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Michael Jackson at 21: "I don’t know what’s the point of manhood”
Interview year: 1979
Shortly after his 11th birthday in 1969, Michael Jackson, backed by four of his fife brothers, came screaming out of Gary, Indiana, to capture the world’s attention with two minutes and fifty-eight seconds of blistering boogie called “I Want You Back.” Michael, Marlon, Jermaine, Tito and Jackie – the Jackson 5 – were an instant success, chalking up a quick succession of hit discs in the same casual way other people save up pennies: “ABC,” “The Love You Save,” “Never Can Say Goodbye,” “Mama’s Pearl,” “Goin’ Back To Indiana,” “I’ll Br There,” “Get It Together” and “Dancin’ Machine” highlight a lengthy list of gold and platinum that doesn’t even include Michael and Jermaine’s solo successes.
And, when the group left Motown Records for a new contract at Epic in 1975 (losing Jermaine in the process, adding younger brother Randy and renaming themselves the Jacksons) it took awhile for them to make the hit lists again, but when they did, they did it big. Destiny, the current LP (the first one written and produced by the group) has gone platinum, aided by its singles, “Blame It On The Boogie” and the smash, “Shake Your Body (Down To The Ground.”
Even as the group was going through its cycle of changes, Michael was evolving as well. The 10-year-old who talked of nothing but snakes, rats and swimming became a 15-year-old who said shyly that his perfect mate was simply, “a nice girl.” That Michael Jackson in turn became an 18-year-old who mourned society’s poverty, greed and assorted ills and wanted to take all the children of the world under his arms to protect them from a hellish earth.
Michael Jackson, a person some call “the gentlest spirit” in the entire music industry, is 21-years-old now, and all the Michaels that have gone before have been synthesized into this version. But there’s something disturbing about this Michael. Maybe it’s ego.
But maybe it’s not. Maybe it’s the quiet, assured knowledge of who he is and what he is, and the recognition of the fact because he’s Michael Jackson there’s only so much he has to take from – or explain to – anybody. Maybe beneath Michael’s usual characterization as a shy marshmallow, there lurks the glint of steel.
SOUL: In the pre-Jackson 5 days, your father was really strict on you guys. Did you feel restricted? Did you wanna go get it some trouble with the rest of the kids?
MICHAEL: No. We didn’t know anything about that. We were always stage people – raised on the stage, around show business people. I never associated with street life. I don’t even know what it’s like, outside of the movies.
SOUL: Not knowing what street life is like, is it more difficult to relate or project to fans of yours who are from the street?
MICHAEL: Sometimes, yeah. I’ve heard a lot of fans say, “God, you act like you’re not used to ordinary people. Why do you back up when we talk to you?” and stuff like that.
And I try my best to cooperate, but it’s just sometimes hard to be loose—totally loose—with them, because I’m not used to that environment. I’m not saying I’m living on a higher plane or I’m better than they… I honestly wasn’t raised in the streets. We’re all people, we’re all the same, but I wasn’t brought up that way.
SOUL: Do you have trouble understanding street philosophies?
MICHAEL: No. I understand all that stuff—a lot of it’s wonderful. Like, being around fans and different characters on tour, I get to pick up a lot of it.
SOUL: It seems that out of the whole family, you’re the least in tune, used to, or ready for the street thing.
MICHAEL: I love the street attitude: I really do. I think it’s so interesting and so dramatic, but sometimes I’m not used to it. I love it—especially in New York. Different characters you run into. The way the different people, and their cultures and their backgrounds have brought them to come up to me and ask, “Aren’t you so-and-so?’ It’s just funny.
SOUL: Did you ever tell’em, “No, I’m not Michael Jackson”?
MICHAEL: Yeah. I’ve said that a couple of times. Not meaning it – just to see their expressions, to see them put up the courage and pride to walk up to me and find out is it me. I just want to see how they would act, and it is funny. They say, “Are you Michael Jackson?” And I start laughing… I say, “Everybody tells me that.” They say, “Aw, man, you’re kiddin’.” And they’ll look down and then ease away. A lot of people don’t come up because they’re afraid they may be real embarrassed. It’s like building up to a big letdown. It’s awful. And then the other one with’em will say, „Man. I told you. See what I mean? Come on, let’s go.”Then they walk off (and) I say, “Yes it is!”
You get those who’ll say, “C’mon, man, you talk like him, you’re built like him…” Then you get the real mean ones – those who’ll come up to you and say, “Siddown! Sign this for my baby.” I say, “I don’t have a pen” “What! You don’t have a pen? Go hunt for one.” I say, „Oh my God, how can they be so bold and so cruel?"
You get some real terrible ones. They think they own you, and they don’t. Like, they’ll say to you, “Well, I made you who you are.” And that’s really not true. It’s true in a way, but if they didn’t like the record, they wouldn’t have bought it. I sold my record – not my soul. I didn’t sell the right for them to order me around. I sold a record. And I do it for the joy to the world of it.
SOUL: How did you feel, the first times you had all those people hollering and screaming for you?
MICHAEL: It’s a wonderful feeling. Not to be mobbed is wonderful. We just came off our European tour – we went to Switzerland, Spain, Germany, France, Holland, England – and it was really exciting. Total chaos. It hurts to be mobbed – not mentally, but physically. I mean, your body feels like a noodle, being pulled by 10 different people. It really does – especially mine.
They don’t realize it. They love you so much that they just want a part of you. They say, “I gotta get a piece of this guy, if it’s his shirt, if it’s his hair, his face – anything.” There are fans who actually have pieces of my hair. Like, I could go to England right now and they’d show me, say, “This is your hair from three years ago.” I say, “Oh, my gosh.” And it’s sitting in their wallet. They collect hair!
See, I understand why they do it to me, because if you love somebody so much and you have their pictures on the walls, you go to bed seein’’em, you pray to their pictures, you buy all their records, you think about’em, and finally when you see them in person you’re like, “Oh, my God.” You just fall out. You can’t believe it.
SOUL: What was it like when you first found your freedom restricted? You can’t even go to the movies by yourself.
MICHAEL: I seldom go to movies by myself. I think I’ve been once to the movies by myself. In New York, I was staying with (Wiz director) Sidney Lumet…. I saw Halloween. I was so scared; it was a scary movie. And I had glasses and a hat on and a coat and nobody knew me. I had such a good time.
There are fans who know the back of your head, the way your body’s shaped. I have walked across fans with my head totally down and I will, like, puff my face out so they don’t know who I am – and they stop you anyway. It’s amazing. I don’t know how they know. I guess they study your body/
We just had a girl here two weeks ago – we woke up and found her sitting by the pool… just sitting there. She’d jumped the gate. Luckily, our dogs were up. They’re usually out and they would’ve really destroyed her. We brought her inside. She demanded not to leave, and so we held her there until we had somebody to come and take her out. She demanded not to go in a very rude way.
There are all kinds of people at our gate. One lady said she was sent by God; she must see me, or she’ll be destroyed. Thirty-year-old lady. Girls hitchhiked from New York, come in front of our gate and say they wanna stay with us – sleep in. We can’t take them in. The neighbors actually take’em in; they live with our neighbors. There are people out there all the time.
SOUL: What did you think when you saw your very first crazy person?” “Goin’ Back To Indiana?”
MICHAEL: (laughing) No. I said to myself, „It’s incredible, the power and influence an entertainer can have on people to make them do things. Entertainers have incredible power. It frightens me. Sometimes I get real scared about that.
See, the thing I’m afraid about, an entertainer can be built up to be a monster in his field. I mean, so big to the world that whatever that entertainer do or say, the world will see it, they will listen to it, they will follow it. He begins to have more power and influence on people than the presidents and the kings of the world. He sets an example, and he has to be very careful. I mean, the world’s watching. The lyrics of his songs, the way he dresses, the way he talks – everything. People follow this.
SOUL: Stevie and Ali have that power.
MICHAEL: They’re wonderful. They’re two of my favorite men. I love them two. Ali was just at our show in Houston and he came up from the audience and gave a wonderful speech. I got it on tape, as a matter of fact. He said, “Listen – I’m the greatest fighter in the world. I’ve proved that I’m gonna retire. I’m gonna end the champ. I wanna end on top.” And he said, „I want’cha to know something: I don’t go to see no shows, I don’t watch no TV, I don’t go to no concerts, I don’t do any of that stuff, ‘cause I’m high on a cloud that you can’t even touch me, But I want you to know something. Muhammad Ali is the greatest boxer ever, and the Jackson 5 is the greatest group ever. And if I go to see somebody, they’re bad!” That’s what he said, and the audience went crazy.
It’s something I’m really thankful for. I don’t say it in a boastful way. I say it in a really thankful way, ‘cause I’m thankful. I’m honored to do what I do for the world. I’m glad to be chosen to do it, ‘cause it could’ve been someone else.
Some fans expect – they look – for you to be stuck up. They think all entertainers are spoiled brats… you’ve had everything, and I don’t have everything. I do wanna have the things I want, but I never want to go overboard where you just take things for granted. I will never take things for granted.
SOUL: Mike, when do you plan to leave home?
MICHAEL: A lot of people’ve asked me that question, I do things by force and a lot of things by feeling, and I just don’t feel it’s time. If I moved out, I would die of loneliness. I’m used to children, which I love, I’m used to family, which I love – people around me all the time. I would probably cry everyday if I moved out. I really would.
But, independence is good a lot of times. You can take a ride all by yourself… get to think… escapism. And I think a lot of people need that, but I couldn’t do that myself. Not now, especially.
SOUL: Why now especially?
MICHAEL: Because… there’s a lot of things that I’m doing here with the family, a lot of planning… and I feel that maybe if I moved out, I may get further and further apart.
SOUL: Well, moving hasn’t stopped Marlon and Jackie…
MICHAEL: But see, they don’t have a lot of the pressures and attention that I have from other people… the world. A lot of people come up to me and they want me to leave the group – the family.
SOUL: Do you feel like if you were away from the Mothership, there’d be more of a chance of them getting their way?
MICHAEL: See, a lot of people ask me to do this thing – to leave – but I let God speak through me and if it’s time. He’ll tell me if I should or if I shouldn’t.
SOUL: We’re talking about leaving the house or the group?
MICHAEL: The group and the house. We may be together forever, there may be a time when feelings tell me what’s right for me and to leave.
SOUL: Michael, what is it like to be such a moral man coming of age in such an amoral society?
MICHAEL: It’s easy to be so many people in this business. It’s easy to be taught and changed and bribed and connived. I just believe in my inner self and that’s how I am – the same person I was when I was small, but growing. I’m thankful for the growth in so many ways.
SOUL: But what does coming of age, being a man, your 21st birthday, mean?
MICHAEL: To tell you the truth, for me, manhood doesn’t come at an age. Manhood, I know – I’m not even gonna say “think” – is mental. There’s some five-year-old men, there’s some eight-year-old men, there’s some 30-year-old children. I don’t know what’s the point of manhood.
A lot of people say the old corny thing – “Responsibility, machoism, bein’ the head” – and all that stuff. I really feel that manhood is doin’ exactly what you wanna do in this life and to do it successfully, and to conquer a goal. That’s the whole thing in life, I guess, to do what you wanna do. And if it’s great, to share it. To me, Walt Disney is a real man. Charlie Chaplin, a real man. Fred Astaire, a real man. Bill Robinson, a real man, because not only have they conquered goals, but look at how much joy they have given to other people, how many they have influenced. Other people looked up to them. They made paths.
SOUL: Are you a man yet?
MICHAEL: In many ways, yeah. A lot of people would come up to me when I was 13… they’d say, “You just don’t know.” When we had “ABC” out, for example, all these mothers tellin’ me their children, first’ thing they learned to say was “abc” from our record. That’s influence… puttin’ something on the mind of children.
Many groups we have influenced – I could name so many of them. We were the first young group to have the hit records back to back like we did. Then all these other groups came out, tryin’ to do the same thing.
SOUL: Like the Osmonds?
MICHAEL: Yeah, and that’s an influence. And the sound of music and the style of dress and the style of… so many things.
SOUL: How long have you been a man?
MICHAEL: I don’t know. I hate to judge manhood, because I don’t feel I really am until I really do what I wanna do – what I was meant to do.
SOUL: Which is?
MICHAEL: To really do and see myself in the entertainment field as I see – to really do films the way I wanna do it, choreography, even getting into the directing end of it and really studying it.
SOUL: So there’s goals that still haven’t been reached?
MICHAEL: Oh yeah, I can never stop.
Source : www.mjtranslate.com/en/interviews/1697
From : www.the-michael-jackson-archives.com/soul79baby.html
Edited by ArcoIris - 2/4/2018, 05:26
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