A Q & A With Michael Jackson
In His Own Words
Thursday, June 25, 2009
By Bryan Monroe
Q: How did it all start?
A:
Motown was preparing to do this movie called The Wiz… and Quincy Jones
happened to be the man who was doing the music. Now, I had heard of
Quincy before. When I was in Indiana as a child, my father used to buy
jazz albums, so I knew him as a jazz musician.
So after we had made this movie––we had gotten pretty close on the
film, too; he helped me understand certain words, he was really
father-like––I called him after the movie, out of complete
sincerity––’cause I’m a shy person, ESPECIALLY then, I used to not even
look at people when they were talking to me, I’m not joking––and I
said, ‘I’m ready to do an album. Do you think… could you recommend
anybody who would be interested in producing it with me or working with
me?’ He paused and said, ‘Why don’t you let ME do it?’ I said to
myself, ‘I don’t know why I didn’t think of that.’ Probably because I
was thinking that he was more my father, kind of jazzy. So after he
said that, I said, ‘WOW, that would be great.’ What’s great about
working with Quincy, he let’s you do your thing. He doesn’t get in the
way.
So the first thing I came to him with was from Off the Wall, our first
album, and Rod Temperton came in the studio, and he came with this
killer––he’s this little German guy from Wurms, Germany––he comes with
this … ‘doop, dakka dakka doop, dakka dakka dakka doop’, this whole
melody and chorus, Rock With You. I go, WOW! So when I heard that, I
said, ‘OK, I really have to work now.’ So every time Rod would present
something, I would present something, and we’d form a little friendly
competition. I love working like that. I used to read how Walt Disney
used to, if they were working on Bambi or an animated show, they’d put
a deer in the middle of the floor and make the animators kind of
compete with different styles of drawing. Whoever had the most stylized
effect that Walt liked, he would pick that. They would kind of compete,
it was like a friendly thing, but it was competition, ’cause it breeds
higher effort. So whenever Rod would bring something, I would bring
something, then he would bring something, then I would bring something
else. We created this wonderful thing.
Q: So, after Off the Wall, in the spring of ’82, you went back in the studio to work on Thriller.
A:
After Off the Wall, we had all these No. 1 hits from it – “Don’t Stop
’Til You Get Enough,” “Rock With You,” “She’s Out of My Life,” “Workin’
Day and Night”––and we were nominated for a Grammy award, but I was
just not happy with how the whole thing happened because I wanted to do
much more, present much more, put more of my soul and heart in it.
Q: Was it a transition point for you?
A:
A COMPLETE transition. Ever since I was a little boy, I would study
composition. And it was Tchaikovsky that influenced me the most. If you
take an album like Nutcracker Suite, every song is a killer, every one.
So I said to myself, ‘Why can’t there be a pop album where
every…’––people used to do an album where you’d get one good song, and
the rest were like B-sides. They’d call them “album songs”— and I would
say to myself, ‘Why can’t every one be like a hit song? Why can’t every
song be so great that people would want to buy it if you could release
it as a single?’ So I always tried to strive for that. That was my
purpose for the next album. That was the whole idea. I wanted to just
put any one out that we wanted. I worked hard for it.
Q: So, the creative process, were you deliberate about that, or did it just kind of happen?
A:
No, I was pretty deliberate. Even though it all came together some kind
of way, consciously, it was created in this universe, but once the
right chemistry gets in the room, magic has to happen. It has to. It’s
like putting certain elements in one hemisphere and it produces this
magic in the other. It’s science. And getting in there with some of the
great people, it’s just wonderful.
Quincy calls me a nickname, ‘Smelly.’ Smelly came from ––and [Steven]
Spielberg calls me that, too. Back then, especially back then — I say a
few swear words now––but especially then, you couldn’t get me to swear.
So I would say, ‘That’s a “smelly” song.’ That would mean, ‘It’s so
great’ that you’re engrossed in it. So he would call me ‘Smelly.’
But yeah, working with Quincy was such a wonderful thing. He lets you
experiment, do your thing, and he’s genius enough to stay out of the
way of the music, and if there’s an element to be added, he’ll add it.
And he hears these little things. Like, for instance, in “Billie Jean,”
I had come up with this piece of the bass lick, and the melody, and the
whole composition. But in listening, he’ll add a nice riff…
We would work on a track and then we’d meet at his house, play what we
worked on, and he would say, ‘Smelly, let it talk to you.’ I’d go,
‘OK.’ He’d say, ‘If the song needs something, it’ll tell you. Let it
talk to you.’ I’ve learned to do that. The key to being a wonderful
writer is not to write. You just get out of the way. Leave room for God
to walk in the room. And when I write something that I know is right, I
get on my knees and say thank you. Thank you, Jehovah!
Q: When’s the last time you had that feeling?
A: Well, recently. I’m always writing. When you know
it’s right, sometimes you feel like something’s coming, a gestation,
almost like a pregnancy or something. You get emotional, and you start
to feel something gestating and, magic, there it is! It’s an explosion
of something that’s so beautiful, you go, WOW! There it is. That’s how
it works through you. It’s a beautiful thing. It’s a universe of where
you can go, with those 12 notes…
(He’s now listening to an early, writing version of Billie Jean playing on an iPhone…)
…What
I do when I write is that I’ll do a raggedy, rough version just to hear
the chorus, just to see how much I like the chorus. If it works for me
that way when it’s raggedy, then I know it’ll work… Listen to that,
that’s at home. Janet, Randy, me… Janet and I are going “Whoo,
Whoo…Whoo, Whoo…” I do that, the same process with every song. It’s the
melody, the melody is most important. If the melody can sell me, if I
like the rough, then I’ll go to the next step. If it sounds good in my
head, it’s usually good when I do it. The idea is to transcribe from
what’s in your mentality onto tape.
If you take a song like “Billie Jean,” where the bass line is the
prominent, dominant piece, the protagonist of the song, the main
driving riff that you hear, getting the character of that riff to be
just the way you want it to be, that takes a lot of time. Listen,
you’re hearing four basses on there, doing four different
personalities, and that’s what gives it the character. But it takes a
lot of work.
Q: Another big moment was the Motown 25 performance…
A: I was at the studio editing Beat It, and for some reason I happened
to be at Motown Studios doing it––I had long left the company. So they
were getting ready to do something with the Motown anniversary, and
Berry Gordy came by and asked me did I want to do the show, and I told
him ‘NO.’ I told him no. I said no because the Thriller thing, I was
building and creating something I was planning to do, and he said, ‘But
it’s the anniversary...’ So this is what I said to him. I said, ‘I will
do it, but the only way I’ll do it is if you let me do one song that’s
not a Motown song.’ He said, ‘What is it?’ I said, ‘Billie Jean’. He
said, ‘OK, fine.’ I said, ‘You’ll really let me do “Billie Jean?” He
said, ‘Yeah.’
So I rehearsed and choreographed and dressed my brothers, and picked
the songs, and picked the medley. And not only that, you have to work
out all the camera angles.
I direct and edit everything I do. Every shot you see is my shot. Let
me tell you why I have to do it that way. I have five, no, six cameras.
When you’re performing––and I don’t care what kind of performance you
are giving––if you don’t capture it properly, the people will never see
it. It’s the most selfish medium in the world. You’re filming WHAT you
want people to see, WHEN you want them to see it, HOW you want them to
see it, what JUXTAPOSITION you want them to see. You’re creating the
totality of the whole feeling of what’s being presented, in your angle
and your shots. ‘Cause I know what I want to see. I know what I want to
go to the audience. I know what I want to come back. I know the emotion
that I felt when I performed it, and I try to recapture that same
emotion when I cut and edit and direct.
Q: How long have you been creating all of those elements?
A: Since I was a little boy, with my brothers. My father used to say, ‘Show ‘em Michael, show ‘em.’
Q: Did they ever get jealous of that?
A:
They never showed it at the time, but it must have been hard, because I
would never get spanked during rehearsals or practice. [Laughter] But
afterwards was when I got in trouble. [Laughter]. It’s true, that’s
when I would get it. My father would rehearse with a belt in his hand.
You couldn’t mess up. My father was a genius when it comes to the way
he taught us, staging, how to work an audience, anticipating what to do
next, or never let the audience know if you are suffering, or if
something’s going wrong. He was amazing like that.
Q: Is that where you think you got not just a lot of your business sense, but how to control the whole package?
A:
Absolutely. My father, experience; but I learned a lot from my father.
He had a group when he was a young person called the Falcons. They came
over and they played music, all the time, so we always had music and
dancing. It’s that cultural thing that Black people do. You clear out
all the furniture, turn up the music…when company comes, everybody gets
out in the middle of the floor, you gotta do something. I loved that.
Q: Do your kids do that now?
A: They do, but they get shy. But they do it for me, sometimes.
Q: Speaking of showmanship: MTV, they didn’t play Black folks. How hard was that for you?
A:
They said they don’t play [Black artists]. It broke my heart, but at
the same time it lit something. I was saying to myself, ‘I have to do
something where they… I just refuse to be ignored.’ So yeah, “Billie
Jean,” they said, ‘We won’t play it.’
But when they played it, it set the all-time record. Then they were
asking me for EVERYTHING we had. They were knocking our door down. Then
Prince came, it opened the door for Prince and all the other Black
artists. It was 24-hour heavy metal, just a potpourri of crazy images…
They came to me so many times in the past and said, ‘Michael, if it
wasn’t for you, there would be no MTV.’ They told me that, over and
over, personally. I guess they didn’t hear it at the time…but I’m sure
they didn’t mean any pure malice [laughter].
Q: That really gave birth to the modern video age…
A:
I used to look at MTV. My brother [Jackie], I’ll never forget, he’d
say, ‘Michael, you gotta see this channel. Oh, my God, it’s the best
idea. They show music 24 hours a day… 24 Hours A Day!’ So I said, ‘Let
me see this.’ And I’m watching it, I’m seeing all this stuff going on
and saying ‘If only they could give this stuff some more entertainment
value, more story, a little more dance, I’m sure people would love it
more.’ So I said, when I do something, it’s gotta have a story––an
opening, a middle and a closing––so you could follow a linear thread;
there’s got to be a thread through it. So while you are watching the
entertainment value of it, you’re wondering what is going to happen. So
that’s when I started to experiment with Thriller, The Way You Make Me
Feel and Bad and Smooth Criminal and directing and writing.
Q: What do you think about the state of music videos and music today?
A:
[The industry], it’s at a crossroads. There’s a transformation going
on. People are confused, what’s going to happen, how to distribute and
sell music. I think the Internet kind of threw everybody for a real
loop. ‘Cause it’s so powerful, kids love it so much. The whole world is
at their fingertips, on their lap. Anything they want to know, anyone
they want to communicate with, any music, any movies… This thing, it
just took everybody for a loop. Right now, all these Starbucks deals
and Wal-Mart deals, direct to artist, I don’t know if that’s the
answer. I think the answer is just phenomenal, great music. Just
reaching the masses. I think people are still searching. There’s not a
real musical revolution going on right now, either. But when it’s
there, people will break a wall down to get to it. I mean, ‘cause
before Thriller, it was the same kind of thing. People were NOT buying
music. It helped to bring everybody back into the stores. So, when it
happens, it happens.
Q: Who impresses you?
A: As far as artistry, I think Ne-Yo is doing wonderful. But he has a
very Michael Jackson feel, too. But that’s what I like about him. I can
tell that he’s a guy who understands writing.
Q: Do you work with these young artists?
A: Sure. I’ve always been the type where, I don’t care if it’s the
mailman or the guy sweeping the floor. If it’s a great song, it’s a
great song. Some of the most ingenious ideas come from everyday people,
who just go, ‘Why don’t you try this, or do this.’ It’ll be a wonderful
idea, so you should just try it. Chris Brown is wonderful. Akon, he’s a
wonderful artist.
I always want to do music that inspires or influences another
generation. You want what you create to live, be it sculpture or
painting or music. Like Michelangelo, he said, “I know the creator will
go, but his work survives. That is why to escape death, I attempt to
bind my soul to my work.’ And that’s how I feel. I give my all to my
work. I want it to just live.
Q: How does it feel to know you have changed history? Do you think about that a lot?
A: Yeah, I do, I really do. I’m very proud that we opened doors, that
it helped tear down a lot. Going around the world, doing tours, in
stadiums, you see the influence of the music. When you just look out
over the stage, as far as the naked eye could see, you see people. And
it’s a wonderful feeling, but it came with a lot of pain, a lot of pain.
Q: How so?
A:
When you’re on top of your game, when you’re a pioneer, people come at
you. It’s there, who’s at the top, you want to get at them.
But I feel grateful, all those record-breaking things, to the biggest
albums, to those No. 1s, I still feel grateful. I’m a guy who used to
sit in my living room and listen to my father play Ray Charles. My
mother used to wake me up at 3 in the morning, ‘Michael, he’s on TV,
he’s on TV!’ I’d run to the TV and James Brown would be on TV. I said,
‘That’s what I want to do.’
Q: Can we expect more of Michael Jackson?
A:
I’m writing a lot of stuff right now. I’m in the studio, like, every
day. I think, like, the rap thing that is happening now, when it first
came out, I always felt that it was gonna take more of a melodic
structure to make it more universal, ‘cause not everybody speak
English. [Laughter] And you are limited to your country. But when you
can have a melody, and everybody can hum a melody, then that’s when it
became France, The Middle East, everywhere! All over the world now
‘cause they put that melodic, linear thread in there. You have to be
able to hum it, from the farmer in Ireland to the lady who scrubs
toilets in Harlem to anybody who can whistle to a child poppin’ their
fingers. You have to be able to hum it.
Q: So, you’re almost 50 now. Do you think you’ll be doing this at 80?
A:
The truth is, umm, no. Not the way James Brown did, or Jackie Wilson
did, where they just ran it out, they killed themselves. In my opinion,
I wish [Brown] could have slowed down and been more relaxed and enjoyed
his hard work.
Q: Will you tour again?
A: I don’t care about long tours. But what I love about touring is that
it sharpens ones craft beautifully. That’s what I love about Broadway,
that’s why actors turn to Broadway, to sharpen their skills. It does do
that. ‘Cause it takes years to become a great entertainer. Years. You
can’t just grab some guy out of obscurity and throw ‘em out there and
expect for this person to compete with that person. It’ll never work.
And the audience knows it; they can see it. The way they gesture their
hand, move their body, the way they do anything with the microphone, or
the way they bow. They can see it right away.
Now Stevie Wonder, he’s a musical prophet. He’s another guy I have to
credit. I used to say to myself, ‘I want to write more.’ I used to
watch [producers] Gamble and Huff, and Hal Davis and The Corporation
write all those hits for the Jackson 5 and I really wanted to study the
anatomy. What they used to do, they used to have us come in and sing
after they did the track. I used to get upset ‘cause I would want to
see them make the track. So they would give me “ABC” after the track
was done, or “I Want You Back” or “The Love You Save.” I wanted to
experience it all.
So Stevie Wonder used to literally let me sit like a fly on the wall. I
got to see Songs in the Key of Life get made, some of the most golden
things. I would sit with Marvin Gaye and just…and these would be the
people who would just come over to our house and hang out and play
basketball with my brothers on the weekend. We always had these people
around. So when you really can see the science, the anatomy and the
structure of how it all works, it’s just so wonderful.
Q: So, you play on a world stage. How do you see the shape of the world today?
A: I’m very concerned about the plight of the international global
warming phenomenon. I knew it was coming, but I wish they would have
gotten people’s interest sooner. But it’s never too late. It’s been
described as a runaway train; if we don’t stop it, we’ll never get it
back. So we have to fix it, now. That’s what I was trying to do with
“Earth Song,” “Heal the World,” “We Are the World,” writing those songs
to open up people’s consciousness. I wish people would listen to every
word.
Q: What do you think about the next presidential race? Hillary, Barack?
A: To tell you the truth, I don’t follow that stuff. We were raised to
not…we don’t look to man to fix the problems of the world, we don’t.
They can’t do it. That’s how I see it. It’s beyond us. Look, we don’t
have control over the grounds, they can shake. We don’t have control
over the seas, they can have tsunamis. We don’t have control over the
skies, there are storms. We’re all in God’s hands. I think that man has
to take that into consideration. I just wish they would do more for the
babies and children, help them more. That would be great, wouldn’t it?
Q:
Speaking of babies, as a father now, rewind back 25 years ago. What is
the difference between that Michael and the Michael today?
A:
That Michael is probably the same Michael here. I just wanted to get
certain things accomplished first. But I always had this tug in the
back of my head, the things I wanted to do, to raise children, have
children. I’m enjoying it very much.
Q: What do you think about all the stuff that’s out there about you, all the things you read? How do you feel about that?
A:
I don’t pay attention to that. In my opinion, it’s ignorance. It’s
usually not based on fact. It’s based on, you know, myth. The guy who
you don’t get to see. Every neighborhood has the guy who you don’t see,
so you gossip about him. You see those stories about him, there’s the
myth that he did this or he did that. People are crazy!
I’m just about wanting to do wonderful music.
But back to Motown 25, one of the things that touched me the most about
doing that was, after I did the performance––I’ll never forget. There
was Marvin Gaye in the wings, and the Temptations and Smokey Robinson
and my brothers, they were hugging me and kissing me and holding me.
Richard Pryor walked over to me and said [in a quiet voice], ‘Now that
was the greatest performance I’ve ever seen.’ That was my reward. These
were people who, when I was a little boy in Indiana, I used to listen
to Marvin Gaye, The Temptations, and to have them bestow that kind of
appreciation on me, I was just honored. Then the next day, Fred Astaire
calls and said, ‘I watched it last night, and I taped it, and I watched
it again this morning. You’re a helluva mover. You put the audience on
their ASS last night!’ So, later, when I saw Fred Astaire, he did this
with his fingers [He makes a little moonwalk gesture with his two
fingers on his outstretched palm].
I remember doing the performance so clearly, and I remembered that I
was so upset with myself, ‘cause it wasn’t what I wanted. I wanted it
to be more. But not until I finished. It was a little child, a little
Jewish child backstage with a little tuxedo on, he looked at me, and he
said [in a stunned voice] ‘Who taught you to move like that?’
[Laughter] And I said, ‘I guess God… and
rehearsal.’
