Heaven Can Wait

My favourite MJ song- Human Nature



Michael Jackson's music taught me life lessons. I grew up in the 90's..arguably the era of the peak of MJ's success.

I remember thinking how INTENSE the video for "Earth Song" is. It was one of my first lessons about world/human and nature suffering.

I remember "Man in the Mirror" and the message of change. Before I ever heard any Gandhi quote about "Be the change you want to see in the world", I heard his lyric, "If you wanna make the world a better place, take a look at yourself and make the change".

I remember watching "Black or White" video, and that inspiring me to want to travel, to see all these exotic people- the african warriors, the native american pow-wow, the epic image of the Bharatanatyam dancer in the middle of the street. Oh man that last one, when I saw it, i think i knew what it was like to feel pride for my culture. More importantly, it taught me about acceptance and embracing other cultures. Mind you, this video came out in the early 90's, and i was a wee kid.

Remember back in the day (the early 90's) you could't play CD's on your car stereo? It was all tapes? Yeah..I remember MJ's "Dangerous'' being the first cassette tape I ever owned. I'm not making this up. My dad gave it to me, cos I loved the cover art so much. I played it so much I had to keep re-winding the black tape with my finger cos it kept coming loose. I don't have it anymore though.

I sort have a monopoly on all the music cds in the house. Vivek has only managed to take The Eagles Greatest Hits CD from the collection that my folks passed me ages ago. I still have a working copy of MJ's "HIStory" which has the gorgeous song "Stranger in Moscow". The video taught me about cinematography-angles, filters, lighting.

I remember that when Izzah and I were coming up with dance moves for the campfire routine, the go-to source was always MJ. What would MJ do? And when we found a move we could use, we'd call it the "MJ move" when we were running through the routine. MJ taught me how to dance, through all the musicians and performers he's influenced, who have in turn influenced me.

I think aviators and military style jackets are cool cos of MJ. Not cos of Top Gun, pfft. MJ. The King of Pop. Not only pop music, pop culture as well.

There will never be another individual like him. Never. We should be grateful to have lived in this era, to have experienced part of the phenomenon at least, as children of the 90's.