I Miss Rock

Chris Cornell has the BEST voice ever


PLAYLIST
1. Like the Sun - I Mother Earth
2. All My Real Friends - High Holy Days
3. Deny - Default
4. I Am the Highway* - Audioslave

*Video of our move from Los Angeles, CA to Yakima, WA in March 2006. We left my whole family behind to start a new one. Thank you brothers and sisters for holding him so tenderly. I tried to show how precious that was too see in the video. Thank God that dad noticed that one of our wheels on the trailer was bad with a tire that was about to blow just before we left his house... Then someone on the road shattered the driver side window on my truck just 2 hours after we left. On top of that we went from rain and icy roads of Northern California to freezing cold rain and snow up north in Oregon and Washington... "Long and weary my road has been..." - 4 days later we finally arrived safely! Thanks bro for driving the other car with our baby boy! Ruby and I will never forget that! -E.
________________________________________________

R.I.P.

He was such a freak.
But...
If I'm going to remember him, it will be like this:

I'll Be There
Don't Stop 'Til You Get Enough
Rock With You



Billie Jean (live)
Thriller (dance)
Moonwalk (extended)

PICS & COMMENTS
Mourning fans

I grew up on Michael in the 70's and he was nothing short of an idol, but for me he died long ago. This makes one less pedophile hiding behind wealth and fame. I look at him as I do Roman Polanski. Appreciate the dance, but definitely not the dancer.

Yep. I don't think our opinions will be popular, but my first thought is, now those kids actually have a shot at growing up normal.

I feel the same way. I can't really stand to look at him, even if hearing his songs make my feet start to tap.

Mourning fan__UCLA Medical Center

Exactly. Although it's weird to think of a person who has been famous for as long as I had a concept of what celebrity was is now gone, I don't have the urge to shed a tear for him.

I agree. I'm not trying to be a ghoul, and I love his music and believe him to be a pop genius but I don't think you can overlook the last, oh two decades.

I'll admit, I'm stunned. But, I have to agree with you, in part. His legacy is so tainted. It was impossible to enjoy his art when I could not stand the artist.

Media and fans__UCLA Medical Center

Fourth'd. I feel that we'll hear in the next months all the dirty laundry. Much like Howard Hughes, whose dysfunction and mental illness was a closely guarded, protected secret, I bet all the people bound by confidentiality agreements and/or stipends will be coming forward with much Michael Jackson's apologists would prefer remain hidden.

Thanks for putting into words what I have spent the last hour trying to figure out how to say.

Neverland Ranch__Beverly Hills

It's a sad story all the way around. He needed help before he went totally street rat crazy, but nobody was there for him. They saw him as a golden goose, not a human being.

I guess I mourn for whatever was lost a long time ago, because you're right -- he's been essentially a shadow of his former self, and he was clearly a tortured soul who dealt with abuse on his own.

Orphaned kids of a rich, legendary father do not have any shot of a normal childhood.

MJ's crown, scepter and crystal glove__Apr.09 auction

This is very much how I feel. I was a huge Jackson 5 fan when I was a child (still am) but that Michael Jackson disappeared years ago. I admit I feel sad and actually a bit sick in my stomach but I feel sad for that little boy and for what he became.

You can't libel a dead man. It's gonna get real crazy.

Carved hanging swing__Apr.09 auction

No one would help him because it may have threatened their paycheck, so it just continued to spiral out of control.

Fifth'd, or wherever we are. I can appreciate the tragedy of his life, but if he really did molest children, I have no sympathy for him. It's sad that he probably had some serious demons, but not sad that he tried to work them out on young kids.
For the kids he's alleged to have harmed, I feel for them. A lot of people are talking about how great he was now. And he had years of greatness, but then it all slid downhill.

Black or White vid__1991

I'm mostly sad about my lost childhood, I think, and this stands in for other things about my childhood that I'm sad about losing.
For example...my sister and my brother and I all dancing to "Beat It" in our living room. That was a happy time, and preceded many unhappy times, so I'm sad because I feel like a little bit of that is lost.

1974

A person does not wake up one day and become a pedophile. There is always something under the surface. It just took the public a while to figure everything out.

The talent, the art, the music and dancing, what he brought to our lives is amazing. His own life was in some respects a sacrifice to that. I've no doubt he's done some wrong but I think his own face is testament to the fact that he was a deeply screwed up person. Doesn't take away from the sheer joy and greatness of his music.


You articulated most of the thoughts that have been tormenting me for an hour. I am sad at the loss of his musical genius. But I am appalled by the overwhelming evidence that he engaged in inappropriate relationships with children and even more by the crowd of hangers-on who rushed to protect him from the consequences of his behavior.
I trust that our Creator will judge him with the mercy we would all want. And forgive me for my own lack of grace and kindness.


I go back and forth:
Let's assume your parents and family physically and mentally abuse you to an extreme, before, during, and after you are applying a tremendous talent and spreading profound enjoyment to hundreds of millions of people. How might a retaliation to that abuse manifest itself in an adult with no cultural or financial limitations? I feel for him, and those he hurt.

His personal demons and misdeeds don't subtract from his genius, they exist alongside each other.

MJ dangles his baby over Berlin hotel balcony

This rings of the sentiment of my mother when I told her that MJ died.
She's sad, but at the same time, she can't bring herself to look at and appreciate what he turned himself into.
When mid-80's MJ came up on screen, she said 'That's the Michael Jackson I know' and walked out the room.
Sad...but I think I'm over it. The music will live forever.

In this culture, it's amazing what one will forgive for the sake of entertainment.

He was mercilessly abused, assaulted and driven by his "guardians" from the time he was a little kid. There are complex reasons behind why he was so fucked up. Doesn't excuse his actions, but his whole life was very tragic, and worthy of just a bit of compassion.

The generational gap is always more apparent when it comes to pop culture, I've found.
I'm almost 25, and I spent my childhood rocking the fuck out to MJ in the 80s and early 90s. Although the last couple decades have shown a completely different person, I still can't help but remember him as the world's biggest superstar.
Right after I heard the news, I went to the final for this prep class I am taking at a junior college, and I asked this 19 year old guy if he had heard about it. He just kinda said "Yeah, kinda sad" and shrugged it off, and I realized that most younger people probably only know him as a freak show, nothing more.
[Jezebel]

Transformation

Smooth Criminal