07-08-09…is that some kind of cultish date?
- Several articles have popped up on Casey Kasem’s last countdown. In a lot of ways, Casey is the reason I do what I do, because he gave life to the charts that I worshipped as a kid. I will occasionally put on Sirius-XM’s “80s on 8″ or “70s on 7″ during the weekend to hear rebroadcasts of Casey’s countdowns. Sadly, I thought he was already done, having turned the reins several years ago. As a result of the linked article, though, I can now go to YouTube and hear Casey cursing. Good times.
- If you enjoyed the late 80s entries I did a couple of weeks ago, go on over to Wacky on the Junk and check out some of his recent posts on Breathe, Level 42, and Curiosity Killed the Cat. He got me good, as I was planning to come back for a few of those. Good stuff (and possibly some samples for ya, too)!
- Yuri and I did up another “Us Against the Music” last weekend about the MJ chart fallout, along with some chat about Maxwell (who is looking to do some big thangs on next week’s Billboard chart). Check it out!
- I should have my laptop returned to me on Thursday, and regular posts should return at that point. In the meantime, here’s a terrific commentary for the brand-new video Beyonce single, “Sweet Dreams”.
I think I’ve got myself together here. Went to lunch, and put on Sirius to hear the Michael Jackson memorial. Things were good until “Will You Be There”, and then the floodgates opened. First off, to have Jennifer Hudson sing it is brilliant, given what she’s been through in the past year. But when Michael’s spoke outro of the song played, I got choked up.
The video finally hit today for “
- First off, if you haven’t already done so, head on over 
- Post-New Romanticism – I don’t know if this is an actual term, but it fits what I’m looking for here. As groups like Duran Duran and Culture Club lost some sway with the public, they were replaced by pop groups with an even smoother style, which bordered on Adult Contemporary. Groups like Johnny Hates Jazz and Danny Wilson were big in ’87-’88, and I ate it all up. I wore out the cassette tape of T’Pau’s Bridge of Spies, which only spawned one Top 40 hit here in the US with “Heart and Soul” (#4 Hot 100, #13 Club Play). My favorite song from this period, though, was “China in Your Hands”, which was #1 in the UK, but never charted here. One more nail in the coffin of Americans having good taste in their pop music.
- Kiss Me, Kiss Me, Kiss Me – Ah, Robert Smith. How I wanted to be you in 1987. I had just gotten caught up with Staring at the Sea when Kiss Me came into view. Despite only having one minor Top 40 hit (“Just Like Heaven”, #40), this is the album that really started the momentum moving in their direction here in the US. “Heaven” was by far the deepest, most romantic record I had ever loved (I was 18, ‘nuff said), and I subsequently experienced a couple of firsts with that album playing in the background. It was DEEP, folks! [Somewhere along the line, I will have to pen my ode to Disintegration.]
- R&B and Rap – I went through three majors in one year at school, and the only consistent thing in my academic life was working at the radio station on campus. I threw myself into that venture with every free minute of my time. While I may have been pop and alternative elsewhere, at the station I was R&B and rap. High on rotation that year was Keith Sweat, whose Make It Last Forever was far and away the most played album on the R&B shows at the station. While the seeds for my crossover to rap had been planted years ago, 1987 was the year that they took root and grew. Teena Marie (“Ooh La La La”), 3rd Bass, Rob Base and DJ EZ Rock, and New Edition (“Can You Stand the Rain” was the JAM!) all made a big impact.
- Sign O’ the Times – Given all of the influences that I was feeling that year, it really shouldn’t be any wonder that Prince was the epitome of my musical preferences. The title track was both funky and topical, and “U Got the Look” came out of nowhere to liven up Top 40. For me, the pinnacle of Sign was “Adore”, which I am not afraid to say is the best performance of a love song in the Rock era. I won’t say “best love song”, because lyrically I don’t think it stands up to the true champs. From a delivery standpoint, Prince wins hands down. The phrase is clichéd, but I have no problem in referring to this as a Master Class in how to really deliver a song. You get as much meaning from the delivery as you do from the lyrics. In my opinion, this is Prince’s best album and performance by a mile. 
Stumble It!
Remember the Time
June 25, 2009 · 6 Comments
Damn…I can’t believe just how quickly that title came to me. It doesn’t matter to me that everyone and their cousin will have something to say, because as far as I’m concerned, they SHOULD. To quote a friend, “they bettah DO!” Michael Jackson, for all of his quirks, eccentricities, publicity stunts, and gaudiness, is a legend. I use “is” because that legend does not disappear today. In fact, it grows.
The Jackson 5 became the Jacksons, and I was right with them. “Shake Your Body”, “Enjoy Yourself”, “Lovely One”, and even “Blame It On the Boogie” were all jams. Songs I didn’t even know at the time came back to me eventually, such as “Can You Feel It”. If you want to talk about an epic pop/R&B song, that’s the one. All of that just prepped Michael for a future that I doubt even he could have predicted.
There are moments in my life that I will remember as long as I live: the moment it hit me that my Grandma was no longer with us, that the Challenger exploded, that I drove every one of my possessions across the city line into Denver. Michael’s performance of “Billie Jean” on Motown 25 is right up there. When Michael stepped to center stage while his brothers left the stage, you just knew something was going to happen. But that’s an understatement. When he let loose the moonwalk, I couldn’t pull my eyes away from the screen. The performance was too short, and no one could drag me away from the screen until the show was completely over and I was absolutely sure I wasn’t going to miss anything else. I was a persistent kid, to say the least.
It doesn’t seem possible that Bad hit the shelves in 1987, because Michael never left the airwaves. (A personal favorite part of mine was “Torture”, from the Jacksons record Victory) Michael could have recorded lullabies, and it would have been an instant smash, but instead, he pushed his sound further toward the center of R&B and Pop. Folks hadn’t heard tracks like “Dirty Diana” and “Smooth Criminal” before, and they ate it up. Just to stress the impact of Bad, the first FIVE singles went to #1, and the other two went to #11 and #7. 30 millions copies sold worldwide. Tour grossed a then-record $125 million. Crazy.
1991 brought Dangerous to the world, and for me, this was his creative peak. “Remember the Time” is in my Top 5 tracks by him, and I felt like he had done a combination evolving his sound while remaining current and up with the trends of the day. HIStory wasn’t as much of a success for me, but “You Are Not Alone” proved that Michael still had it. Even a remix album like Blood on the Dancefloor, which could have just ridden on the coattails of the hits that preceded, instead came hard with the title cut, a jam that was sadly overlooked in its time.
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