“Good Night, Sweet Prince.” (That’s a quote from Hamlet. This post is not about Prince; it’s about Michael Jackson, which I know is a little confusing.)
Friday, June 26th, 2009
I haven’t had an opportunity to review anything this week because I’m on a corporate team-building retreat with the entire bait shop staff. But I had to offer just a few thoughts on Michael Jackson.
Michael Jackson was an incredibly talented artist and a singularly gifted entertainer. I can’t say I was a fan, because I was a hard rock and metal kinda guy at the height of his career. But I do remember bopping around to the Jackson Five as a kid, being awestruck the first time I saw him moonwalk, tuning in to MTV to see the premiere of the Thriller video, and watching with a growing sense of revulsion as he transformed himself into an other-worldly, grossly disfigured caricature of a man. He was a train-wreck of a human being. But he and Quincy Jones crafted an almost perfect pop album in Thriller, and nothing will change that fact.
Sitting in my hotel room, watching the unfolding news coverage, I realized that upon my return I’d be listening ad nauseum to my superstitious friend go on and on about how these things always come in threes. First Farrah, now Michael, and whoever died next. Then it hit me: I had forgotten Ed McMahon. She already had her trio, and I’d just have to grin and bear her nonsense.
