There was plenty of context, even if that context wasn’t known at the time. A song like “Man In The Mirror” practically invited people to notice that changes were being made. The Michael Jackson of 1988 did not look like the Michael Jackson of 1983, and the Michael Jackson of 1983 did not look like the Michael Jackson of 1979. Plenty of them seemed to think that he was a weirdo. But for weird kids who read the gossip columns of local newspapers, like me, it was pretty apparent that plenty of adults did not look at Michael Jackson the way that I did. He came off more as a walking miracle, a manifestation of flash and dazzle and magic. To a kid in the ’80s, it didn’t make sense to look at Michael Jackson as a fallible human being. In The Number Ones, I’m reviewing every single #1 single in the history of the Billboard Hot 100, starting with the chart’s beginning, in 1958, and working my way up into the present.
0 kommentar(er)
