously quite weird for me, given that it is the song that I “gave” to him.
This Footage was shot on June 23rd, 2009 by AEG Live (the people that killed him).
So now, when your idiot mates tell you something new about Michael Jackson and you don’t really care; then you just say, “Oh REALLY, did you see the video of his final performance?”
Your idiot mate, initially speechless, stutters, “wh-wh-wh-what last rehearsal video?”
“You know, the one filmed a week before he died. At rehearsals. For his upcoming tour.”
“What are you talking about? There’s no video. Where did you see the video?” they’ll shriek.
That’s when you slide your sunglasses down your nose, perching them at the very tip. Then you lift your hand to within 15cm of your eyes, palm up but with finger folded over – and you analyse your nails – as though you’re drifting away. [A De Niro scowl works well when you do this]
“2OCEANSVIBE!!………twat!“
“Oh ja!!!” they’ll say. “But I went there. Umm. Is it co.za or .com?”
“Just shut-up. You fool. Just shout your mouth and get out of here.”
Wow, things are really going full circle. Would you believe it, but Michael Jackson’s Thriller is the number one selling album on iTunes and Amazon say that Jackson’s albums had taken 14 of the top 20 places on the Amazon.co.uk sales chart.
A secret library of over a hundred songs recorded by Michael Jackson could be released following his death.
One of the singer’s biographers, Ian Halperin, claimed that the unheard songs had been made for his children.
Mr Halperin, author of Unmasked, The Michael Jackson Story, said before his death: “He wants to leave them for his kids, a very personal legacy to them. I was told he will not let them come out now.”
Jackson leaves three children: Prince, 12, Paris Katherine, 11, and Prince Michael II aged seven.
It is rumoured, given the parlous financial situation of his estate, that any such recordings will not be kept private for long. It is understood that Jackson may have gone to the grave under debts of about $400 million (£240 million) – though some believe the true figure may be much higher.
Sales of Michael Jackson’s music and memorabilia have already begun to soar. In America, the Thriller album is number one on iTunes, while his Number Ones album has now reached the top spot on the UK iTunes chart.
Online retailers Amazon say that Jackson’s albums had taken 14 of the top 20 places on the Amazon.co.uk sales chart. The Amazon chart was topped by his first solo album, Off The Wall, which features tracks such as “Don’t Stop ’Til You Get Enough” and “She’s Out Of My Life”.
Already, Jackson’s death is beginning to producing a new industry. Outside the Los Angeles hospital where he was pronounced dead, a group of men appeared selling $10 T-shirts with a silhouette of Jackson and reading: “In loving memory of Michael Jackson.” Memorial T-shirts were also being sold at the Glastonbury music festival.
On eBay, bidding grew on a number of Jackson memorabilia items. Limited edition records, musical instruments used by the star and even a movie contract with his signature were being sold for thousands of pounds.
The Neverland ranch and Jackson’s final resting place, if made accessible to the public, could also become lucrative tourist attractions.
Graceland, the mansion owned by Elvis Presley and where he was buried, has become a much-visited landmark. Opening its doors to the paying members of the public is thought to have made the trust that operates Graceland in the region of $100 million.
It is interesting to note that American Law dictates that the descendents and controllers of deceased estates cannot sue for libel. So take into account the amount of borderline sensational stories were always waiting to be told about Michael Jackson, but were held back through fear of legal and financial damage..
Now that Michael Jackson’s passed away and the mad scramble to cover the breaking story has settled down a bit, the media can now turn its focus toward more important matters—How to profit from Jackson’s demise.
The untimely death of someone like Jackson, a once in a generation worldwide superstar, is one of the few things that can possibly breathe new life into the balance sheets of a slowly dying tabloid media industry. Remember, not only was Michael Jackson a star of Elvis proportions, but he was an insanely weird star of Elvis proportions, perhaps the weirdest star the world has ever known (Even weirder than Elvis himself!) or will ever know, with a long personal history filled with scandal.
Here’s something key to remember on this—In the United States of America, the dead cannot be libeled. Only living individuals can sue for libel.
Now just imagine how many sensational Michael Jackson stories are out there waiting to be told that were never told before out of fear of being driven into financial ruin with libel lawsuits tied up for years in the American court system. Surely there will be people looking to sell their stories now, and surely there will be tabloid magazines that will scrape up whatever cash they can muster to buy these stories, even the most marginal, and slap them on their front pages under provocative headlines. They will sell by the millions, even in a down economy, because Western society has an insatiable appetite for celebrity scandal. It makes us feel better about our own wretched lives when the curtain is pulled back on those in the spotlight to reveal souls that are just as dark and tormented as our own, if not more.
But it won’t just stop there.
In the days, weeks and months to come we’ll be bombarded with more Michael Jackson television specials, print media special issues, commemorative products, re-releases of albums, etc. than most of us can stand. And then of course the more traditional media will recycle some of the stories dug up by the aforementioned tabloids and their reporting of those stories will bring in viewers and sell copies of newspapers/magazines. What you’ve seen just in the last 12 hours or so, what with the release of Jackson’s death photo and the second by second movements of his corpse being reported on live television, is only scratching the surface.
Wow. This is going to be big.
It’s going to be so tiring.
Saw a guy on TV now, wearing a professionally printed T-shirt ALREADY saying “In Loving Memory of Michael Jackson,” with a pic of the King of Pop on the front.
AEG Live will have to refund the tickets as will Ticketmaster
26.06.2009
Spare a thought for the guys that probably killed Michael Jackson – AEG Live – the company behind the ridiculously impossible upcoming lineup of 50 Michael Jackson Comeback concerts. Dubbed “This is it” – it seems it just might be for the company. Especially since they were hardly able to insure the ticket sales and had to “self-insure” it themselves.
AEG Live, the company that persuaded Michael Jackson to sign up for 50 nights at the O2 arena, is facing a liability of up to ÂŁ300 million and a dark house for the next nine months.
It was Randy Phillips, head of the US entertainment company that turned the derelict former Dome into the UK’s most popular new arena, who persuaded Jackson to return for a stunning series of “farewell” concerts, beginning next month.
The announcement, fuelled by a rare public appearance by Jackson at the venue, sparked an online frenzy, some 360,000 registering applications before sales had even opened. Within hours, one million fans had attempted to snap up tickets for an initial run of ten concerts, which rapidly turned into 50.
Tickets were immediately placed on the secondary ticket market for up to £1,000. But Jackson’s last reported public announcement on his residency at the O2 suggests that a combination of managers, advisers, concert promoters and those seeking to recover his debts, had let events spiral out of the singer’s control. “I don’t know how I’m going to do 50 shows,” he said. “I’m really angry.”
Amid scepticism over whether the frail singer could complete the residency, especially among insurance companies, AEG Live said that it was prepared to “self-insure” the shows.
Reinsurance magazine, which found that there was low demand in the London insurance market for the policy to cover all dates promoted by AEG Live, placed the liability at about ÂŁ300 million.
The first ten concerts are believed to have been placed on the London insurance market at a value of £80 million. Phillips had assured insurance brokers that doctors had spent five hours with Jackson, taking blood tests. “He’s a vegetarian, he’s in great shape,” Phillips said. “The insurance cover, we are working on that now.”
But rather than lowering expectations for the shows, AEG pumped out reports that Jackson would present the most spectacular live show seen on an indoor stage.
Only this week, Jackson’s PR machine announced that “extra tickets” would be available for the shows, due to begin on July 13, and revealed that Jackson’s stage costumes would be studded with 300,000 Swarovski crystals. Rumours were stoked that Jackson was preparing a stage move to succeed his famous “moonwalk”. “I would trade my body for his tomorrow,” said Phillips, amid reports, furiously denied by Jackson’s advisers, that the singer was suffering from skin cancer.
Even at midnight, after Jackson’s death was confirmed, the O2 website was still advertising the This Is It tour, and directing fans towards a Jackson website, headlined “The time has come” and promising fans their final audience with the King of Pop.
The death has serious implications for Seatwave, the company that traded in about 10,000 Jackson tickets on the secondary market, in partnership with the O2 arena, often for a price far above face value.
The company [who killed him] placed a message on its website saying: “We at Seatwave are saddened by Michael Jackson’s death. Our condolences go to his family and we appreciate the great legacy he has left us.”
AEG Live’s website said that fans who could not make the dates rescheduled after the opening dates had been cancelled would get a full refund. That promise will now be honoured for one million customers.
Ticketmaster, which also sold Jackson tickets, has a policy to refund the face value of the ticket, plus the booking fee.
Latest reports and quotes from Michael Jackson’s long-time friend, Brian Oxman, suggest his death was a result of the abuse of prescription medication. Much like the death of Anna Nicole Smith.
Michael Jackson’s long-time family friend Brian Oxman has hinted the icon was killed by an abuse of prescription drugs, likening his death to tragic star Anna Nicole Smith.
The legendary superstar was pronounced dead this afternoon at UCLA Medical Center in Los Angeles after falling into a deep coma, following a heart attack.
A coroner for the medical facility has confirmed the Thriller hitmaker died after suffering a cardiac arrest.
The star’s family, including his mother, brothers and sister LaToya, rushed to his bedside, but were too late to say their goodbyes.
And lawyer Oxman has revealed the atmosphere on the ward is one of devastation, insisting his family is too upset to even confirm the sad news.
He told CNN news, “Michael Jackson is my friend and I am just heartbroken.
“Everyone is rather speechless. The atmosphere is so very sad. I can’t tell you what has taken place, but everyone is very stunned.
“I saw Randy and Jermaine and I hugged them. I cried with them. No one will confirm anything to me. All I can tell you is that the family members are crying.
“LaToya, Jermaine and Randy are at the hospital. They are in a room by themselves and they are sobbing.”
But Oxman, a long-time pal of the Jackson clan, is adamant the Thriller singer’s death is down to the people who surrounded the star.
He claims that the superstar family have been desperately trying to “take care” of their fragile relative, and he was in perfect health until recently.
And Oxman believes an “abuse of medications” is the reason for his untimely demise.
He explains, “I believe (his manager) Frank DiLeo was with him at the time (of his heart attack), that is what I have been told.
“This family has been trying for months and months and months to take care of Michael Jackson. The people who have surrounded him have been enabling him.
“If you think the case of Anna Nicole Smith was an abuse, that is nothing compared to what has taken place in the life of Michael Jackson.
“I do not know what medications he was taking, but the reports that we have received within the family are that they were extensive.
“I don’t know the cause of all this. But this is something that I feared. This is a case of abuse of medications, unless the cause is something else.”
American pop music legend Michael Jackson died of a heart attack in a Los Angeles hospital today, just weeks before he hoped to resurrect his four-decade long career with a series of sold-out shows in London.
RIP Michael Jackson. 1958-2009.
Jackson was taken to the University of California at Los Angeles medical centre, and paramedics administered cardiopulmonary resuscitation in the ambulance. He arrived at the hospital in a coma and was reported dead about three hours later.
The world-famous entertainer had planned a series of 50 concerts in the O2 area beginning 12 July. Although in the last two decades his reputation was sullied by accusations of child molestation and his bizarre public behaviour, the shows sold 1m tickets within hours, proving the King of Pop has enduring appeal, even among fans who were not yet born when he released the “Thriller” album in 1982.
Jackson’s impact on American pop music cannot be overstated. His signature vocal style, dance moves, including the moon walk, and his military-inspired fashion sense influenced pop culture world wide. He earned worldwide acclaim for his 1982 Thriller album, produced by Quincy Jones. His subsequent efforts, including his Bad album in 1987 and a collaboration with sister Janet Jackson were also well received. His Thriller video, with its occult imagery and choreographed ensemble dance helped launch the music video genre.
He ultimately sold more than 750m albums worldwide and won 13 Grammy awards. But he has withdrawn from the public eye, taking his last tour in 1997 and releasing his last album of new material in 2001. Raised in the Motown tradition, Jackson’s worldwide popularity broke racial barriers. His impact on pop music and dance cannot be overstated.
For a time Jackson was the best-selling and most famous pop star in the world. But his increasingly odd public behaviour and two accusations of child molestation led the public to sour on him. The cost of his lavish lifestyle took a tremendous toll on his earnings. In 2008 he was forced to give up the deed to his Neverland Ranch in order to pay down what he owed. In April he stopped a public auction of his belongings including jewel encrusted concert tickets, stage-wear and music memorabilia. He was at the time thought to as much as $24m in debt.
Jackson was a native of Gary, Indiana, a gritty industrial city near Chicago. He became renowned in the 1970s as the lead singer of the Jackson 5, astonishing audiences with his charming looks, his crisp, delightfully playful voice and his smooth dance moves. He broke through as a solo artist in 1979 with Off the Wall, produced by Quincy Jones. The two had a long and fruitful collaboration, producing Thriller and Bad.
In 1993 Jackson was first accused of child molestation by a 13-year-old boy and his father. Authorities searched his ranch and Jackson agreed to a strip search. The case was eventually settled out of court and Jackson was never charged.
In 2003, he was the subject of a documentary by British filmmaker Martin Bashir, in which he admitted to sleeping in the same room as children at his Neverland Ranch. Prosecutors had been investigating him for years, and soon after, he faced new charges that he molested a 13-year-old cancer survivor. In 2005 a jury acquitted him of the charge.
Jackson married twice, the first time to Lisa Marie Presley, daughter of rock and roll legend Elvis Presley, in an unusual union of pop music dynasties. He later married an Australian nurse and fathered two children with her. The mother of his third child is not known.
In recent years he has frequently been seen in public wearing a mask, as have his children. In 2002 he was seen dangling his infant from the balcony of a hotel room, as legions of photographers watched in horror below.
Jackson suffered from vitiligo, a condition that causes the skin to turn white. In May the Sun reported he had been diagnosed with skin cancer, a rumour his camp denied.
Jackson had been engineering a come-back tour, an effort to rehabilitate his public image and bolster his tottering finances. The warp-speed sales of the tickets to his O2 shows indicated he is still beloved among his fans. A staggering 1m tickets sold out within a matter of hours after going on sale in March.
