This is My Extremely Timely Michael Jackson Post

The Michael Jackson fervor has obviously died down quite a bit (it went like this: "Whoa, Michael Jackson died?! I've only been thinking of him in his capacity as a possibly-criminal weirdo. Now I remember that he sang several very good songs!"). It's not gone completely--people are still putting Michael Jackson CDs on hold with alacrity at my library. (The powers that be at the library clearly anticipated this. Many of the CDs that pass through my hands--on their way to the hold shelf or to the patrons that ordered them in--are very very new. ["Whoa, Michael Jackson died?! We had better buy several copies of the very good songs he sang!"])

I observed Michael Jackson Times by purchasing The Essential Michael Jackson on iTunes. Unfortunately, I have yet to warm up to any Michael Jackson songs I hadn't already known and enjoyed. On the other hand, the ones I already liked are really good. And since I haven't slapped together some YouTube videos for awhile, here are--from the 38 tracks on the album--my top four.

4) "Beat It." Not only is this a good song, but I am fairly awesome at it in Guitar Hero: World Tour. Just so you know.



(There's an ad that has babies "skating" and "break dancing" to "Beat It," but I find it more creepy than cute.)*

3) "Billie Jean." You can criticize the hair, but how could you criticize the song?



"Be careful what you do, because a lie becomes the truth." Now those are lyrics, man.

If you are familiar with my taste in music, it will not surprise you that my top two (and there's a big gap in my affection between #s 3 and 2 on this list) are Jackson 5 songs. Ebullient!

2) "The Love You Save." This song sounds so cute, and the lyrics have a lot of schoolyard metaphors, but the real message is "You are acting like a woman of easy virtue. 'Ware lest you lose your prospects for marriage!"



Wow, the Jackson boys were bad lip synchers. Good dancers, though.

1) "I Want You Back." It's similar to the more famous "ABC," but "ABC" is inferior. This video has, again, the terrible lip-synching, but that's only the second-most distracting thing about this. The winner is the inexplicable JERMAINE splashed across the back wall.





*I made it through that whole thing without an "Eat It" reference! I'm surprised, too.