正文
杰克逊的音乐，舞蹈，和形象整整影响了几代音乐家。被当之无愧地称为流行歌曲之王。 他的悴然离世使全球他的粉丝们伤心不已。
他的自传Moonwalk和自传体的电影Moonwalker于1988年他三十岁事业处于巅峰期出台。纪录他从童星到世界巨星最值得纪念的心路旅程和时刻。
Moonwalk和Moonwalker目前在市面上已经绝版。我在这里将分九次转贴。谢谢观看阅读。
Michael Jackson
Moonwalk
Chapter One – Just Kids With A Dream
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I've always wanted to be able to tell stories, you know, stories that came
from my soul. I'd like to sit by a fire and tell people stories - make them
see pictures, make them cry and laugh, take them anywhere emotionally with
something as deceptively simple as words. I'd like to tell tales to move
their souls and transform them. I've always wanted to be able to do that.
Imagine how the great writers must feel, knowing they have that power. I
sometimes feel I could do it. It's something I'd like to develop. In a way,
songwriting uses the same skills, creates the emotional highs and lows, but
the story is a sketch. It's quicksilver. There are very few books written on
the art of storytelling, how to grip listeners, how to get a group of people
together and amuse them. No costumes, no makeup, no nothing, just you and
your voice, and your powerful ability to take them anywhere, to transform
their lives, if only for minutes.
As I begin to tell my story, I want to repeat what I usually say to people
when they ask me about my earliest days with the Jackson 5: I was so little
when we began to work on our music that I really don't remember much about
it. Most people have the luxury of careers that start when they're old
enough to know exactly what they're doing and why, but, of course, that
wasn't true of me. They remember everything that happened to them, but I was
only five years old. When you're a show business child, you really don't
have the maturity to understand a great deal of what is going on around you.
People make a lot of decisions concerning your life when you're out of the
room. So here's what I remember. I remember singing at the top of my voice
and dancing with real joy and working too hard for a child. Of course, there
are many details I don't remember at all. I do remember the Jackson 5 really
taking off when I was only eight or nine.
I was born in Gary, Indiana, on a late summer night in 1958, the seventh of
my parents' nine children. My father, Joe Jackson, was born in Arkansas, and
in 1949 he married my mother, Katherine Scruse, whose people came fromAlabama. My sister Maureen was born the following year and had the tough jobof being the oldest. Jackie, Tito, Jermaine, LaToya, and Marlon were all next in line. Randy and Janet came after me.
A part of my earliest memories is my father's job working in the steel mill.
It was tough, mind-numbing work and he played music for escape. At the same
time, my mother was working in a department store. Because of my father, and
because of my mother's own love of music, we heard it all the time at home.
My father and his brother had a group called the Falcons who were the local
R&B band. My father played the guitar, as did his brother. They would do
some of the great early rock 166;n' roll and blues songs by Chuck Berry, Little
Richard, Otis Redding, you name it. All those styles were amazing and each
had an influence on Joe and on us, although we were too young to know it at
the time. The Falcons practised in the living room of our house in Gary, so
I was raised on R&B. Since we were nine kids and my father's brother had
eight of his own, our combined numbers made for a huge family. Music was
what we did for entertainment and those times helped keep us together and
kind of encouraged my father to be a family-oriented man. The Jackson 5 were
born out of this tradition - we later became the Jacksons - and because of
this training and musical tradition, I moved out on my own and established a
sound that is mine.
I remember my childhood as mostly work, even though I loved to sing. I
wasn't forced into this business by stage parents the way Judy Garland was.
I did it because I enjoyed it and because it was as natural to me as drawing
a breath and exhaling it. I did it because I was compelled to do it, not my
parents or family, but by my own inner life in the world of music.
There were times, let me make that clear, when I'd come home from school and
I'd only have time to put my books down and get ready for the studio. Once
there, I'd sing until late at night, until it was past my bedtime, really.
There was a park across the street from the Motown studio, and I can
remember looking at those kids playing games. I'd just stare at them in
wonder - I couldn't imagine such freedom, such a carefree life - and wish
more than anything that I had that kind of freedom, that I could walk away
and be like them. So there were sad moments in my childhood. It's true for
any child star. Elizabeth Taylor told me she felt the same way. When you're
young and you're working, the world can seem awfully unfair. I wasn't forced
to be little Michael the lead singer - I did it and I loved it - but it was
hard work. If we were doing an album, for example, we'd go off to the studio wasn't time. I'd come home, exhausted, and it'd be eleven or twelve and past time to go to bed.
So I very much identify with anyone who worked as a child. I know how they
struggled, I know what they sacrificed. I also know what they learned. I've
learned that it becomes more of a challenge as one gets older. I feel old
for some reason. I really feel like an old soul, someone who's seen a lot
and experienced a lot. Because of all the years I've clocked in, it's hard
for me to accept that I am only twenty-nine. I've been in the business for
twenty-four years. Sometimes I feel like I should be near the end of my
life, turning eighty, with people patting me on the back. That's what comes
from starting so young.
When I first performed with my brothers, we were known as the Jacksons. We
would later become the Jackson 5. Still later, after we left Motown, we
would reclaim the Jacksons name again.
Every one of my albums or the group's albums has been dedicated to our
mother, Katherine Jackson, since we took over our own careers and began to
produce our own music. My first memories are of her holding me and singing
songs like "You Are My Sunshine" and "Cotton Fields." She sang to me and to
my brothers and sisters often. Even though she had lived in Indiana for some
time, my mother grew up in Alabama, and in that part of the country it was
just as common for black people to be raised with country and western music
on the radio as it was for them to hear spirituals in church. She likes
Willie Nelson to this day. She has always had a beautiful voice and I
suppose I got my singing ability from my mother and, of course, from God.
Mom played the clarinet and the piano, which she taught my oldest sister,
Maureen, whom we call Rebbie, to play, just as she'd teach my other older
sister, LaToya. My mother knew, from an early age, that she would never
perform the music she loved in front of others, not because she didn't have
the talent and the ability, but because she was crippled by polio as a
child. She got over the disease, but not without a permanent limp in her
walk. She had to miss a great deal of school as a child, but she told us
that she was lucky to recover at a time when many died from the disease. I
remember how important it was to her that we got the sugar-cube vaccine. She
even made us miss a youth club show one Saturday afternoon - that's how
important it was in our family.
My mother knew her polio was not a curse but a test that God gave her to
triumph over, and she instilled in me a love of Him that I will always have.
She taught me that my talent for singing and dancing was as much God's work
as a beautiful sunset or a storm that left snow for children to play in.
Despite all the time we spent rehearsing and travelling, Mom would find time
to take me to the Kingdom Hall of the Jehovah's Witnesses, usually with
Rebbie and LaToya.
Years later, after we had left Gary, we performed on "The Ed Sullivan Show",
the live Sunday night variety show where America first saw the Beatles,
Elvis, and Sly and the Family Stone. After the show, Mr. Sullivan
complimented and thanked each of us; but I was thinking about what he had
said to me before the show. I had been wandering around backstage, like the
kid in the Pepsi commercial, and ran into Mr. Sullivan. He seemed glad to
see me and shook my hand, but before he let it go he had a special message
for me. It was 1970, a year when some of the best people in rock were losing
their lives to drugs and alcohol. An older, wiser generation in show
business was unprepared to lose its very young. Some people had already said
that I reminded them of Frankie Lymon, a great young singer of the 1950s who
lost his life that way. Ed Sullivan may have been thinking of all this when
he told me, "Never forget where your talent came from, that your talent is a
gift from God."
I was grateful for his kindness, but I could have told him that my mother
had never let me forget. I never had polio, which is a frightening thing for
a dancer to think about, but I knew God had tested me and my brothers and
sisters in other ways - our large family, our tiny house, the small amount
of money we had to make ends meet, even the jealous kids in the
neighbourhood who threw rocks at our windows while we rehearsed, yelling
that we'd never make it. When I think of my mother and our early years, I
can tell you there are rewards that go far beyond money and public acclaim
and awards.
My mother was a great provider. If she found out that one of us had an
interest in something, she would encourage it if there was any possible way.
If I developed an interest in movie stars, for instance, she'd come home
with an armful of books about famous stars. Even with nine children she
treated each of us like an only child. There isn't one of us who's ever
forgotten what a hard worker and great provider she was. It's an old story.
Every child thinks their mother is the greatest mother in the world, but we
Jacksons never lost that feeling. Because of Katherine's gentleness, warmth,
and attention, I can't imagine what it must be like to grow up without a
mother's love.
One thing I know about children is that if they don't get the love they need
from their parents, they'll get it from someone else and cling to that
person, a grandparent, anyone. We never had to look for anyone else with my
mother around. The lessons she taught us were invaluable. Kindness, love,
and consideration for other people headed her list. Don't hurt people. Never
beg. Never freeload. Those were sins at our house. She always wanted us to
give , but she never wanted us to ask or beg. That's the way she is.
I remember a good story about my mother that illustrates her nature. One
day, back in Gary, when I was real little, this man knocked on everybody's
door early in the morning. He was bleeding so badly you could see where he'd
been around the neighbourhood. No one would let him in. Finally he got to
our door and he started banging and knocking. Mother let him in at once.
Now, most people would have been too afraid to do that, but that's my
mother. I can remember waking up and finding blood on our floor. I wish we
could all be more like Mum.
The earliest memories I have of my father are of him coming home from the
steel mill with a big bag of glazed doughnuts for all of us. My brothers and
I could really eat back then and that bag would disappear with a snap of the
fingers. He used to take us all to the merry-go-round in the park, but I was
so young I don't remember that very well.
My father has always been something of a mystery to me and he knows it. One
of the few things I regret most is never being able to have a real closeness
with him. He built a shell around himself over the years and, once he
stopped talking about our family business, he found it hard to relate to us.
We'd all be together and he'd just leave the room. Even today it's hard for
him to touch on father and son stuff because he's too embarrassed. When I
see that he is, I become embarrassed, too.
My father did always protect us and that's no small feat. He always tried to
make sure people didn't cheat us. He looked after our interests in the best
ways. He might have made a few mistakes along the way, but he always thought
he was doing what was right for his family. And, of course, most of what my father helped us accomplish was wonderful and unique, especially in regard
to our relationships with companies and people in the business. I'd say we
were among a fortunate few artists who walked away from a childhood in the
business with anything substantial - money, real estate, other investments.
My father set all these up for us. He looked out for both our interests and
his. To this day I'm so thankful he didn't try to take all our money for
himself the way so many parents of child stars have. Imagine stealing from
your own children. My father never did anything like that. But I still don't
know him, and that's sad for a son who hungers to understand his own father.
He's still a mystery man to me and he may always be one.
What I got from my father wasn't necessarily God-given, though the Bible
says you reap what you sow. When we were coming along, Dad said that in a
different way, but the message was just as clear: You could have all the
talent in the world, but if you didn't prepare and plan, it wouldn't do you
any good.
Joe Jackson had always loved singing and music as much as my mother did, but
he also knew there was a world beyond Jackson Street. I wasn't old enough to
remember his band, the Falcons, but they came over to our house to rehearse
on weekends. The music took them away from their jobs at the steel mill,
where Dad drove a crane. The Falcons would play all over town, and in clubs
and colleges around northern Indiana and Chicago. At the rehearsals at our
house, Dad would bring his guitar out of the closet and plug it into the amp
he kept in the basement. He'd always loved rhythm and blues and that guitar
was his pride and joy. The closet where the guitar was kept was considered
an almost sacred place. Needless to say, it was off-limits to us kids. Dad
didn't go to Kingdom Hall with us, but both Mom and Dad knew that music was
a way of keeping our family together in a neighbourhood where gangs
recruited kids my brothers' ages. The three oldest boys would always have an
excuse to around when the Falcons came over. Dad let them think they were
being given a special treat by being allowed to listen, but he was actually
eager to have them there.
Tito watched everything that was going on with the greatest interest. He'd
taken saxophone in school, but he could tell his hands were big enough to
grab the chords and slip the riffs that my father played. It made sense that
he'd catch on, because Tito looked so much like my father that we all
expected him to share Dad's talents. The extent of the resemblance was scary
as he got older. Maybe my father noticed Tito's zeal because he laid down
rules for all my brothers: No one was to touch the guitar while he was out.
Period.
Therefore, Jackie, Tito, and Jermaine were careful to see that Mom was in
the kitchen when they "borrowed" the guitar. They were also careful not to
make any noise while removing it. They would then go back to our room and
put on the radio or the little portable record player so they could play
along. Tito would hoist the guitar onto his belly as he sat on the bed and
prop it up. He took turns with Jackie and Jermaine, and they'd all try the
scales they were learning in school as well as try to figure out how to get
the "Green Onions" part they'd hear on the radio.
By now I was old enough to sneak in and watch if I promised not to tell. One
day Mom finally caught them, and we were all worried. She scolded the boys,
but said she wouldn't tell Dad as long as we were careful. She knew that
guitar was keeping them from running with a bad crowd and maybe getting beat
up, so she wasn't about to take away anything that kept them within arm's
reach.
Of course, something had to give sooner or later, and one day a string
broke. My brothers panicked. There wasn't time to get it repaired before Dad
came home, and besides, none if us knew how to go about getting it fixed. My
brothers never figured out what to do, so they put the guitar back in the
closet and hoped fervently that my father would think it broke by itself. Of
course, Dad didn't buy that, and he was furious. My sisters told me to stay
out of it and keep a low profile. I heard Tito crying after Dad found out
and I went to investigate, of course. Tito was on his bed crying when Dad
came back and motioned for him to get up. Tito was scared, but my father
just stood there, holding his favourite guitar. He gave Tito a hard,
penetrating look and said, "Let me see what you can do."
My brother pulled himself together and started to play a few runs he had
taught himself. When my father saw how well Tito could play, he knew he'd
obviously been practising and he realised that Tito and the rest of us
didn't treat his favourite guitar as if it were a toy. It became clear to
him that what had happened had been only an accident. At this point my
mother stepped in and voiced her enthusiasm for our musical ability. She
told him that we boys had talent and he should listen to us. She kept
pushing for us, so one day he began to listen and he liked what he heard.
Tito, Jackie, and Jermaine started rehearsing together in earnest.
A couple of years later, when I was about five, Mom pointed out to my father that I
was a good singer and could play the bongos. I became a member of the group.
About then my father decided that what was happening in his family was
serious. Gradually he began spending less time with the Falcons and more
with us. We'd just woodshed together and he'd give us some tips and teach us
techniques on the guitar. Marlon and I weren't old enough to play, but we'd
watch when my father rehearsed the older boys and we were learning when we
watched. The ban on using Dad's guitar still held when he wasn't around, but
my brothers loved using it when they could. The house on Jackson Street was
bursting with music. Dad and Mom had paid for music lessons for Rebbie and
Jackie when they were little kids, so they had a good background. The rest
of us had music class and band in the Gary schools, but no amount of
practice was enough to harness all that energy.
The Falcons were still earning money, however infrequent their gigs, and
that extra money was important to us. It was enough to keep food on the
table for a growing family but not enough to give us things that weren't
necessary. Mom was working part-time at Sears, Dad was still working the
mill job, and no one was going hungry, but I think, looking back, that
things must have seemed one big dead end.
One day Dad was late coming home and Mom began to get worried. By the time
he arrived, she was ready to give him a piece of her mind, something we boys
didn't mind witnessing once in a while just to see if he could take it like
he dished it out, but when he poked his head through the door, he had a
mischievous look on his face and he was hiding something behind his back. We
were all shocked when he produced a gleaming red guitar, slightly smaller
than the one in the closet. We were all hoping this meant we'd get the old
one. But Dad said the new guitar was Tito's. We gathered around to admire
it, while Dad told Tito he had to share it with anyone who would practice .
We were not to take it to school to show it off. This was a serious present
and that day was a momentous occasion for the Jackson family.
Mom was happy for us, but she also knew her husband. She was more aware than
we of the big ambitions and plans he had for us. He'd begun talking to her
at night after we kids were asleep. He had dreams and those dreams didn't
stop with one guitar. Pretty soon we were dealing with equipment, not just
gifts. Jermaine got a bass and an amp. There were shakers for Jackie. Our
bedroom and living room began to look like a music store. Sometimes I'd hearMom and Dad fight when the subject of money was brought up, because all
those instruments and accessories meant having to go without a little
something we needed each week. Dad was persuasive, though, and he didn't
miss a trick.
We even had microphones in the house. They seemed like a real luxury at the
time, especially to a woman who was trying to stretch a very small budget,
but I've come to realise that having those microphones in our house wasn't
just an attempt to keep up with the Joneses or anyone else in amateur night
competitions. They were there to help us prepare. I saw people at talent
shows, who probably sounded great at home, clam up the moment they got in
front of a microphone. Others started screaming their songs like they wanted
to prove they didn't need the mikes. They didn't have the advantage that we
did - an advantage that only experience can give you. I think it probably
made some people jealous because they could tell our expertise with the
mikes gave us an edge. If that was true, we made so many sacrifices - in
free time, schoolwork, and friends - that no one had the right to be
jealous. We were becoming very good, but we were working like people twice
our age.
While I was watching my older brothers, including Marlon on the bongo drums,
Dad got a couple of young guys named Johnny Jackson and Randy Rancifer to
play trap drums and organ. Motown would later claim they were our cousins,
but that was just an embellishment from the P.R. people, who wanted to make
us seem like one big family. We had become a real band! I was like a sponge,
watching everyone, and trying to learn everything I could. I was totally
absorbed when my brothers were rehearsing or playing at charity events or
shopping centres. I was most fascinated when watching Jermaine because he
was the singer at the time and he was a big brother to me - Marlon was too
close to me in age for that. It was Jermaine who would walk me to
kindergarten and whose clothes would be handed down to me. When he did
something, I tried to imitate him. When I was successful at it, my brothers
and Dad would laugh, but when I began singing, they listened. I was singing
in a baby voice then and just imitating sounds. I was so young I didn't know
what many of the words meant, but the more I sang, the better I got.
I always knew how to dance. I would watch Marlon's moves because Jermaine
had the big bass to carry, but also because I could keep up with Marlon, who
was only a year older then me. Soon I was doing most of the singing at home
and preparing to join my brothers in public. Through our rehearsals, we were all becoming aware of our particular strengths and weaknesses as members of the group and the shift in responsibilities was happening naturally.
Our family's house in Gary was tiny, only three rooms really, but at the
time it seemed much larger to me. When you're that young, the whole world
seems so huge that a little room can seem four times its size. When we went
back to Gary years later, we were all surprised at how tiny that house was.
I had remembered it as being large, but you could take five steps from the
front door and you'd be out the back. It was really no bigger then a garage,
but when we lived there it seemed fine to us kids. You see things from such
a different perspective when you're young. Our school days in Gary are a
blur for me. I vaguely remember being dropped off in front of my school on
the first day of kindergarten, and I clearly remember hating it. I didn't
want my mother to leave me, naturally, and I didn't want to be there.
In time I adjusted, as all kids do, and I grew to love my teachers,
especially the women. They were always very sweet to us and they just loved
me. Those teachers were so wonderful; I'd be promoted from one grade to the
next and they'd all cry and hug me and tell me how much they hated to see me
leave their classes. I was so crazy about my teachers that I'd steal my
mother's jewellery and give it to them as presents. They'd be very touched,
but eventually my mother found out about it, and put an end to my generosity
with her things. That urge that I had to give them something in return for
all I was receiving was a measure of how much I loved them at that school.
One day, in the first grade, I participated in a program that was put on
before the whole school. Everyone of us in each class had to do something,
so I went home and discussed it with my parents. We decided I should wear
black pants and a white shirt and sing "Climb Ev'ry Mountain" from The Sound
of Music . When I finished that song, the reaction in the auditorium
overwhelmed me. The applause was thunderous and people were smiling; some of
them were standing. My teachers were crying and I just couldn't believe it.
I had made them all happy. It was such a great feeling. I felt a little
confused too, because I didn't do anything special. I was just singing the
way I sang at home every night. When you're performing, you don't realise
what you sound like or how you're coming across. You just open your mouth
and sing.
Soon Dad was grooming us for talent contests. He was a great trainer, and he
spent a lot of money and time working with us. Talent is something that Godgives to a performer, but our father taught us how to cultivate it.
I think
we also had a certain instinct for show business. We loved to perform and we
put everything we had into it. He's sit at home with us every day after
school and rehearse us. We'd perform for him and he'd critique us. If you
messed up, you got hit, sometimes with a belt, sometimes with a switch. My
father was real strict with us - real strict. Marlon was the one who got in
trouble all the time. On the other hand, I'd get beaten for things that
happened mostly outside rehearsal. Dad would make me so mad and hurt that
I'd try to get back at him and get beaten all the more. I'd take a shoe and
throw it at him, or I'd just fight back, swinging my fists. That's why I got
it more than all my brothers combined. I would fight back and my father
would kill me, just tear me up. Mother told me I'd fight back even when I
was very little, but I don't remember that. I do remember running under
tables to get away from him, and making him angrier. We had a turbulent
relationship.
Most of the time, however, we just rehearsed. We always rehearsed.
Sometimes, late at night, we'd have time to play games or with our toys.
There might be a game of hide-and-go-seek or we'd jump rope, but that was
about it. The majority of our time was spent working. I clearly remember
running into the house with my brothers when my father came home, because
we'd be in big trouble if we weren't ready to start rehearsals on time.
Through all this, my mother was completely supportive. She had been the one
who first recognised our talent and she continued to help us realise our
potential. It's hard to imagine that we would have gotten where we did
without her love and good humour. She worried about the stress we were under
and the long hours of rehearsal, but we wanted to be the best we could be
and we really loved music.
Music was important in Gary. We had our own radio stations and nightclubs,
and there was no shortage of people who wanted to be on them. After Dad ran
our Saturday afternoon rehearsals, he'd go see a local show or even drive
all the way to Chicago to see someone perform. He was always watching for
things that could help us down the road. He'd come home and tell us what
he'd seen and who was doing what. He kept up on all the latest stuff,
whether it was a local theatre that ran contests we could enter or a
Cavalcade of Stars show with great acts whose clothes or moves we might
adapt. Sometimes I wouldn't see Dad until I got back from Kingdom Hall on
Sundays, but as soon as I ran into the house he'd be telling me what he'd
seen the night before. He'd assure me I could dance on one leg like James
Brown if I'd only try this step. There I'd be, fresh out of church, and back
in show business.
他的自传Moonwalk和自传体的电影Moonwalker于1988年他三十岁事业处于巅峰期出台。纪录他从童星到世界巨星最值得纪念的心路旅程和时刻。
Moonwalk和Moonwalker目前在市面上已经绝版。我在这里将分九次转贴。谢谢观看阅读。
Michael Jackson
Moonwalk
Chapter One – Just Kids With A Dream
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
I've always wanted to be able to tell stories, you know, stories that came
from my soul. I'd like to sit by a fire and tell people stories - make them
see pictures, make them cry and laugh, take them anywhere emotionally with
something as deceptively simple as words. I'd like to tell tales to move
their souls and transform them. I've always wanted to be able to do that.
Imagine how the great writers must feel, knowing they have that power. I
sometimes feel I could do it. It's something I'd like to develop. In a way,
songwriting uses the same skills, creates the emotional highs and lows, but
the story is a sketch. It's quicksilver. There are very few books written on
the art of storytelling, how to grip listeners, how to get a group of people
together and amuse them. No costumes, no makeup, no nothing, just you and
your voice, and your powerful ability to take them anywhere, to transform
their lives, if only for minutes.
As I begin to tell my story, I want to repeat what I usually say to people
when they ask me about my earliest days with the Jackson 5: I was so little
when we began to work on our music that I really don't remember much about
it. Most people have the luxury of careers that start when they're old
enough to know exactly what they're doing and why, but, of course, that
wasn't true of me. They remember everything that happened to them, but I was
only five years old. When you're a show business child, you really don't
have the maturity to understand a great deal of what is going on around you.
People make a lot of decisions concerning your life when you're out of the
room. So here's what I remember. I remember singing at the top of my voice
and dancing with real joy and working too hard for a child. Of course, there
are many details I don't remember at all. I do remember the Jackson 5 really
taking off when I was only eight or nine.
I was born in Gary, Indiana, on a late summer night in 1958, the seventh of
my parents' nine children. My father, Joe Jackson, was born in Arkansas, and
in 1949 he married my mother, Katherine Scruse, whose people came fromAlabama. My sister Maureen was born the following year and had the tough jobof being the oldest. Jackie, Tito, Jermaine, LaToya, and Marlon were all next in line. Randy and Janet came after me.
A part of my earliest memories is my father's job working in the steel mill.
It was tough, mind-numbing work and he played music for escape. At the same
time, my mother was working in a department store. Because of my father, and
because of my mother's own love of music, we heard it all the time at home.
My father and his brother had a group called the Falcons who were the local
R&B band. My father played the guitar, as did his brother. They would do
some of the great early rock 166;n' roll and blues songs by Chuck Berry, Little
Richard, Otis Redding, you name it. All those styles were amazing and each
had an influence on Joe and on us, although we were too young to know it at
the time. The Falcons practised in the living room of our house in Gary, so
I was raised on R&B. Since we were nine kids and my father's brother had
eight of his own, our combined numbers made for a huge family. Music was
what we did for entertainment and those times helped keep us together and
kind of encouraged my father to be a family-oriented man. The Jackson 5 were
born out of this tradition - we later became the Jacksons - and because of
this training and musical tradition, I moved out on my own and established a
sound that is mine.
I remember my childhood as mostly work, even though I loved to sing. I
wasn't forced into this business by stage parents the way Judy Garland was.
I did it because I enjoyed it and because it was as natural to me as drawing
a breath and exhaling it. I did it because I was compelled to do it, not my
parents or family, but by my own inner life in the world of music.
There were times, let me make that clear, when I'd come home from school and
I'd only have time to put my books down and get ready for the studio. Once
there, I'd sing until late at night, until it was past my bedtime, really.
There was a park across the street from the Motown studio, and I can
remember looking at those kids playing games. I'd just stare at them in
wonder - I couldn't imagine such freedom, such a carefree life - and wish
more than anything that I had that kind of freedom, that I could walk away
and be like them. So there were sad moments in my childhood. It's true for
any child star. Elizabeth Taylor told me she felt the same way. When you're
young and you're working, the world can seem awfully unfair. I wasn't forced
to be little Michael the lead singer - I did it and I loved it - but it was
hard work. If we were doing an album, for example, we'd go off to the studio wasn't time. I'd come home, exhausted, and it'd be eleven or twelve and past time to go to bed.
So I very much identify with anyone who worked as a child. I know how they
struggled, I know what they sacrificed. I also know what they learned. I've
learned that it becomes more of a challenge as one gets older. I feel old
for some reason. I really feel like an old soul, someone who's seen a lot
and experienced a lot. Because of all the years I've clocked in, it's hard
for me to accept that I am only twenty-nine. I've been in the business for
twenty-four years. Sometimes I feel like I should be near the end of my
life, turning eighty, with people patting me on the back. That's what comes
from starting so young.
When I first performed with my brothers, we were known as the Jacksons. We
would later become the Jackson 5. Still later, after we left Motown, we
would reclaim the Jacksons name again.
Every one of my albums or the group's albums has been dedicated to our
mother, Katherine Jackson, since we took over our own careers and began to
produce our own music. My first memories are of her holding me and singing
songs like "You Are My Sunshine" and "Cotton Fields." She sang to me and to
my brothers and sisters often. Even though she had lived in Indiana for some
time, my mother grew up in Alabama, and in that part of the country it was
just as common for black people to be raised with country and western music
on the radio as it was for them to hear spirituals in church. She likes
Willie Nelson to this day. She has always had a beautiful voice and I
suppose I got my singing ability from my mother and, of course, from God.
Mom played the clarinet and the piano, which she taught my oldest sister,
Maureen, whom we call Rebbie, to play, just as she'd teach my other older
sister, LaToya. My mother knew, from an early age, that she would never
perform the music she loved in front of others, not because she didn't have
the talent and the ability, but because she was crippled by polio as a
child. She got over the disease, but not without a permanent limp in her
walk. She had to miss a great deal of school as a child, but she told us
that she was lucky to recover at a time when many died from the disease. I
remember how important it was to her that we got the sugar-cube vaccine. She
even made us miss a youth club show one Saturday afternoon - that's how
important it was in our family.
My mother knew her polio was not a curse but a test that God gave her to
triumph over, and she instilled in me a love of Him that I will always have.
She taught me that my talent for singing and dancing was as much God's work
as a beautiful sunset or a storm that left snow for children to play in.
Despite all the time we spent rehearsing and travelling, Mom would find time
to take me to the Kingdom Hall of the Jehovah's Witnesses, usually with
Rebbie and LaToya.
Years later, after we had left Gary, we performed on "The Ed Sullivan Show",
the live Sunday night variety show where America first saw the Beatles,
Elvis, and Sly and the Family Stone. After the show, Mr. Sullivan
complimented and thanked each of us; but I was thinking about what he had
said to me before the show. I had been wandering around backstage, like the
kid in the Pepsi commercial, and ran into Mr. Sullivan. He seemed glad to
see me and shook my hand, but before he let it go he had a special message
for me. It was 1970, a year when some of the best people in rock were losing
their lives to drugs and alcohol. An older, wiser generation in show
business was unprepared to lose its very young. Some people had already said
that I reminded them of Frankie Lymon, a great young singer of the 1950s who
lost his life that way. Ed Sullivan may have been thinking of all this when
he told me, "Never forget where your talent came from, that your talent is a
gift from God."
I was grateful for his kindness, but I could have told him that my mother
had never let me forget. I never had polio, which is a frightening thing for
a dancer to think about, but I knew God had tested me and my brothers and
sisters in other ways - our large family, our tiny house, the small amount
of money we had to make ends meet, even the jealous kids in the
neighbourhood who threw rocks at our windows while we rehearsed, yelling
that we'd never make it. When I think of my mother and our early years, I
can tell you there are rewards that go far beyond money and public acclaim
and awards.
My mother was a great provider. If she found out that one of us had an
interest in something, she would encourage it if there was any possible way.
If I developed an interest in movie stars, for instance, she'd come home
with an armful of books about famous stars. Even with nine children she
treated each of us like an only child. There isn't one of us who's ever
forgotten what a hard worker and great provider she was. It's an old story.
Every child thinks their mother is the greatest mother in the world, but we
Jacksons never lost that feeling. Because of Katherine's gentleness, warmth,
and attention, I can't imagine what it must be like to grow up without a
mother's love.
One thing I know about children is that if they don't get the love they need
from their parents, they'll get it from someone else and cling to that
person, a grandparent, anyone. We never had to look for anyone else with my
mother around. The lessons she taught us were invaluable. Kindness, love,
and consideration for other people headed her list. Don't hurt people. Never
beg. Never freeload. Those were sins at our house. She always wanted us to
give , but she never wanted us to ask or beg. That's the way she is.
I remember a good story about my mother that illustrates her nature. One
day, back in Gary, when I was real little, this man knocked on everybody's
door early in the morning. He was bleeding so badly you could see where he'd
been around the neighbourhood. No one would let him in. Finally he got to
our door and he started banging and knocking. Mother let him in at once.
Now, most people would have been too afraid to do that, but that's my
mother. I can remember waking up and finding blood on our floor. I wish we
could all be more like Mum.
The earliest memories I have of my father are of him coming home from the
steel mill with a big bag of glazed doughnuts for all of us. My brothers and
I could really eat back then and that bag would disappear with a snap of the
fingers. He used to take us all to the merry-go-round in the park, but I was
so young I don't remember that very well.
My father has always been something of a mystery to me and he knows it. One
of the few things I regret most is never being able to have a real closeness
with him. He built a shell around himself over the years and, once he
stopped talking about our family business, he found it hard to relate to us.
We'd all be together and he'd just leave the room. Even today it's hard for
him to touch on father and son stuff because he's too embarrassed. When I
see that he is, I become embarrassed, too.
My father did always protect us and that's no small feat. He always tried to
make sure people didn't cheat us. He looked after our interests in the best
ways. He might have made a few mistakes along the way, but he always thought
he was doing what was right for his family. And, of course, most of what my father helped us accomplish was wonderful and unique, especially in regard
to our relationships with companies and people in the business. I'd say we
were among a fortunate few artists who walked away from a childhood in the
business with anything substantial - money, real estate, other investments.
My father set all these up for us. He looked out for both our interests and
his. To this day I'm so thankful he didn't try to take all our money for
himself the way so many parents of child stars have. Imagine stealing from
your own children. My father never did anything like that. But I still don't
know him, and that's sad for a son who hungers to understand his own father.
He's still a mystery man to me and he may always be one.
What I got from my father wasn't necessarily God-given, though the Bible
says you reap what you sow. When we were coming along, Dad said that in a
different way, but the message was just as clear: You could have all the
talent in the world, but if you didn't prepare and plan, it wouldn't do you
any good.
Joe Jackson had always loved singing and music as much as my mother did, but
he also knew there was a world beyond Jackson Street. I wasn't old enough to
remember his band, the Falcons, but they came over to our house to rehearse
on weekends. The music took them away from their jobs at the steel mill,
where Dad drove a crane. The Falcons would play all over town, and in clubs
and colleges around northern Indiana and Chicago. At the rehearsals at our
house, Dad would bring his guitar out of the closet and plug it into the amp
he kept in the basement. He'd always loved rhythm and blues and that guitar
was his pride and joy. The closet where the guitar was kept was considered
an almost sacred place. Needless to say, it was off-limits to us kids. Dad
didn't go to Kingdom Hall with us, but both Mom and Dad knew that music was
a way of keeping our family together in a neighbourhood where gangs
recruited kids my brothers' ages. The three oldest boys would always have an
excuse to around when the Falcons came over. Dad let them think they were
being given a special treat by being allowed to listen, but he was actually
eager to have them there.
Tito watched everything that was going on with the greatest interest. He'd
taken saxophone in school, but he could tell his hands were big enough to
grab the chords and slip the riffs that my father played. It made sense that
he'd catch on, because Tito looked so much like my father that we all
expected him to share Dad's talents. The extent of the resemblance was scary
as he got older. Maybe my father noticed Tito's zeal because he laid down
rules for all my brothers: No one was to touch the guitar while he was out.
Period.
Therefore, Jackie, Tito, and Jermaine were careful to see that Mom was in
the kitchen when they "borrowed" the guitar. They were also careful not to
make any noise while removing it. They would then go back to our room and
put on the radio or the little portable record player so they could play
along. Tito would hoist the guitar onto his belly as he sat on the bed and
prop it up. He took turns with Jackie and Jermaine, and they'd all try the
scales they were learning in school as well as try to figure out how to get
the "Green Onions" part they'd hear on the radio.
By now I was old enough to sneak in and watch if I promised not to tell. One
day Mom finally caught them, and we were all worried. She scolded the boys,
but said she wouldn't tell Dad as long as we were careful. She knew that
guitar was keeping them from running with a bad crowd and maybe getting beat
up, so she wasn't about to take away anything that kept them within arm's
reach.
Of course, something had to give sooner or later, and one day a string
broke. My brothers panicked. There wasn't time to get it repaired before Dad
came home, and besides, none if us knew how to go about getting it fixed. My
brothers never figured out what to do, so they put the guitar back in the
closet and hoped fervently that my father would think it broke by itself. Of
course, Dad didn't buy that, and he was furious. My sisters told me to stay
out of it and keep a low profile. I heard Tito crying after Dad found out
and I went to investigate, of course. Tito was on his bed crying when Dad
came back and motioned for him to get up. Tito was scared, but my father
just stood there, holding his favourite guitar. He gave Tito a hard,
penetrating look and said, "Let me see what you can do."
My brother pulled himself together and started to play a few runs he had
taught himself. When my father saw how well Tito could play, he knew he'd
obviously been practising and he realised that Tito and the rest of us
didn't treat his favourite guitar as if it were a toy. It became clear to
him that what had happened had been only an accident. At this point my
mother stepped in and voiced her enthusiasm for our musical ability. She
told him that we boys had talent and he should listen to us. She kept
pushing for us, so one day he began to listen and he liked what he heard.
Tito, Jackie, and Jermaine started rehearsing together in earnest.
A couple of years later, when I was about five, Mom pointed out to my father that I
was a good singer and could play the bongos. I became a member of the group.
About then my father decided that what was happening in his family was
serious. Gradually he began spending less time with the Falcons and more
with us. We'd just woodshed together and he'd give us some tips and teach us
techniques on the guitar. Marlon and I weren't old enough to play, but we'd
watch when my father rehearsed the older boys and we were learning when we
watched. The ban on using Dad's guitar still held when he wasn't around, but
my brothers loved using it when they could. The house on Jackson Street was
bursting with music. Dad and Mom had paid for music lessons for Rebbie and
Jackie when they were little kids, so they had a good background. The rest
of us had music class and band in the Gary schools, but no amount of
practice was enough to harness all that energy.
The Falcons were still earning money, however infrequent their gigs, and
that extra money was important to us. It was enough to keep food on the
table for a growing family but not enough to give us things that weren't
necessary. Mom was working part-time at Sears, Dad was still working the
mill job, and no one was going hungry, but I think, looking back, that
things must have seemed one big dead end.
One day Dad was late coming home and Mom began to get worried. By the time
he arrived, she was ready to give him a piece of her mind, something we boys
didn't mind witnessing once in a while just to see if he could take it like
he dished it out, but when he poked his head through the door, he had a
mischievous look on his face and he was hiding something behind his back. We
were all shocked when he produced a gleaming red guitar, slightly smaller
than the one in the closet. We were all hoping this meant we'd get the old
one. But Dad said the new guitar was Tito's. We gathered around to admire
it, while Dad told Tito he had to share it with anyone who would practice .
We were not to take it to school to show it off. This was a serious present
and that day was a momentous occasion for the Jackson family.
Mom was happy for us, but she also knew her husband. She was more aware than
we of the big ambitions and plans he had for us. He'd begun talking to her
at night after we kids were asleep. He had dreams and those dreams didn't
stop with one guitar. Pretty soon we were dealing with equipment, not just
gifts. Jermaine got a bass and an amp. There were shakers for Jackie. Our
bedroom and living room began to look like a music store. Sometimes I'd hearMom and Dad fight when the subject of money was brought up, because all
those instruments and accessories meant having to go without a little
something we needed each week. Dad was persuasive, though, and he didn't
miss a trick.
We even had microphones in the house. They seemed like a real luxury at the
time, especially to a woman who was trying to stretch a very small budget,
but I've come to realise that having those microphones in our house wasn't
just an attempt to keep up with the Joneses or anyone else in amateur night
competitions. They were there to help us prepare. I saw people at talent
shows, who probably sounded great at home, clam up the moment they got in
front of a microphone. Others started screaming their songs like they wanted
to prove they didn't need the mikes. They didn't have the advantage that we
did - an advantage that only experience can give you. I think it probably
made some people jealous because they could tell our expertise with the
mikes gave us an edge. If that was true, we made so many sacrifices - in
free time, schoolwork, and friends - that no one had the right to be
jealous. We were becoming very good, but we were working like people twice
our age.
While I was watching my older brothers, including Marlon on the bongo drums,
Dad got a couple of young guys named Johnny Jackson and Randy Rancifer to
play trap drums and organ. Motown would later claim they were our cousins,
but that was just an embellishment from the P.R. people, who wanted to make
us seem like one big family. We had become a real band! I was like a sponge,
watching everyone, and trying to learn everything I could. I was totally
absorbed when my brothers were rehearsing or playing at charity events or
shopping centres. I was most fascinated when watching Jermaine because he
was the singer at the time and he was a big brother to me - Marlon was too
close to me in age for that. It was Jermaine who would walk me to
kindergarten and whose clothes would be handed down to me. When he did
something, I tried to imitate him. When I was successful at it, my brothers
and Dad would laugh, but when I began singing, they listened. I was singing
in a baby voice then and just imitating sounds. I was so young I didn't know
what many of the words meant, but the more I sang, the better I got.
I always knew how to dance. I would watch Marlon's moves because Jermaine
had the big bass to carry, but also because I could keep up with Marlon, who
was only a year older then me. Soon I was doing most of the singing at home
and preparing to join my brothers in public. Through our rehearsals, we were all becoming aware of our particular strengths and weaknesses as members of the group and the shift in responsibilities was happening naturally.
Our family's house in Gary was tiny, only three rooms really, but at the
time it seemed much larger to me. When you're that young, the whole world
seems so huge that a little room can seem four times its size. When we went
back to Gary years later, we were all surprised at how tiny that house was.
I had remembered it as being large, but you could take five steps from the
front door and you'd be out the back. It was really no bigger then a garage,
but when we lived there it seemed fine to us kids. You see things from such
a different perspective when you're young. Our school days in Gary are a
blur for me. I vaguely remember being dropped off in front of my school on
the first day of kindergarten, and I clearly remember hating it. I didn't
want my mother to leave me, naturally, and I didn't want to be there.
In time I adjusted, as all kids do, and I grew to love my teachers,
especially the women. They were always very sweet to us and they just loved
me. Those teachers were so wonderful; I'd be promoted from one grade to the
next and they'd all cry and hug me and tell me how much they hated to see me
leave their classes. I was so crazy about my teachers that I'd steal my
mother's jewellery and give it to them as presents. They'd be very touched,
but eventually my mother found out about it, and put an end to my generosity
with her things. That urge that I had to give them something in return for
all I was receiving was a measure of how much I loved them at that school.
One day, in the first grade, I participated in a program that was put on
before the whole school. Everyone of us in each class had to do something,
so I went home and discussed it with my parents. We decided I should wear
black pants and a white shirt and sing "Climb Ev'ry Mountain" from The Sound
of Music . When I finished that song, the reaction in the auditorium
overwhelmed me. The applause was thunderous and people were smiling; some of
them were standing. My teachers were crying and I just couldn't believe it.
I had made them all happy. It was such a great feeling. I felt a little
confused too, because I didn't do anything special. I was just singing the
way I sang at home every night. When you're performing, you don't realise
what you sound like or how you're coming across. You just open your mouth
and sing.
Soon Dad was grooming us for talent contests. He was a great trainer, and he
spent a lot of money and time working with us. Talent is something that Godgives to a performer, but our father taught us how to cultivate it.
I think
we also had a certain instinct for show business. We loved to perform and we
put everything we had into it. He's sit at home with us every day after
school and rehearse us. We'd perform for him and he'd critique us. If you
messed up, you got hit, sometimes with a belt, sometimes with a switch. My
father was real strict with us - real strict. Marlon was the one who got in
trouble all the time. On the other hand, I'd get beaten for things that
happened mostly outside rehearsal. Dad would make me so mad and hurt that
I'd try to get back at him and get beaten all the more. I'd take a shoe and
throw it at him, or I'd just fight back, swinging my fists. That's why I got
it more than all my brothers combined. I would fight back and my father
would kill me, just tear me up. Mother told me I'd fight back even when I
was very little, but I don't remember that. I do remember running under
tables to get away from him, and making him angrier. We had a turbulent
relationship.
Most of the time, however, we just rehearsed. We always rehearsed.
Sometimes, late at night, we'd have time to play games or with our toys.
There might be a game of hide-and-go-seek or we'd jump rope, but that was
about it. The majority of our time was spent working. I clearly remember
running into the house with my brothers when my father came home, because
we'd be in big trouble if we weren't ready to start rehearsals on time.
Through all this, my mother was completely supportive. She had been the one
who first recognised our talent and she continued to help us realise our
potential. It's hard to imagine that we would have gotten where we did
without her love and good humour. She worried about the stress we were under
and the long hours of rehearsal, but we wanted to be the best we could be
and we really loved music.
Music was important in Gary. We had our own radio stations and nightclubs,
and there was no shortage of people who wanted to be on them. After Dad ran
our Saturday afternoon rehearsals, he'd go see a local show or even drive
all the way to Chicago to see someone perform. He was always watching for
things that could help us down the road. He'd come home and tell us what
he'd seen and who was doing what. He kept up on all the latest stuff,
whether it was a local theatre that ran contests we could enter or a
Cavalcade of Stars show with great acts whose clothes or moves we might
adapt. Sometimes I wouldn't see Dad until I got back from Kingdom Hall on
Sundays, but as soon as I ran into the house he'd be telling me what he'd
seen the night before. He'd assure me I could dance on one leg like James
Brown if I'd only try this step. There I'd be, fresh out of church, and back
in show business.
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