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09 Dec 2010

Dear Michael

GIFs Pictures, GIFs Pictures, Michael Album, Michael Jackson 55 Comments

A ‘Michael’ Album Review Written By Peter Mills.

“I hear the whole entire arrangement in my head; what instrument is supposed to do.  I put them down orally on tape and then I go out and find that instrument.  I don’t give in until I get exactly what I want. I sing every part with my mouth.

“Let’s dig the corpse up, scratch ‘Dirty Paedo’ into the forehead of its skull, attach strings to its limbs and make the bastard dance for us again. It would be kinder. Although saying that, Teddy Riley has spoken in the last fortnight of how he believes Michael Jackson is actually still alive. But I don’t believe him. If Michael Jackson were still alive, the catastrophic event that is the first posthumous album (bearing the seemingly ironic eponymous title of ‘Michael’ – someone at Sony is having a right old laugh at this), would probably have more of ‘Michael’ actually singing on it.

“The opening track, the subpar ‘anthemic’ ballad, Hold My Hand, introduces us to this leitmotif. It’s sold as a duet with Akon, but what it actually is, is an Akon song occasionally featuring Michael Jackson. It’s the first single and, frankly, a fucking embarrassment. It’s difficult to fathom why Michael Jackson ever chose to collaborate with Akon in the first place, but I imagine it has something to do with blackmail.

Heard of hot new superproducer Eddie Cascio?

No?

He’s a kid from suburbia, part of a family that Michael Jackson befriended (he never learned), and is responsible for three of the songs on Michael. One day, Michael Jackson decided to go round to their house and record the three shittest songs of his career in the style of a well-known Michael Jackson soundalike. Not only that, but he opted to experiment yet further by singing the songs through a piece of fucking pipe. This is true because Sony says so. Twenty-seven years ago, Paul McCartney released his Pipes of Peace album, on which belongs the unparalleled, irrefutably majestic vocal duet between him and Michael Jackson that is Say Say Say. Despite the title of this song’s parent album, I’m not aware of any rumours that either Michael Jackson or Paul McCartney sang through pipes on Say Say Say. I’m not sure when Michael Jackson decided to start singing through pipes, but I definitely think it was a mistake, as on the Cascio tracks it makes him sound much less like he had one of the richest and most soulful singing voices of all time, a voice nurtured and trained since childhood, and more like he’s doing spontaneous drunken self-parodying angry spastic karaoke.


“The Cascio tracks – Breaking News, Keep Your Head Up and Monster – are fakes.
This isn’t a matter for debate, it is a fact.

“Over the past twenty years, I have listened to Michael Jackson’s voice nearly every single day. As a working estimate, although it’s definitely more, I have listened to Michael Jackson singing around 80,000 times. I have heard his voice mature; I have heard his style change. Say what you like about my plainly evident, morbidly obsessive, autistic behaviour, but you have to admit, I’m probably a bit of an expert on what his voice sounds like.”

“Years ago, on the Matthew Kelly programme, You Bet, a contestant came on whose task it was to identify a Michael Jackson song after listening to a one second clip of any randomly chosen Michael Jackson song. He got them all correct, and as entertaining as this was for any Michael Jackson fan watching, I personally thought the contestant was actually a bit slow. I could tell you with 100% accuracy which hiccup, yelp or hee hee comes from which song; a fact that makes it all the more grating to recognise some of them sampled and put onto these Cascio tracks. In Breaking News, for example, we find the hee hee hee from In The Closet; in Keep Your Head Up, they bizarrely sample some lyrically incongruous lines from the end of Earth Song.

The double-edged thing about all of this, however, is that some anonymous hero out there has launched a covert attack on the album, using the guerrilla tactic of leaking bona fide previously unreleased Michael Jackson songs, seemingly to be used as a comparison. And these are startlingly good. Two of them, entitled Do You Know Where Your Children Are? and Slave to the Rhythm, are better than most other Michael Jackson songs I’ve heard over the last fifteen years. It’s anyone’s guess as to why Sony decided to go with bogus, far inferior tracks for the album, but theories range from the conspiratorial suggestion that a vengeful Sony are purposefully attacking Michael Jackson’s legacy, to the perhaps more plausible theory that, after having done a $250 million deal to release seven albums over the next ten years, they have discovered that, for whatever reason, they simply don’t have enough songs in the vault, and hence need to flesh the albums out using an imposter. Sony aren’t so much milking all they can out of their most profitable cash cow, as they are maniacally bludgeoning its bones into bits, soaking the bits in water, then putting the resultant sludge into bags with little holes in them before squeezing out the shit and making really thin and sandy sausages out of it.

Meaning that there are just three up-tempo tracks on the Michael Jackson album called Michael that are actually sung by Michael Jackson. Even so, two of these have already been heard before in one way or another. (I Can’t Make It) Another Day (written and produced by Lenny Kravitz), was leaked last year, features Michael Jackson’s unmistakable searing vocals at full throttle, as well as some great guitar. It has James Bond Theme written all over it. The other one previously heard is Behind the Mask, which is an adapted version of an original song by Yellow Magic Orchestra. Versions of the song by Greg Phillinganes and Eric Clapton also exist. But this is by far the best. And why? Once again, because of Michael Jackson’s unique, inimitable and unsurpassable vocals. So, in fact, only one truly new up-tempo Michael Jackson song exists on the new album called Michael by Michael Jackson. It’s called Hollywood Tonight. And thankfully, it’s a funky delight.

The other three remaining tracks on the album vary in quality. One, The Way You Love Me, had also been previously released, as part of 2005’s Ultimate Collection, and listening to it is a bit like watching someone in the first flushes of love walking down the street with a smile on their face after they’ve just left their new lover’s flat on a weekday morning. It’s nice to see and everything, but you’d almost certainly accidentally-on-purpose trip them up then kick them, given half the chance. Best of Joy is another ballad, but this one recalls a different type of flush, it being reminiscent of that strangely pretty turd you fleetingly raised your eyebrows in surprise at (but didn’t make you smile) before flushing; it briefly entertained you, but was instantly forgotten. The best ballad on the album is Much Too Soon, the closing track, a song Karen Carpenter would have been proud of. And it’s a suitably heartbreaking finale to the beginning of the rape of the legacy of Michael Jackson.

The thing, the worst, most irritating, most infuriating thing is, is that Michael Jackson has a fanbase like no other in terms of size and loyalty, and if these people united they could actually stop this happening. Unfortunately, a large section of the fan community is choosing to ignore this deception. In their desperation for a new Michael Jackson album, in their craving for some contact with their God, they are turning a blind eye. It is futile to attempt rational argument with these people. I’ve tried, and they have responded to my questions with such gems of logic as, “Michael would have accepted everyone’s opinion.”, “Those of you who cannot embrace a non-perfect MJ album are just like his Papa Joe who cannot appreciate his son for his imperfect performances, thus hurting Michael so much as a child.” and “‎’I AM MICHAEL! WE ARE ALL MICHAEL! LET US HOLD HANDS TOGETHER!”

For some reason, Michael Jackson fans have very little credibility. And it is this that will allow the genuinely shocking inevitability of Sony succeeding with possibly the greatest cover-up in the history of recorded music.”

More by Peter on This Is It :  http://165.140.70.174/~cobracra/ves

55 Responses to “Dear Michael”

  1. Sabine says:

    Hey Isabeau :heart:

    First I want to tell you that I read all the stuff that you sent me, it was very lovely. Thanks for sharing it with me.

    Isabeau: I know that fans say ‘don’t give money to these people’ but my opinion is that they are rich already and it does not hurt Michael anymore, thanks God. I want to read before deciding what to think.

    Well, you know, I think everyone should buy/read whatever they want. My reluctance, I guess it’s based on my background. I’ve worked in the legal system for over 20 years. One thing that is common is lawyers will prevent a jury from seeing information that they believe will negatively affect their opinion. Doesn’t matter if it’s true or not, as soon as a person hears something it affects their thinking process and they absorb the information and incorporate it into their thinking, influencing them and their opinion.

    So that’s why you’ll see in court lawyers will ask that things be stricken from the record, or will request that a witness not be allowed to testify.

    So knowing that, I don’t read everything, just like I don’t watch a lot of programs on T.V., because I know that it will “change” my mind and my thinking and sometimes I don’t want that influence. Of course one has to make a decision about what to allow in before you allow it in, which is tricky, but sometimes you can often get a sense of of what kind of information a program or book contains and decide, no, I don’t want to expose myself to that. So I practice self-censoring :smile:

    As for Schmuley, I never really read his book for that very fact. I read some of his very judgmental and biased views and then, based on that, I decided to just read the fan version that edited out his comments. Schmuley is tricky, he speaks very well, and makes very good points and so it’s difficult to filter his negative, biased opinions from the damaging and judging comments he makes, and that totally masks what Michael is saying.

    But you know, he just wrote another book, and it’s Michael’s thoughts on children, and I hear that it’s positive, so it’s like fruit. You look and see what is ripe and looks good and nutricious, and the stuff that is spoiled and rotten or maybe have been infected with something that you don’t want, or I don’t want, I avoid.

    Now I asked you before if you read Cowboy Mike at all — well, BBM is a sequel to Cowboy Michael, and so it would be difficult to get the relationship that Sabah has with Michael without reading everything that they’ve been through together in the prior chapters — ooops, I mean book!!!!

    So I’d recommend reading that first!!!!

  2. isabeau says:

    I’ happy you read and liked what I sent to you :)
    I have a different appoach to reading may be because I was an editor and I never had nothing to do with lawyers and legal procedures and their strange ethics based on money.
    My father always stressed to me the point of judjing with my own mind and heart. I know it is not scientific but at least we can affinate our sensibility by studying the human nature, observing it and try to understand the reasons who drove a person to a certain act or words. In this process you some bad disapointmens may occur but it’s all good for the next times for more balanced evaluation. I went deep into Smuley’s mind and I got it. I recognised all the bigotry, judgemental and little fanatic way of thinking (with a good mask) you can find in religious people (not necessary ‘spiritual’) and I even sensed a true wish to try to do something useful BUT it was all spoiled by his damn ego. We say here “he slipped on a banana peel” :) That is so evident to me between the lines… He did not trick me because I’m used to good spiritual kind of thinking and acting and that’s NOT it at all !! The Dalai Lama would be disgusted by what he’d done, I bet from what I know about him… and no matter how he tryed to make it sound useful for others’ well being ‘not to fall in MJ’s mistakes’ … How presumptuous, egotonic… and SAD expecially when you go around in tv shows as you were a movie star. He betryed Michael and was not loving at all and I’m not saying that to defend Michael no matter what, I would think that for anybody. That is just not at all the way a real spiritual adviser would act. I know that for sure.
    I’m happy he wrote a nice book now. This whole experience may be tought to him something…(he is not stupid or superficial) and may be he feels regret or guilt toward what he called ‘dear friend’ (and I think he’s sincere). People change mainly through strong experiences. Who knows… My judging is not ultimate. I’m not God and I can’t see in people’s heart so I try not to judge too much but just to have my own opinion.
    I can watch any tv progam I want, they will never change my mind. I laugh and turn channel if I sense it’s bullshit (for me). Viceversa I listen and ponder asking my heart. If it’s too confusing or I don’t have enough elements and data to judge, I ‘suspend ‘ my evaluation and wait for more information.

    I don’t believe in cencership at all with only rare exceptions. On my opinion the Discovery Channel autopsy shows, for exemple, are horrible to show to little kids and it is not respectful of the sufference of the relatives of the dead person, it shows no mercy due to the fact that we consider, and sadly, only the material side of Life and have we are now on the exagerate opposite side to how we were in ancient times and it is considered a silly ridiculuos thing to care about the ‘soul’ of the dead person because we don’t ‘believe’ he/she is alive!!). I think is a process through humanity learns anyway, so… I’m free not to watch it and turn off the tv or change channel. To air those programs in the name of science is, on my humble opinion, very insane.
    I’m sorry Sabine… I get carried away again… :(

    You said I should read all CBM before reading BBM !! OMG… faint……………………………………………….. :))))
    I don’t know, I enjoy any chapter anyway it seems… we’ll see what happens…
    and there is a new chapter of the TTWC! you write fast girl!!
    L-O-V-E always and a huge hug :wub:

  3. Sabine says:

    you’re apologizing again, :smile:

    Don’t apologize for expressing yourself. :heart:

    I totally agree with everything you said about Schmuley.

    I guess I’m an enigma. On certain subjects I can be completely removed and unbiased, but other subjects affect me terribly, and I have to watch my input. Especially if it’s negative. It sometimes makes me physically ill.

    I suppose it’s the artist in me. I am greatly affected by my environment and what I hear, see and read.

    And you know, I think everyone is to some extent. Though maybe not aware of it :smile:

    Probably I am more affected than others. I think artists are more sensitive to the human condition and such.

    Now, I don’t believe in censorship either. But then again, there are some programs – like how you feel about the Discovery Channel program — that I think should not air. And like here, on CCC, I would not allow any abusive or degrading comments.

    See, I can argue both sides of the argument!!!! :cheerful:

    Should a pedophile be given freedom of speech and action? No, absolutely not. So you see, these things are not black and white.

    Now about CBM, if you ever want to read it, you should. It’s very good, if I do say so myself :smile:

    :wub: Thanks for the hug!!!!!!!

  4. Nuje says:

    Boyeee what happened to this conversation. ooops, Hi Sabine! It looks like everyone abandoned it. a lil too hot in the kitchen!

    mjjwendy: Sabine, will you ceate a forum to discuss the cd once it has come out? I hope so.

    I think its sadly true that to agree to disagree is really an art and easier said than done. :pouty:

  5. Sabine says:

    Nuje, Nuje, Nuje – I always read “June” when I see your name. :biggrin:

    Well, yeah, this conversation was getting hot! :lol:

    You know in honor of Martin Luther King’s Birthday, I was putting up MLJ quotes on my FB page!

    I liked this one a whole lot: “People fail to get along because they fear each other; they fear each other because they don’t know each other; they don’t know each other because they have not communicated with each other.”

    :heart: I’m a strong believer in communication, but it’s very difficult for some people, not to say what they feel/believe, but to hear what another person feels/believes and try to understand it; i.e., to listen :heart:
    — Martin Luther King Jr.

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"So long as men can breathe, or eyes can see, So long lives this, and this gives life to thee." W. Shakespeare
“When I say, "I love you," it's not because I want you or because I can't have you. It has nothing to do with me. I love what you are, what you do, how you try. I've seen your kindness and your strength. I've seen the best and the worst of you. And I understand with perfect clarity exactly what you are. You're a hell of a . . man.”

(Spike to Buffy, Buffy the Vampire Slayer.)

“I just hope that one day they will be fair and portray me the way I really am, just a loving and peaceful guy.” ~ Michael
"So long as men can breathe, or eyes can see, So long lives this, and this gives life to thee." W. Shakespeare

"----->His intelligence is instinctual and emotional, like a child’s. If any artist loses that childlikeness, you lose a lot of creative juice. So Michael creates around himself a world that protects his creativity”. ~ Jane Fonda

WARNING: NOT JUST MJ fanfic - NO! It's Cobracrack®. It's better than plain Michael Jackson fan fiction and highly addictive!! One hit and you will be unable to function without yet another and another. Taking a hit of Cobracrack® while looking at a Michael Jackson picture can also prove fatal. At the very least you might experience an extremely intense Mikegasm that will leave you unable to be satisfied by any other man in your lifetime. READER BEWARE!!!! 18 over, please, though age doesn't matter. It's not the adult content that's going to get you, it's the force of MICHAEL! CobraCrackCentral® is not liable for any failed tests, lost jobs or broken relationships. Married women are particular at risk. Common side effects: Reading stories over and over; referring to characters as if they are real people; intense dislike for corny Michael Jackson fan fiction; Insatiable demand for sex; inability to sleep or function due to an infection of the EXTREMELY contagious virus: OvahXspojer (staring at MJ pics for hours at a time and imagining yourself in the scenes from the stories).

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