Danny Baker’s 1980 article for the NME about Michael Jackson, and his brothers, titled “The great Greenland mystery”, may well be my favourite piece of music writing ever. The subject matter lends itself to the bizarre, of course. For the most part of this pretty lengthy article, the Jackson angle is at once central and peripheral, sometimes at the same time.
The best example of that is an account of a press conference in LA, held to promote The Jackson’s Triumph album (the one with the soaring “can You Feel It”). From experience I know that his portrayal of these events is hilariously accurate. Especially so in the context of entertainment writing, as I experienced during a brief excursion into the field in the early ’90s.
Here then the pertinent excerpts from Baker’s classic and very, very funny article (followed by a few Jacko tracks for your pleasure):
Full post at http://www.halfhearteddude.com/?p=69
I was thinking about this article a coupel of days ago. It just makes me cringe so badly.
Bugger. A coupLE of days ago. Not a coupel.
Better living through revising comments before hitting Publish button.
Argh. Poor Yoshi – I’ve definitely been a Yoshi before and those are not good memories. Poor, poor guy.
That article made my howl at the time, and I’ve never quite forgotten it… so it was great to read the best bits again, thanks for that. It was also the last time that MJ gave an interview to the music press, I believe…