The opening line for "Bad", "Your butt is mine". Of course it simply means "I'll kick your ass", but there is a certain other meaning... (The song was originally supposed to be a duet with him and Prince, who refused, saying, "There is no way I am singing 'Your butt is mine' to you and you are not singing it to me.")
"Beat it". The fact that he rhythmically repeats it during the mostly Title-Only Chorus doesn't help.
Applicability: "Somewhere In The Dark," which was recorded exclusively for his audiobook recording of E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial, can easily be read as an analogy for Internet-based relationships.
Archive Panic: Even if you exclude his Jackson 5/The Jacksons tenure, his Motown solo albums, and leaked unreleased material, Jackson's discography is still pretty massive. Most longtime fans suggest that newcomers start with either the Number Ones compilation (all the big hits), or The Essential Michael Jackson (A full career-spanning two-disc set).
Audience-Alienating Era: The nineties onward were not kind to Michael. Public drama started creeping into his music more, leading to a large number of diss tracks against the media and tabloid market, seen most frequently on HIStory where he calls out the California district attorney who led the investigation against him by name.
Some fans only like his pre-Thriller work, some only like Thriller and refuse to listen to his other stuff and some like it till the end, including Invincible and his posthumous albums.
Whether or not Bob Fosse had a influence on the Billie Jean dance.
A good portion of fans believe that Dirty Diana was about Diana Ross. Other fans believe what Michael said about how the song was just about a random groupie.
"Love Never Felt So Good" was ecstatically embraced by the public as a wonderful piece of Awesome Music, receiving glowing reviews. The fact that it was turned into a "duet" with Justin Timberlake (who recorded his part well after Jackson had passed) has inspired a lot of debate, however, with lots of fans preferring the original solo vocals and wondering why producers seemed to think Timberlake's involvement was even needed when Jackson's unreleased tracks finally saw the light of day. (Sure, Justin Timberlake is quite a big deal, but Michael Jackson is always going to be the Michael Jackson.) The Timberlake duet charted and enjoyed copious airplay, though, so clearly not everybody minded its existence.
Far more people know of Michael Jackson's version of "Gone Too Soon" than the 1983 original by Dionne Warwick, to the point where when Jackson died in 2009, Usher performed the song at Jackson's funeral.
An odd case with Yellow Magic Orchestra's "Behind the Mask": most people in the west are more familiar with the rewrite given to Jackson, most famously performed by Eric Clapton (though Jackson first gave his version to Greg Philliganes). In a case of Approval of God, Ryuichi Sakamoto loved this version and recorded it with Bernard Fowler on vocals for his Media Bahn Live album and then studio recorded for a single. Nowadays, the Jackson version is most well-known on account of the heavy publicity surrounding its inclusion in his posthumous 2010 album Michael (Jackson having one of the biggest and most persistent cults of personality in the music world certainly helps).
Creator Worship: Almost raised to literal inhuman superstar levels during his lifetime, Jackson was able to become the best-selling artist of all time thanks the success of his music videos, Thriller and the amazingness of the Moonwalk Dance. Even when his eccentric lifestyle and accusations of child abuse damaged his reputation among the general public he still remained the most famous person on the planet and maintained his otherwordly legendary aura. His hardcore fans never gave up their adoration, despite what bad press appeared about him. Someone released doves when he was pronounced not guilty at his child molestation trial, and since his death he's been elevated even higher.
Epic Riff: "Beat It." Just "Beat It." The bass riff in "Smooth Criminal," too.
Even Better Sequel: Off the Wall was the highest-selling album by a black singer, but Thriller became the highest-selling album period.
A longstanding rivalry exists between Jackson's fanbase and that of Prince, the other Black musical superstar of the '80s. Many of Jackson's more "mainstream" fans decry Prince as a vulgar womanizer, while many of Prince's more hardcore fans view Jackson as a formidable singer and dancer, but an overly commercialized one who relied too much on other musicians for writing, playing, and producing. Ironically, Jackson and Prince were on good terms with one another, with their rivalry being more musical than personal, and attempted to collaborate with one another on two separate occasions in the '80s.
One with the Beyoncé fandom, mostly because Beyoncé fans continuously compare Beyoncé to Michael or claim that she is better than him. This would seem ridiculous to Michael and Beyoncé themselves since the two were friends in real life. Michael thought Beyoncé was a great performer, while Beyoncé considers Michael to be in a league of his own and cites him as the single greatest inspiration on her career.
Positive ones are "MJ" and "Bambi"... but the most infamous one is "Wacko Jacko", due to Michael's increased behavior and appearance perceived by the media. The name has been revealed to have a racist meaning behind it.
Michael's children are collectively known as "MJ3" (due to all three having some variation of "Michael Jackson" as part of their names) or "P3" (Prince, Paris, and Prince II.)
Fanon Discontinuity: His first posthumous album, Michael, especially considering that the authenticity of some of the tracks was questioned.
First Installment Wins: Though by no means a universal sentiment, a vocal portion of critics and fans consider Off the Wall, his first release on Epic Records and his first collaboration with Quincy Jones, to be his best album. At the very least, it's generally agreed to be his most coherent and perfectionist release, with later releases becoming more experimental and concept-driven, both for better and for worse.
Friendly Fandoms: Thanks to his contributions to the soundtrack for Sonic 3 & Knuckles, a good number of Michael Jackson's fans also happen to be fans of the Sonic the Hedgehog series, to the point where covering Jackson's songs In the Style ofSonic music is a popular trend.
As popular as he was in the United States, he was more popular in other countries (including Germany) due to the negative press being not as bad there. In the end, while he had tours for Dangerous and HIStory mounted, they did not include stops in the continental U.S.; he was planning for the Dangerous tour to reach the U.S., but then the first round of abuse allegations arrived. His This Is It residency was even planned to take place at the O2 Arena in London.
Jackson is hugely popular in Japan, thanks to his flamboyant image, androgynous singing voice, and self-described Peter Pan-style personality meshing well with the kawaiiko movement. Japanese society's distrust of the country's notoriously corrupt legal system also helped him weather the accusations of child molestation in the '90s and 2000s. It also helps that Jackson recorded a Cover Version of "Behind the Mask" by Yellow Magic Orchestra, a Japanese band whose fame and influence at home are often compared to The Beatles.
He wrote a book called Dancing the Dream about, as a reviewer summarized: "a fanciful collection of poems, reflections and photographs that champions kids, endangered species, the homeless, AIDS victims and planet Earth."
"Heal the World", Ghosts and "Earth Song" also qualify, especially the notorious Brit Awards performance of the latter in 1996 (see Messianic Archetype on the main page) which Jarvis Cocker crashed at the midway point.
There's a lot of this in the rabid fandom too — the website Inner Michael is completely devoted to propping him up as a shining exemplar of humanity who was pure and perfect, a helpless victim of the black-hearted folk of the world who displaced their evil onto him by distorting his forever-innocent behavior.
He also collaborated with Eddie Murphy on the song "Whatzupwitu", the video for which features the two of them singing amidst a sea of fluffy white clouds as innocent schoolchildren frolic and sing around them. It's even more diabetes-inducing than it sounds.
Heartwarming in Hindsight: The music video for "Hollywood Tonight" stars Sofia Boutella. Both the song and the video are about a young woman looking for her big break in Tinseltown. Boutella has gotten major roles in big Hollywood blockbusters since, most of them well-received.
Michael Jackson noisesExplanationJackson's work on Epic Records famously features a variety of distinctive interjections such as "hee hee," "come on" (often misheard as "shamone"), and "hoo." Consequently, invoking these tics is incredibly commonplace among parodies of Jackson, affectionate or not, and many jokes about him (again, both positive and negative) use them for the sake of puns (e.g. "Michael Jackson's pronouns were hee/hee").
"Billie Jean" A.I. CoverExplanationIn May 2023, it became a meme to take A.I. programs of pop cultural characters' voices and sync them to "Billie Jean", ranging fromMr. Krabs, toSquidward, toSonic the Hedgehog, toNeco-Arc, toDio Brando. Most of these videos feature the characters wearing Michael's signature fedora and rhinestone glove.
Mama say mama sa mama appelsap!ExplanationClose to the end of "Wanna be Startin' Something", people can be heard chanting 'Mama ko mama sa maka makoosa!', but many people from The Netherlands misheard it as this, which translates to 'Mama say mama sa mama applejuice'. This has gone to the point where an alternate name for Mondegreen in Dutch is 'Mama appelsap'.
Mexicans Love Speedy Gonzales: According to legend, Michael once performed a concert in England. When he heard that Diana, Princess of Wales was going to attend, he decided to omit his song "Dirty Diana", afraid the title and "obsessed groupie" nature of the song might be offensive. This was only reversed after speaking to Diana herself, who asked he put it back as it was one of her personal favorites.
Never Live It Down: The notorious "Jew me, sue me" and "Kick me, kike me" lines in "They Don't Really Care About Us," which earn him accusations of antisemitism. The intended meaning behind the line is that people can label or throw whatever abuse they want at social minorities, but he will stand up against their hate, but some people would not believe in that. It didn't help that among the many other negative rumors about him in the 2000s was an alleged quote from him calling Jewish people "thieves."
Many people think Michael invented the moonwalk, but Jazz musicians like Cab Calloway were doing the move as "The Buzz" as far back as the 1920s.
Nor did he invent the one-glove look. That one dates back to 1920 and Enrico Caruso, arguably the King of Opera, after an apparent stroke crippled his right hand. He even joked that people would just see it as a way of getting publicity. Michael himself likely wore the glove to cover up skin blotches from the vitiligo since he began wearing it shortly before the disease started spreading.
However, this is averted in that he did invent the equipment for the famous leaning move in the "Smooth Criminal" music video. You can read the official patent for it yourself.
Overshadowed by Controversy: Jackson's career went through an interesting loop with this. From 1993 until his death, his reputation was eclipsed by allegations of child molestation. His public image improved slightly after being acquitted in court on a second charge in 2005note the first one in 1993 wasn't taken to court and instead ended with a financial settlement, and after his death in 2009, he was praised again as an innovative and trendsetting musician. However, the allegations still lurked in the background and re-entered the public discourse after the Me Too movement began in 2017, culminating in a new wave of claims in the 2019 documentary Leaving Neverland, which created a massive divide regarding their veracity and how they should affect Jackson's legacy and reputation.
Popularity Polynomial: Started to happen after Dangerous and by the Turn of the Millennium, only his most die-hard fans stood by him. Jackson was beginning to go back into the spotlight prior to his farewell residency, which was intended in part to rehabilitate his image a few years after his acquittal on child molestation charges. In a supreme case of irony, his death a month before the start of the residency made him even more popular than what analysts believe the shows could've accomplished. However, the release of Leaving Neverland ten years later caused it to revert as people re-evaluated his legacy in light of the film's contents. Even then, that faded out afterwards, with Jackson's pop culture presence improving again but remaining on the sidelines compared to the blockbuster status of his two posthumous albums.
Posthumous Popularity Potential: This is most definitely the case. Michael spent the later years of his life being mocked for alleged child molestation and for his physical appearance. The news of his death brought an outpouring of grief and caused record sales to skyrocket. In fact, Jackson's death caused major websites to crash due to extraordinary internet traffic, and MJ's memorial service remains one of the most watched events in online streaming history.
Protection from Editors: Jackson ended his working relationship with Quincy Jones following the release of Bad and had complete creative control for Dangerous, HIStory, and Invincible. While Dangerous is often held in the same regard as the Jackson/Jones collaborations, HIStory and Invincible were criticized by listeners outside of Jackson's dyed-in-the-wool fans as playing into his worst excesses as an artist. Consequently, retrospective analysts regard Jones as a crucial figure in reigning in Jackson's constantly lofty ambitions and that his absence as producer resulted in Jackson putting too much stock into his own hype.
Sequel Displacement: As noted above, it's usually acknowledged that his solo career starts with Off the Wall, which marks his departure from Motown to Epic Records.
Overall: "Thriller", "Billie Jean", and "Smooth Criminal" tie for first, with runner-ups being "Beat It", "Bad", "Man in the Mirror", and "Black or White".
Invincible: "Heaven Can Wait" and "You Rock My World"
Michael: "Hold My Hand", "(I Like) The Way You Love Me", and "Behind the Mask"
Xscape: "Love Never Felt So Good" and "Slave to the Rhythm"
Stuck in Their Shadow: With the exception of Janet, who launched her career in 1982 but didn't hit it big until '86, no one seemed to care about Michael's siblings once he became a megastar.
Surprisingly Improved Sequel: The first posthumous album, Michael, got mixed reviews and even raised controversy on whether it actually featured Jackson. The follow-up, Xscape, on the other hand, was much better received.
In light of worsening global warming and climate change, the message of "Earth Song" is unfortunately more relevant now than it was back in 1995.
Minority groups being oppressed has always been a hot-button topic, even when HIStory came out back in 1995, but after the George Floyd incident in May 2020, "They Don't Care About Us" has become all the more lyrically relevant.
Vindicated by History: HIStory and some of his other later works like Blood on the Dance Floor and Invincible were re-examined after his passing and found to be actually quite good.
Vocal Minority: His U.S. fanbase from 1994 onward, best summed up by the throngs that hung out around the courthouse during his 2005 trial and the small, stunned crowd which gathered outside the hospital where he died shortly after it was reported that he was there (and before it was announced he had a heart attack, was in a coma or dead).
meaning behind it.