I woke up on the morning of 26th June with a devastating SMS from a friend and then a call from my cousin delivering the worst possible news. Dazed, confused, sad and torn. I got ready for work with thousands of tunes and videos slide-showing in my head. I got out of my house, thinking to myself how ironic that the weather was gloomy. I sat in the car, switched on the radio and heard him crooning, “You Rock My World”, and broke down.
That night I drove back to Ipoh. Alone in the highway with him playing in the background, I was still tearing.
Cried like a baby watching his memorial two weeks later.
I am still tearing, as I write this.
It’s been a month since we bid farewell to the greatest entertainer that ever lived. It’s been a month and still I can seem to put in words of this feeling. The feeling, a mixed bag of joy and sorrow, for having lived in his era, and then loosing him.
What can you say to this do this man justice?
I can't for the life of me accept the fact that he has passed on. The icon that made me and million others, love music and dance is no more.
Michael Jackson.
I react everytime I hear that name. EVERY single time.
I feel privileged to have lived in the musical era of a genius. In the era that the world saw it's best musician, singer, entertainer & performer. There will be no other man to eclipse his success. There will NEVER be.
Here's a man, one in a gazillion, to be so gifted with abundance of talents, whether it was singing, dancing, composing and song writing. People who sing that well aren't supposed to dance AS well. You are just NOT supposed to.
But he was of course, God's gift to the world. Michael is probably the first and only artist to have the largest fan base one can possibly imagine. With the way the world currently is, it is no surprise when artists break cultural barriers in conquering masses. When Michael did it, it was history.
To call him the King of Pop is not enough to explain what he is. For I think, he changed how music was going to sound and how music videos and dance were going to look. He was a performer par excellence, with unusual but unique dance moves, unique sense of style and electrifying sense of presence and a man with a great sense of self and individuality. He, I think, IS Pop. He is legend.
Such a person deserved better. But the world was cruel to him. They didn’t leave him alone when he was alive. They don’t seem to leave him alone now neither. The scandal and rumours and speculation circling his death are too unfair for him and his family, especially his children. I wished those who didn’t let him live in peace should at let him rest in peace.
My first memories of him were when I was four. The age children start to recognize faces, music, movies and everything from television. My mom had then taped a show of Michael Jackson that was aired in conjunction with the release of his second solo album Bad. She used to put in on while she fed me. I fell in love with his music, dance. Everything. I remember watching that tape every day.
For some reason, I thought I was Michael Jackson. I remember watching Bad. He had curly long hair. Considering my age, I thought only women were allowed to have long hair, and so I thought he was a woman. My hair was curly. I had just started dance class then. As my interest grew, I looked to the one person that rocked my socks off. And I started calling my self Michael Jackson. Introduced myself that way to EVERYONE. Two of my father's friends in Ipoh still call me Michael Jackson to this day. Yeah, I know.
I used to put on the tape and dance like crazy. Thriller used to scare me. I still used to watch it hiding behind a wall. Billie Jean was mind-blowing. Bad was cool. Beat It, Dirty Diana, Another Part of Me, Smooth Criminal. They were not just songs. They were my childhood.
And a million of others’ teenage & adulthood. The world mourns today, with unbearable pain, reminiscing on the memories he has carved in all of our lives.
I wished he got his chance to perform for the last time, say goodbye and redeem himself. If not for anything, to prove he can still do it at 50 and remind everyone of his greatness. Then I thought, maybe he didn’t need to do that. I think this is his way of punishing all those who not only forgot him over the years, but put him in tremendous turmoil and torture. It is apt that he left; making us feel worse than he possibly could have when he was live. It is apt that he left; leaving us wanting more.
Up in heaven, I hope he gets my prayers and my heartfelt gratitude for having graced my life the way he did. You rocked my world, indeed you did.
Michael Joseph Jackson, I will forever miss you. Rest in Peace.
