Lyndsey Winship is the Guardian’s dance critic.
Priya Elan: ‘My initial reaction was to throw Off the Wall in the bin’
My pop allegiances were always with Prince and Madonna, but I came of age when Bad-era
Michael Jackson was massive. He transcended race, he transcended gender and for me he transcended a personal connection. Being a fan of his felt like being a fan of a skyscraper or a corporation. You could admire its foundations, its height, the sheer spectacle, but it would be harder to love the bones of it. He was unlike Prince and Madonna, who seemed to let their freakish rebellion hang out with a carefree abandon.
Later in life, I couldn’t resist Thriller and Off the Wall. Spurred on by Spike Lee’s documentary of the
making of latter, I fell in love with the magical disco grooves and the story of the child star turned spangly king of the dance floor. Watching Leaving Neverland, I felt an allegiance with the survivors: their story of manipulation, control and parental neglect is a familiar tripartite to those who have experienced emotional or physical abuse as children. By the end of the unrelenting four hours, I was broken by the story of grown men and parents trying to examine the scars of their past. My initial reaction was to throw Off the Wall in the bin (I didn’t), but the next day, listening to a ’70s soul compilation whose first song was the Jacksons’ Blame it on the Boogie, it was to skip that track. I couldn’t go there.
Priya Elan is editor of the Guardian Guide.
Laura Snapes: ‘It’s a cautionary tale against idol worship’
I have never really associated Jackson with his music. I was born in 1989, and grew up in a pop landscape where he was decreasingly visible. His songs remained totemic, but so much so that it rarely occurred to me that they had been made by humans, the same way that I never wondered who designed the McDonald’s logo, or what’s really in a can of Coke. The first time I really became aware of Jackson the man was in the build-up to Martin Bashir’s 2003 documentary, which my parents wouldn’t let me watch because it was “inappropriate”. Obviously, I watched it anyway. Since then, I have always associated Jackson with allegations of paedophilia, and so I never sought out his albums.
Still, the irresistibility of his music crept up on me. The irresistible power Jackson brought to his music is the same power he wielded to abuse children and hoodwink their families into letting him do so. It is the same power that afforded him a coterie of enablers with a vested financial interest in ensuring that the public perceived these allegations to be ridiculous. Jackson’s greatest legacy is as an unparalleled example of how the entertainment industry prioritises profit over pain. It’s a cautionary tale against idol worship, and a reminder to question figures who willingly exploit that dynamic. This is the point where, for me, the man and the music become inextricable, and for ever inadmissible
Laura Snapes is deputy music editor of the Guardian.
Chuck Klosterman: ‘He is too massive to cancel’
The possibility of separating an artist’s work from the artist’s life isn’t a practical question right now. We are at a point (either temporarily or in perpetuity) when people don’t want to engage with that debate. The conflict still exists and the philosophical puzzle hasn’t changed, but the public argument is pretty much over. What is specifically complicated about the Michael Jackson scenario is the sheer magnitude of his footprint. Even if every worldwide streaming service removed his songs and Apple Music terminated his catalogue, there are still at least 60m physical copies of Thriller scattered around the globe. He is too massive to cancel.
What will happen, I suspect, is that the ever-increasing population of transgressive musicians (both living and dead) who find themselves recast as irredeemably problematic will eventually be lumped into a separate silo of cultural history. The unspoken rule will be that their work can be consumed and analysed, but not without overtly recognising that they are members of this exiled fraternity. It will be somewhat similar to how a film student can still reference the cinematography of
Leni Riefenstahl, but only after first noting her political relationships. Jackson’s work is brilliant and unusually ubiquitous, so people will always want to talk about it. They just won’t be able to talk about that music to the exclusion of non-musical events, which will incrementally change its musical meaning.
Charles Klosterman is an author and essayist. His most recent book is But What If We’re Wrong?
Simran Hans: ‘I’m no longer able to square the art with the artist’
I watched Leaving Neverland on my birthday, a bruising 9am screening at the Sundance film festival. The experience was, as you might imagine, somewhat of a downer. Yet, what’s both fascinating and illuminating about this film is the precision with which its two central survivors, James Safechurch and Wade Robson, describe the doublethink of abuse. Survivors can hold two contradictory thoughts in their heads, Michael Jackson was “one of the kindest, most gentle, caring, loving people I knew”, says Safechurch matter of factly. He was also a paedophile, and an abuser. If you weren’t convinced of Jackson’s guilt before (and many of us were), it is near impossible to turn a blind eye to it now, so powerful and incriminating are the testimonies the director, Dan Reed, presents.
There is also a contradiction, or at least a tension present for Jackson fans such as myself when revisiting his art. To detach Jackson’s tarnished celebrity persona from his music and reappraise it as pure and faceless pop commerce because it is more comfortable doesn’t feel right. Listening to him doesn’t feel right, either. I’m not calling for him to be “cancelled” but personally I’m no longer able to square the art with the artist, it doesn’t exist in a vacuum. Jackson made brilliant, titanic pop, and he sexually abused children. People have known both of these things for years. Nothing has changed except the times in which the work is being received.
Simran Hans is a writer, researcher and film programmer.