- For other people with the same name, see Michael Jackson (disambiguation)
Michael Joseph Jackson (born August 29 1958, in Gary, Indiana), is an American singer, songwriter, record producer, dancer, actor, entertainer, and philanthropist. He began his career as the lead singer of Motown act The Jackson 5 in the 1960s and 1970s, but in 1971 he parted with his siblings and has since become arguably the most successful solo artist in music history. Jackson has sold over 250 million records as a solo artist and a further 170 million as a member of Jackson 5, making him the world's biggest-selling male pop artist of the past millennium (according to World Music Awards). His distinctive dance moves, music videos, and pop appeal have led him to be called "The King of Pop" by many in the media. However, he has also been dogged by media fascination with his alleged transracially changing physical appearance and what some perceive as an eccentric lifestyle. The media therefore began referring to Jackson by the nickname "Wacko Jacko", and some in the public have followed suit.
Childhood
Early years
Jackson was born the seventh of nine children in Gary, Indiana, to Joseph and Katherine Jackson. The entire family – including older siblings Rebbie, Jackie, Tito, Jermaine, LaToya, and Marlon, and younger siblings Randy and Janet – lived in a tiny two-bedroom house, and Jackson's father earned a meager living working in a steel mill. At the behest of their mother but against Joseph's wishes, the Jackson children were raised as Jehovah's Witnesses and practiced door-to-door evangelization.
Forming the Jackson 5
Due to Joseph Jackson's strict rules, the children were kept locked in their house while he worked the night shift. However, the children would sneak out of the house to their neighbors’ homes, where they practiced singing and playing music. The older Jackson brothers would sometimes sneak and play Joseph’s prized guitar while he was at work. Eventually, Joseph found out about their musical abilities and decided to capitalize upon it in order to leave Gary for California.
Joseph organized Jackie, Tito, Jermaine, and two unrelated neighborhood youths, Milford Hite (on drums) and Reynaud Jones (on keyboards), as an act called "The Jackson Brothers" in 1962. Michael and Marlon were considered too young to participate, but by 1964 both were members, and by 1967 Michael, considered by the family to be a talented dancer, had replaced his brother Jermaine as the lead singer.
Professional musical career
The Jackson 5 and Motown
With Michael as the lead singer, the Jackson 5 built up a following by playing at clubs and bars throughout the Midwest, and even winning an Amateur Night competition at the Apollo Theater in Harlem, New York. The Jackson 5 signed their first recording contract with the local Steeltown label in 1967, and had a regional hit with "Big Boy" in 1968.
The Jackson 5 were discovered by both Gladys Knight & the Pips and Bobby Taylor & the Vancouvers, who brought them to Motown Records in 1968. Label head Berry Gordy bought out the Jackson 5's Steeltown contract and signed the group to Motown in March 1969. Gordy then moved the Jackson family to Los Angeles, California, and proceeded to turn them into international stars. In fall 1969, The Jackson 5 were presented to the public by Diana Ross and were officially launched as the next big Motown act. The group's first four singles, "I Want You Back" from 1969, and "ABC", "The Love You Save", and "I'll Be There" from 1970 all became number-one hits in the U.S.. Later hits included "Mama's Pearl" & "Never Can Say Goodbye" (1971), "Lookin' Through the Windows" (1972), "Get It Together" (1973) and "Dancing Machine" (1974). They made fourteen albums, and Jackson also recorded four albums as a solo artist, spawning the hits "Got to Be There" (1971, his solo debut); "Rockin' Robin", and the number-one hit "Ben" among others. Most of the Jackson 5 hits were produced by The Corporation™, a collective of songwriters and record producers including Gordy, Freddie Perren, Alphonzo Mizell, and Deke Richards.
The Jacksons and Epic Records
In 1976, the Jackson brothers signed a deal with CBS Records, first joining the Philadelphia International division and later moving over to Epic Records. The new deal with CBS provided more creative freedom and larger royalties that they were not allowed at Motown. By leaving Motown behind, they lost the rights to use the "Jackson 5" name and logo. Additionally Jermaine, who had married Berry Gordy's daughter Hazel, opted to remain at Motown for a full-time solo career. Now known as "The Jacksons", and featuring younger brother Randy in Jermaine's place, the brothers continued their successful career, touring internationally and releasing six albums between 1976 and 1984. Hits during this period included "Enjoy Yourself" & "Show You The Way To Go", "Blame It On The Boogie", "Shake Your Body (Down to the Ground)", "Can You Feel It" & "Heartbreak Hotel". In 1978, he co-starred in The Wiz as the Scarecrow and worked alongside Diana Ross and others on a soundtrack album composed by famed producer Quincy Jones. After Jackson signed a solo contract with Epic in 1978, he began work on his first of several albums with Jones.
Solo career
Off The Wall to Thriller
Michael Jackson's 1979 album Off the Wall was a worldwide hit and spawned the number-one hit singles and music videos "Rock With You" and "Don't Stop 'Til You Get Enough". The ballad "She's Out Of My Life" also reached the top ten in 1980. With that accomplishment, Jackson became the first solo artist to have four top-ten hit singles from a single album. The album went on to sell over seven million copies in America, establishing Jackson as a musical force without his brothers.
In the 1980s, Jackson released a progression of solo albums of slickly-produced synthesizer-heavy pop. In what was perhaps the "Golden Age" of the video clip, some of Jackson's videos were virtually short films with considerable plots, impressive special effects, and featuring Jackson's distinctive dance style. In fact, Jackson is in the habit of referring to his videos as "short films" on his DVD releases.
His Thriller album was released in 1982, produced seven top-ten hit singles, broke records, and quickly became the world's best selling album ever, selling over 59 million copies. The "Billie Jean" music video, released to promote Thriller, became the first video by a black artist to be aired on MTV, and the "Thriller" short film, included with The Making of Michael Jackson's Thriller, became the world's best selling home video at the time.
"Billie Jean", "Thriller", and "Beat It", were the three music videos released from the album, and have since become three of MTV's most significant videos in history, placing highly on several MTV and VH1 countdowns, and receiving substantial airplay on MTV2 to this day. Many music industry critics consider the music video for "Thriller" to be the greatest music video of all time and a large step forward in artistic quality for music videos. MTV and Rolling Stone magazine, in a list compiled in 2000, named ("Billie Jean" number five, The Jackson 5's "I Want You Back" number nine, "Beat It" number twenty-two, and "Rock with You" number eighty-two) among the 100 greatest pop songs of all time. [1] .
While performing "Billie Jean" during the Motown 25: Yesterday, Today, Forever special on television on May 16, 1983, Jackson publicly performed the moonwalk for the first time, stunning TV audiences. In January 1984 at the American Music Awards, Jackson was nominated for nine awards and won a record eight. In February at the Grammy Awards Jackson was nominated for twelve awards and won a record-breaking eight: seven for Thriller and one for his narrative on The E.T. Storybook. In May, Thriller was certified by the Guinness Book of Records as the biggest selling popular music album of all time. In addition in 1984, he was also awarded the H. Claude Hodson Medal of Freedom at the NAACP Image Awards, feted at the White House by President Ronald Reagan with the Presidential Special Achievement Award and in November was awarded a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. By 2005, Thriller had been certified 27x platinum in the U.S.
"We Are the World" to Dangerous
Inspired by Band Aid, he was instrumental in organizing the single "We Are the World" (co-written with Lionel Richie) in 1985 to raise money for USA for Africa – a charity working to raise awareness about and help starving people in Africa. "We Are the World" was sung by forty-four different singers including Harry Belafonte, Cyndi Lauper, Diana Ross, Ray Charles and Stevie Wonder and sold 7 million copies in the United States, becoming one of the best selling single of all time.
Jackson starred in the George Lucas/Francis Ford Coppola 3-D film Captain Eo in 1986, which was shown in Disney theme parks until 1998. Minute for minute it was the most expensive film ever produced at the time, costing an estimated seventeen million dollars to make. The film contained the songs "We Are Here to Change the World" and "Another Part of Me".
In 1987, Jackson released Bad and began his first solo world tour. He performed to sold out audiences at each concert. The following year Jackson released a movie entitled "Moonwalker" and an autobiography entitled Moon Walk.
Bad was another smash success for Jackson though not as big of a success as Thriller was. Its singles and music videos "I Just Can't Stop Loving You", "Bad", "The Way You Make Me Feel", "Man in the Mirror", and "Leave Me Alone" provided Jackson with another string of hits. He made history by becoming the first artist to generate five number one singles off of one album. Of the seven singles released in the USA, the first five went to number one on the Billboard Hot 100 charts, "Another Part of Me" peaked at eleven (number one on Billboard's R&B charts) and "Smooth Criminal" went to number seven.
The title track from Bad was originally intended as a duet with longtime rival Prince. Prince was approached and briefly considered taking part in the project, but eventually decided against it because of the first line ("Your butt is mine"). He later remarked that the album was called "Bad" because "they didn't have enough room to spell 'Pathetic'". Years later, Quincy Jones told a different story when he said that Prince told him and Jackson he didn't want to participate because "it would be a hit without (him)".
Jackson was awarded a record breaking $890 million contract by Sony and released an album Dangerous in 1991. During the Dangerous world tour Jackson announced the creation of his Heal the World Foundation. Dangerous contained the singles and music videos "Who Is It", "Give In To Me", "Gone Too Soon" (a tribute to young AIDS victim Ryan White), and "Will You Be There", which would later become the theme song to the movie Free Willy. But the album's most successful and memorable singles and videos were "Jam", "Remember the Time", "Black or White", "In the Closet", and "Heal the World". As was becoming the standard for Jackson, the album's music videos were among the most costly, creative, and innovative of their time. "Give in to Me" featured Slash from Guns n' Roses in its video. The video for "Heal the World", to correspond to Jackson's charity of the same name, featured children and adults from throughout the world. "Will You Be There" showed Jackson singing in front of scenes from Free Willy. Several of the other videos had complex storylines and dance sequences, and featured cameo appearances by celebrities. The video for "Jam", directed by David Kellogg, showed Jackson and Michael Jordan playing basketball and dancing together, while "Remember the Time" was set in an Egyptian palace and starred Eddie Murphy as the king of the palace who was trying to entertain his wife, played by Iman. Jackson and Naomi Campbell played lovers in "In The Closet". While in the U.S., sales for the album only reached seven million, worldwide, it eclipsed "Bad" as the second biggest-selling album of Jackson's career reaching over twenty-nine million.
Black or White
Of all the album's groundbreaking and popular videos, "Black or White" probably remains the most aired and most remembered today. The original video is over ten minutes long, and premiered simultaneously on November 14 1991, on MTV, VH1, BET, and ABC, becoming one of the most-watched music video premieres in history. The original video begins in suburban America, with Macaulay Culkin playing a young Jackson fan whose father (played by George Wendt) tells him to turn his music down. Culkin's character, instead, decides to bring his speakers into the living room and cranks the speakers to full blast, which sends the father flying through the roof, in a manner somewhat similar to that used in an earlier Twisted Sister music video. He ends up landing in the middle of an African veldt. The music of "Black or White" then starts, and Jackson proceeds to take viewers on a trip around the world, from country to country and culture to culture. As the song ends, the video features a morphing effect, whereby the faces of several different people of different ethnicities' (including Tyra Banks and voice actor Cree Summer) are morphed one into another, as a symbol of global unity. Although this was not the first music video to feature morphing technology – former 10cc members Godley & Creme used morphing even more extensively in the 1985 video to their song "Cry", though in a less technologically polished way – it was the first exposure many people had to the technology, and this effect amazed those who saw the video for the first time. The original video for "Black or White" then continued, even after the song itself ended, for another four minutes. The last four minutes depicted Jackson doing his infamous crotch-rubbing, smashing store windows, and destroying a car with a metal crowbar. It finally ended with a cameo appearance by Bart and Homer Simpson. However, Jackson's rampage and crotch grabbing caused controversy with many parents of young children who watched the video's premiere. MTV and other music video stations decided to cut out the last four minutes of the video for all subsequent airings, and Jackson issued an apology statement to anyone who had been offended. To date, the final four minutes of the "Black or White" video has only since re-aired in America on MTV2 between the hours of 01:00 and 04:00, as part of their special uncensored airing of the "Most Controversial Music Videos" of all time, however the extended version is available on Jackson's DVDs.
The "Black or White" video was mocked by the American comedy show In Living Color in a notoriously pungent parody that tackled Jackson's well-known skin color issues and American race relations. In it, the Jackson impersonator sang that he was not sure whether he was black or white, and was immediately arrested at the end when he struck a car's shatterproof windshield with a sledgehammer. Genesis also poked fun at the infamous section of "Black or White" in their video for "I Can't Dance". After "Black and White" was when the tabloids began calling him "Jacko", then they put in "Wacko", and then began rhyming it with additional words.
HIStory to Invincible
HIStory, a double-disc album, was released in 1995. Its first disc had fifteen of his greatest hits and second disc contained fifteen new songs. The album produced two new hit singles and videos in America. "Scream" was a duet with his sister Janet whose futuristic music video, with a seven million dollar price tag, is the most expensive music video ever made. Thanks to a change in Billboard's chart policy, "You Are Not Alone" became the first song to ever debut at number one on the Billboard Hot 100 Singles Chart; the video had a cameo from Jackson's then-wife, Lisa Marie Presley. The album's other singles and videos, "Childhood", "Earth Song", "Stranger in Moscow", and "They Don't Care About Us" had limited success in America, and performed far better in Europe. "Earth Song" is an emotional plea for taking care of our environment. "Childhood" is notable for having been the theme song to Free Willy 2. "They Don't Care About Us" caused a stir when it was released due to controversial lyrics which were considered by some to be anti-Semitic. This caused American MTV and VH1 to ban the song's music video, even though it garnered heavy airplay on many of America's Boxnetworks. The lyrics "Jew me, sue me/Kick me, kike me" were modified on the album's official release in response to the criticism. Apart from the video for "Scream," singles and videos from HIStory nowadays garner little airplay in America, making the album a failure overall by Jackson's standards, though it has sold over eighteen million double albums by 2004. It was branded a failure very quickly in American shores. Executives and Jackson hoped it would stay at number one throughout the summer, yet it only spent two weeks at the top with unspectacular sales. On the other hand, the album spawned his biggest hit ever in the UK, "Earth Song" stayed at the top of the chart for six weeks and sold over a million copies.
In 1997 Jackson released Blood on the Dance Floor, a remix album of several of the tracks off of HIStory, which also included 5 new songs and has since become the biggest-selling remix album of all time. The album only had one single and official music video, the title track, which failed to catch on in America, and again proved a far more popular hit in Europe. However, Jackson also produced "Ghosts", a forty-minute short film, which was shown in several movie theaters and uses the songs "Ghosts" and "2 Bad" in the film. The short film "Ghosts" is occasionally played as an hour-long special, with space made for commercials, on MTV and VH1, especially during the Halloween season. Four years later, Jackson was inducted to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2001 as a solo artist.
Jackson's 2001 album Invincible, speculated but never confirmed as the most expensive album ever produced, debuted at number one on the U.S. charts, selling two million copies in the United States and eight million worldwide. While the numbers seemed impressive, the sales figures were nonetheless disappointing, considering Jackson's previous success and the cost of the album. As opposed to his earlier albums which each spawned at least six singles, most of which were generally worldwide smashes, Invincible produced only the singles "You Rock My World" and "Butterflies" in America. "Cry" was also issued as a third single in Europe. "You Rock My World" managed the top ten in America, but only for a week, and its big-budget, fourteen-minute music video received only sparse airplay on MTV, VH1, MTV2, and BET, usually in a shortened, five-minute version. "Butterflies" was a top-twenty hit in America as well as a number-two hit on the R&B charts, but did not reach the top ten, despite a popular radio remix featuring rapper Eve; the song's relative lack of success also allowed no budget for a music video.
In June 2002, Jackson was inducted for his work as a songwriter to the Songwriters Hall of Fame. In November 2002 Jackson received in Berlin Germany's Millennium Bambi 2002 award, in recognition of his status as the world's "greatest living pop icon". The awards recognize outstanding personalities and performances in various fields, including show business, film, politics and sport.
Jackson is also noted for his humanitarian efforts, and has often used his music, including the all-star single "We Are the World" (1985), "Man in the Mirror" (1987), and "Heal the World" (1992), to support and promote various causes. He is fond of children, and, apart from having his own, he has had friendships with a number of other children, ranging from disadvantaged children to child celebrities. He has invited many groups of children to his ranch and has sponsored a number of charity drives for children. Jackson was considering a tour of Africa in May or June 2004 to raise money to fight AIDS, if the court would let him. The countries he was planning to visit included Zimbabwe, South Africa, and Senegal.
"One More Chance"
On November 20 2003, Jackson released a new song, "One More Chance," written by R. Kelly. It was the only new track on his Number Ones greatest hits album. "One More Chance" went on to become the number-one track on Billboard's R&B/Hip-Hop Singles Sales chart for three straight weeks. The song was also featured as a montage video on the CBS TV special "Michael Jackson Number Ones" The special was then released on DVD as "The One". As well as the montage, there is also an original music video shot for "One More Chance" that remains unreleased.
Personal life
Michael Jackson had continued to practice door-to-door Jehovah's Witness evangelization after becoming famous, but in disguise. His career and flamboyant style led to friction with congregation elders. At one point, his sister LaToya was shunned by Jehovah's Witnesses, and in 1987, he formally left the religion.
Neverland Jackson most famous house is his eleven square-kilometre (2,600 acre) Neverland Ranch in Santa Ynez, California, named after the magical kingdom Neverland featured in the children's story Peter Pan, since purchasing the property in 1988. Jackson who is a huge Disney fan built an amusement park in the ranch and welcomes about once a week a bus full of sick and poor children for a day of fun. He claims that he likes to be surrounded by children because of their sense of innocence, which he feels he lost too soon. His song "Childhood" includes the lyric "It's been my fate to compensate, for the childhood I've never known" ''History'', 1995, Sony Music.
Jackson who was often seen with a chimpanzee named Bubbles and a snake called Muscles in the 80's, is fond of animals and owns a private zoo at Neverland.
Neverland has inspired many of Jackson's work. He once told an interviewer that he liked climbing trees and wrote songs like "Will You Be There" and "Heal the World" while sitting in his favorite tree called Giving Tree because "it's inspiring".
The "Heal the World" foundation was created by Jackson in 1992, with assistance from former President Jimmy Carter. Michael is also the godfather of Lionel Richie's adopted daughter Nicole Richie.
Jackson's marriages and children
Jackson's relationship with children, both his own and others, have been controversial. Jackson's sleepover parties at his mansion, Neverland Ranch, have received widespread critical media coverage, especially after he revealed that he sometimes slept in the same bed with several unrelated children. In 1994 Jackson married Lisa Marie Presley, the daughter of Elvis Presley; the marriage was severely criticized by the media and lasted less than two years. Despite some comments questionning the validity of this union, Lisa Marie Presley who had been very critical on Jackson those recent years, always maintained that they both shared a normal couple life by the time they were married.
In 1996, Jackson married Deborah Jeanne Rowe, with whom he had a son, Michael Joseph Jackson, Jr. (who publicly goes by the name "Prince"), and a daughter, Paris-Michael Katherine. They were divorced in 1999. Rowe later said that she wanted Jackson have the children as a "gift", which she had offered even while Jackson was married to Presley. Rowe had given up her parental rights to the children, but as of 2005 a family court case is under way regarding visitation. The godparents of these two children are Macaulay Culkin and Elizabeth Taylor.
Around February 2002 Jackson had another son, Michael Joseph Jackson III, also called "Prince Michael II" and "Blanket", apparently with a surrogate mother whose identity has not been disclosed. In late 2002, Jackson stirred up controversy while staying at the Adlon hotel in Berlin by briefly suspending him over the edge of the railing of a balcony. Jackson defended his actions, saying that he held the child very tightly. Jackson's children are veiled or masked when they appear in public with him, which he describes as a security measure. Rowe said it was her idea from the beginning.
There had been rumors that Jackson was having children by various women. One woman claimed that she was giving birth to quadruplets, and the father was Jackson's. They were later confirmed not to be his at all. Jackson suffered the same problem two decades earlier with a woman claiming Michael was a father to one of her fraternal twins. He wrote the memorable hit "Billie Jean" as a result.
Controversies
Skin color
Although Jackson's skin color was a medium brown tone for the entire duration of his youth, his skin has lightened gradually since 1982, and is today a light cream color. Jackson has attributed his changing skin color to vitiligo, a skin disease in which the body develops antibodies against its own pigment, resulting in light patches and an eventual loss of melanin. The public finally got to know of Jackson's condition when he first revealed it in an interview with Oprah Winfrey in 1993. Several members of the media refused to believe Jackson has vitiligo, often saying he bleached his skin, an allegation denied by Jackson. Even Jackson's family members backed up his claim, with Joseph Jackson stating that his own father (Michael Jackson's grandfather) had also suffered from vitiligo.
Jackson has been shown in various pictures over the years to have suffered from the disease. In several early-1980s concert photos, there was a white blotch showcased on Jackson's neck which could easily explained Jackson's lightening condition. After going to a hospital, he finally received the news when his doctor said he was diagnosed with the disease in 1986. Ever since then, Jackson has been seen wearing long-sleeved shirts and pants under an umbrella to hide from the sun, which he says he's allergic to because of his condition.
Plastic surgery
It has been rumored that Jackson has used extensive plastic surgery to modify his appearance, although he claims to have had only three operations: Two rhinoplastic surgeries, the first of which he claims was to repair a broken nose resulting from a dancing accident in 1978, the second to correct imperfections in the first surgery; and the surgical creation of a cleft in his chin. When listing his cosmetic surgery, Jackson often omits mentioning the cleft as insignificant when compared to media claims that he rebuilt his whole face. However, he confirms the surgery in his 1988 autobiography Moon Walk.
Jackson's alleged extensive use of plastic surgery has now caused increased concerns of media's surgeons for possible cartilage and nose collapse. They agree that Jackson's nose structure could easily collapse during an altercation. Other experts, however, claim that in the last twenty-seven years, Jackson had totally only two nasal bone structure surgeries, the latest in 1982, and three other minor corrections of the cartilage in 1983, 1990, and 2000.
Monetary situations
Jackson's ATV/Sony music publishing company is estimated to USD 1,5 billion. In October 2002, various international banks claimed that Jackson was tens of millions of dollars in debt. That same month, concert promoter Marcel Avram sued Jackson in a court in Santa Maria, California, claiming that he reneged on a deal to perform on a series of millennium concerts crossing the International Date Line on the evening of December 31 1999–January 1 2000. Jackson lost the case, and is appealing.
He has been involved in a legal dispute with his former financial adviser, Union Finance and Investment Corp. of South Korea, who claim that Jackson owes the firm twelve million dollars in fees and expenses and that Jackson's extravagant spending may lead to his bankruptcy. See also Jackson's finances in connection to the trial.
Alleged child sexual abuse/molestation
Main articles: Allegations of child sexual abuse by Michael Jackson in the early 1990s and 2005 trial of Michael Jackson
Michael Jackson has also repeatedly been accused of child sexual abuse. In 1993, Jordan Chandler, the son of a former Berverlly Hills dentist movie-producer wannabee Evan Chandler, represented by civil lawyer Larry Feldman accused Jackson of sexual molestation. Jackson was served a search warrant to have the Santa Barbara Police Dept. headed by District Attorney Tom Sneddon view his body and later publicly complained via a December 22, 1993 press conference that the officers violated his privacy by photographing his private parts in a very humiliating manner to look for some skin disorder marks alledgelly described by the young accuser. Jackson settled out of court with the accuser for at least USD 25 million[2]. Jackson's settling out of court brought suspicion among the media, some of whom claimed that Jackson avoided a trial because he was afraid to have been proven guilty. A debated point, is whether Jackson chose to settle, or if it was forced by his insurance provider. When interviewed by Bashir, Michael Jackson confirmed that the 1993/1994 settlement was his own personal decision[3].
In 2003, Jackson was accused of sexual molestation by a second young accuser represented also by civil lawyer Larry Feldman, Gavin Arvizo, who appeared with Jackson on the Living with Michael Jackson television documentary. An investigation was launched by District Attorney Thomas Sneddon. Jackson's Neverland was served a search warrant and the singer was arrested in November 2003. In the prelude to the trial, Jackson allowed a high profile visit of children to Neverland, in December 2004. Michael Jackson's spokesperson provided the press with a list of non-profit children's organizations which had sent the children. According to Court TV, most of these organizations, turned out to be either non-existent, or were upset that they were falsely associated with the visit. [4]
The criminal case was tried in Santa Maria, California during the spring of 2005. Jackson was acquitted of all charges on June 13. A civil (non-criminal) suit over allegations of abduction and sexual assault of a man is currently pending in Louisiana, with the next court date set for August 17 2005.[5]
In 2005, Sony Records' released compilation album, The Essential Michael Jackson, sold just 8,000 copies in the first week in the U.S. (compared to the number-one album, Now 19, which sold 436,000 copies in the same period) though the CD reached number two in the U.K..
Discography
- For a list of Jackson's albums and singles chart statistics throughout his entire career, see Michael Jackson Discography
- For a list of albums that Jackson has released during his solo career, see List of Michael Jackson albums
Video games
- Michael Jackson's Moonwalker is an arcade game that was ported to the Sega Mega Drive/Sega Genesis and Sega Master System.
- Space Channel 5 for the Sega Dreamcast featured Michael Jackson in the later levels.
- Space Channel 5 Part 2, a dance game for the PlayStation 2 and Sega Dreamcast also featured Michael Jackson in the later levels.
- Ready 2 Rumble Round 2 is a fighting game for the PlayStation 2 and Sega Dreamcast featuring Michael Jackson as a hidden character.
See also
- List of best selling music artists — World's top-selling music artists chart.
- List of number-one hits (United States)
- List of artists who reached number one on the Hot 100 (US)
- List of number-one dance hits (United States)
- List of artists who reached number one on the US Dance chart
External links
Official Michael Jackson sites
- MJJ Source.com - Official website of Michael Jackson, run by brother Randy, with Michael's authorization.
- Sony's Michael Jackson site - The official web site for Michael Jackson's music at Sony Music Entertainment, who controls its content.
Informational (not fan sites)
- Michael Jackson at IMDb
- Rock & Roll Hall of Fame page on Michael Jackson
- The American Vitiligo Research Fondation Site
- Sony/ATV music publishing site
Fan sites
- Michael Jackson World Network — U.K. Fan Club
- February 5, 2005 interview - Transcript of Geraldo Rivera interview with Michael Jackson, reprinted on Michael Jackson's official web site.