Michael Jackson
Michael Joseph Jackson, often referred to as The King of Pop or MJ is an American musician and entertainer.
The seventh child of the Jackson family, Michael Jackson debuted on the professional music scene at the age of eleven as a member of the Jackson 5, and went on to become a pop icon as a solo artist. His successful career and controversial, enigmatic personal life have been a part of pop culture for almost four decades. Jackson has dominated pop music since the late 1970s, becoming the first black entertainer to amass a strong cross-over following on MTV with his revolutionary transformation of the music video as an art form and as a promotional tool. The popularity of videos aired on MTV such as "Beat It" and "Billie Jean" created a tremendous synergy that helped to put the relatively young channel "on the map" and Jackson continued to be a dominant figure on MTV with videos such as "Black or White" and "Scream". Jackson also popularized physically-complicated dance techniques, such as the robot and the moonwalk, that have redefined mainstream dance and entertainment. His distinctive style, dance moves, and vocals have influenced a whole generation of hip hop, pop, and R&B artists.
He has been cited as the "Most Successful Entertainer of All Time" by Guinness World Records, and holds the record for the best-selling album ever, Thriller, among 7 more guinness world records.
Michael Jackson has received thirteen Grammy Awards (eight on a single night in 1984) and two of his solo albums have been inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame. Jackson has charted thirteen #1 singles in the United States, more than any other male artist in the Hot 100 era. In November 2006, the World Music Awards announced that Jackson had sold over 750 million units worldwide and given $300 million to charity, making Jackson one of the best-selling music artists and one of the most philanthropic performers of the 20th and 21st century. However, Jackson's controversial appearance and actions have damaged his reputation in the eyes of some of the public and album sales have been in decline since the mid 1990s.
From 1988 to 2005, Jackson lived on his Neverland Ranch property, where he built an amusement park and private zoo that was frequently attended by disadvantaged and terminally ill children. Rumors of sleepover parties received both negative media coverage and public attention after it was revealed that children had slept in his bed or bedroom. This first came to light when he was accused of child sexual abuse in 1993. Michael Jackson's relationship with children was brought into the spotlight again in 2003 when the TV documentary Living with Michael Jackson was broadcast. This resulted in Jackson being tried, and later acquitted, of more child molestation allegations and several other charges in 2005. After this, Jackson went on hiatus, traveling to countries such as Bahrain, before starting work on new material in Ireland. In early 2008, he released Thriller 25 (a special edition of the "Thriller" album), which was a commercial success selling nearly 1.5 million copies worldwide in seven weeks.
“Music is color blind.”
“I had to say to myself, 'Don't write the music. Let the music write itself.”
“She's saying that's ok,Hey baby, do what you wantI'll be your night lovin' thingI'll be the freak you can tauntAnd I don't care what you sayI want to go too farI'll be your everythingIf you make me a star...Dirty Diana”
“Say Say SayWhat you wantBut don't play gamesWith my affectionTake take takeWhat you needBut don't leave meWith no direction”
“Don't stop until you get enough.”
“i'm smooth,but not a criminal.”
“Planet Earth, gentle and blueWith all my heart, I love you.Dancing the Dream by Michael Jackson”
“How many victims must that be? Slaughtered in vain across the land,And how many strugles must that be?Before we choose to live the profits planEverybody sing- Every day create your History,Every path you take you're leaving your legacyEvery soldier dies in his gloryEvery legend tells of conquest and liberty.”
“I'm really very self-confident when it comes to my work. When I take on a project, I believe in it 100%. I really put my soul into it. I'd die for it. That's how I am.”
“You can't hurt me, I found peace within myself.”
“Please go for your dreams. Whatever your ideals, you can become whatever you want to become.”
“Stop this agony of wishing Play it out Don't think, don't hesitate Curving back within yourself Just create... Just create”
“When you're strong and good, then you're Bad.”
“In the field I’m in, there is a lot of that and it gets offered to me all the time. People even go as far as to just stick it in your pocket and walk off. Now, if it was a good thing, they wouldn’t do that. I mean, would somebody drop something beautiful in my pocket and just walk off? But I don’t want to have anything to do with any of that. I mean, as corny as it sounds, but this is how I really believe: Natural highs are the greatest highs in the world. Who wants to take something and just sit around for the rest of the day after you take it (drugs), and don’t know who you are, what you’re doing, where you are? Take in something that’s gonna inspire you to do greater things in the world.”
“I fast every Sunday. I don’t eat anything. Just juices. […] It flushes out the system, cleans out the colon. I think that’s great. To really make it work, you have to do it properly. That’s the sewer valve of the system. You have to keep that clean like you clean the outside of your body. All these impurities come out of your system because you’re not clean inside. It comes out in pimples or disease or through big pores. Toxins trying to get out of your system. People should try to keep themselves clean.”
“I hate it. I hate taxidermy shops and all that crap.”
“There’s a whole psychological reason for those cartoons about good against evil. We have "Superman" and all those other hero people, so that we can go out into life and try to be something. I’ve got most of Disney’s animated movies on video-tapes, and when we watch them. Oh, I could just eat it, eat it. […] Jimmy Cricket, Pinocchio, Mickey Mouse – these are world-known characters. Some of the greatest political figures have come to the United States to meet them.”
“The Wizard Of Oz" has secrets that are just too much. Or "Peter Pan" – the whole 'lost boys' thing is just incredible. They’re not childlike at all, they’re really, really deep; you can rule your life by them. Or say 'child-like', because children are the most brilliant people of all, that’s why they relate to those stories so well. Fairy-tales are wonderful.”
“I love to read. I wish I could advise more people to read. There’s a whole new world in books. If you can’t afford to travel, you travel mentally through reading. You can see anything and go any place you want to in reading.”
“I wrote a book called ‘Dancing The Dream’. It was more autobiographical than Moonwalk, which I did with Mrs. Onassis. It wasn’t full of gossip and scandal and all that trash that people write, so I don’t think people paid much attention to it, but it came from my heart. It was essays, thoughts and things that I’ve thought about while on tour”
“All the things I've read in my school books about England and the Queen were okay, but my eyes are the greatest book in the world.”
“Once at a record store in San Francisco, over a thousand kids showed up. They pushed forward and broke a window. A big piece of glass fell on top of this girl. And the girl's throat was slit. She just got slit. And I remember there was blood everywhere. Oh God, so much blood. And she grabbed her throat and was bleeding and everyone just ignored her. Why? Because I was there and they wanted to grab at me and get my autograph. I wonder whatever happened to that girl.”
“But for me the sweetest contact with God has no form. I close my eyes, look within, and enter a deep soft silence. The infinity of God's creation embraces me.”
“Each song is a child I nourish and give my love to. But even if you have never written a song, your life is a song. How can it not be?”
“To live is to be musical, starting with the blood dancing in your veins. Everything living has a rhythm. Do you feel your music?”
“Children show me in their playful smiles the divine in everyone.”
“When I step out on stage in front of thousands of people, I don't feel that I'm being brave. It can take much more courage to express true feelings to one person. [...] In spite of the risks, the courage to be honest and intimate opens the way to self-discovery. It offers what we all want, the promise of love. ”
“People ask me how I make music. I tell them I just step into it. It's like stepping into a river and joining the flow. Every moment in the river has its song.”
“We have to heal our wounded world. The chaos, despair, and senseless destruction we see today are a result of the alienation that people feel from each other and their environment.”
“When all life is seen as divine, everyone grows wings.”
“In their innocence, very young children know themselves to be light and love. If we will allow them, they can teach us to see ourselves the same way. ”
“Hope is such a beautiful word, but it often seems very fragile. Life is still being needlessly hurt and destroyed.”
“And that's what innocence is. It's simple and trusting like a child, not judgmental and committed to one narrow point of view. If you are locked into a pattern of thinking and responding, your creativity gets blocked. You miss the freshness and magic of the moment. Learn to be innocent again, and that freshness never fades.”
“A star can never die. It just turns into a smile and melts back into the cosmic music, the dance of life.”
“I'm going to search for my star until I find it. It's hidden in the drawer of innocence, wrapped in a scarf of wonder.”
“Sometimes the heart is so heavy that we turn away from it and forget that its throbbing is the wisest message of life, a wordless message that says, "Live, be, move, rejoice -- you are alive!" Without the heart's wise rhythm, we could not exist.”
“I trembled to think of a world without stars. No guide for the sailor to trust at see, no jewels to dazzle our sense of beauty [...] But all around the globe, the air is so dirty and the lights from the cities are so bright that for some people few stars can be seen anymore. A generation of children may grow up seeing a blank sky and asking, "Did there used to be stars there?”
“When children listen to music, they don't just listen. They melt into the melody and flow with the rhythm. Something inside starts to unfold its wings - soon the child and the music are one.”
“In a world filled with hate, we must still dare to hope. In a world filled with anger, we must still dare to comfort. In a world filled with despair, we must still dare to dream. And in a world filled with distrust, we must still dare to believe.”
“They say that parenting is like dancing. You take one step, your child takes another.”
“All of us are products of our childhood.”
“Human knowledge consists not only of libraries of parchment and ink - it is also comprised of the volumes of knowledge that are written on the human heart, chiselled on the human soul, and engraved on the human psyche. ”
“Lies run sprints, but the truth runs marathons. The truth will win this marathon in court.”
“I'm just like anyone. I cut and I bleed and I embarass easily.”
“Heal the World, make it a better place, for you and for me and the entire human race, there are people dying, if you care enough for the living, make a better place for you and for me....”
“The greatest education in the world is watching the masters at work”
“Don't blame it on the sunshine. Don't blame it on the moonlight. Blame it on the boogie.”
“Its all for love... L.O.V.E.”
“Look beyond yourself..”
“I'm starting with the man in the mirror,I'm asking him to change his ways;And no message could have been any clearer,If you wanna make the world a better place,Take a look at yourself, and then make a change!”