Creature from Another Planet

Rearview is an occasional feature that takes a very personal look back at the icons and the iconic, the things that shaped our minds and our lives.

When I was still a little boy, Elvis died.
Back in those days before Breaking News — when we heard our Western pop music via AIR’s 10 p.m. slot twice a week, and Sri Lanka Broadcasting Cooperation when our dinky radio could pick it up — most of it was many years behind what the West was listening to. Ditto with the cassette tapes we could buy. (We did get more up-to-date music, via the BBC and the Voice of America, but with helluva lot more crackle.)

The King’s earlier music was still getting airtime in India, as a result, and so his passing made the headlines.

Image: Manjula Padmanaban

My mother was sad: she’d been a fan. Dad, who liked to joke about Elvis’ songs being miracles from modern sound studios and how he couldn’t really sing, didn’t push his luck.

When Disco was big, an aunt visiting from the US gave me a few tapes. This gave me instant cred with the peer group, it being all modern and American and all. One of them was Off the Wall. I remember being rather unmoved by most of the dance tracks, and only really liking one of the few slower numbers.

That was my introduction to Michael Jackson. If I’d heard of the Jackson 5 before that, via the radio, they hadn’t registered.

After I passed out of school and therefore wouldn’t have my studies affected by it, we got a TV. Colour TV and cable came in a little later, and with it, such up-to-the-moment treats as the Grammys, not quite live, but pretty much in the same week, which, considering what we were used to, was greased lightning.

The Grammys introduced us to that new phenomenon, the music video. And when you’re talking music videos, the definitive introduction to the art, the album that created the art, that changed music from something you listened to, to something you watched, was Thriller. That multi-facetted album won Jackson eight Grammys in 1984 (a record only equalled in 2000, by the group Santana), and has sold over a 100 million copies, making it the largest-selling album ever. It also broke MTV’s colour barrier, being among the first videos by a black act that the channel featured. Smart move, MTV, because Thriller was pretty much the making of the channel, with its huge popularity. The King of Pop had ascended to his throne.

For us teenagers, he was huge. Like it or not, we were imprinted by his trademarks. (Some of them still persist: If you have to blame someone for people my age still wearing white socks in non-sporting situations, lay it at his door.) We teamed them with black shoes and pants a bit short in the leg to show them off. (That’s a little trick MJ picked up from dancers like Fred Astaire, by the way. It draws attention to the dazzling footwork.) Some of us even had red jackets. We didn’t do the white sequinned glove, not in public, that is, except in stage shows.

We played his music at all our parties. We knew, most of us, that we didn’t have the vocal chops to sing like him, and didn’t try. Strangely, though, even if we’re just as far behind in matters terpsichorean, many of us tried to dance like him. We’d get a step or two, yes, but most of us really didn’t get much further than the Moonwalk, his signature move from Billie Jean. His combination of natural grace, sinewy strength, flashy speed and rubber-limbed flexibility was from another planet.

Dad and Mum kind of liked his stuff too, though I suspect they didn’t approve of his crotch-grabbing.
Digression: What we now call Bollywood tried very hard to imitate him, and usually failed dismally. I think the only human being who got close, and in fact evolved his own style that was MJesque without being a rip-off, was the Tamil film star, Prabhudeva. (Telugu star Chiranjeevi did a rip-off of Thriller that was indeed horrific.)

Point of digression: as everyone, down to autorickshaw drivers, copied the man, idolising MJ become infra dig. We, self-conscious young adults, moved on, listened to — watched — other singers and bands. Eventually, when the version of MTV available in this country, and Channel V as well, had been completely colonised by Bollywood, I switched my allegiance to the nature channels.

But if MJ had a new album out, a new video getting rotation, I checked it out. And, usually, he delivered. Even when he didn’t, it wasn’t for lack of effort. The man knew the popularity business instinctively, and he always played his part.

When he came to India, I thought a bit about going to the show; but his being practically adopted by the Shiv Sena put me off not a little. That I was a junior copywriter at that time, and the Rs. 6,000 tickets that were available were beyond my modest means did help with that decision, I must admit.

Those tawdry accusations and all the general weirdness that regularly made the news made me wince, not wanting to believe. We had outgrown him in some ways, but he was too much a part of the making of us for us to disown him. When I heard that he was doing a comeback/farewell series of concerts, I marvelled at the fact that he had enough juice left in the tank to do a punishing schedule at 50. And I decided that if the carnival came to India, this time I’d go.

When I heard the news, a few hours after I’d mourned the death of Farrah Fawcett, my first ever poster girl, I’ll confess that my first reaction was that it must be a gimmick. Nevertheless, jolted awake, I surfed obsessively for hours, from Twitter to Facebook to news sites and back again.
It was true. He was gone. And with him, and Farrah, I must also say goodbye to my youth.