Forget pop - Michael Jackson's death reminds us of his great contributions to the Gothic. As the obituaries swing into motion, death is burnishing the man's reputation in its customary ways. Media outlets are delighted to change the subject from Iran and the economy, to have something to cover with ease and authority. We shouldn't be squeamish about poking at the freshly dead corpse. Now is the time instead for us to recall Jackson's Gothic roles, most notably his life's.
First, some of his songs are classics in horror music. The best of them is "Thriller" (1983), which brought werewolves (or werecats) and zombies back to pop. It also returned to us the sweet tones of Vincent Price. It's also a date movie, where the decent girl's guy turns out to be a monster - an ancient trope, and one fine antecedent to Twilight.
There's also the historic link to that classic 1980s American fear of the occult - remember this opening title card from the singer, then a Jehovah's Witness?
Ah, for the glory days of back-masking and Satanic panic.
Second, Jackson turned himself into a figure of Gothic horror, with his own life as a monster-in-progress. Perhaps having his head set on fire for a Pepsi commercial was the start. Repeated surgeries kept reshaping that very public body: rhinoplasty, facelifts, artificial clefts, skin color changes, what else was used to alter his appearance? Such a shape-shifting, mutating, fluid creature.
Splendid rumors kept bursting to the media's surface, like noisome gas in a swamp: this Gothic artist buying up the Elephant Man's bones, hanging out intimately with a chimpanzee, or sleeping in a hyperbaric chamber. Not to mention the repeated accusations of pedophilia. Charges of antisemitism. Stories of drug addiction, weight loss, hiding from the public, the deepening cult of childhood. And now the weirdness of a death at 50, depite access to the best medical care. Forget whatever biographic truth might lurk, somewhere down there, buried under strata of media, promotion, fear, and cult workship: the story has been one of monstrosity.
[D]oesn’t his life embody not just the Hero-Villain, but the Gothic itself?
Maybe not. If the Gothic is marginal, Michael Jackson was always ever canonical. If the Gothic is about the powerful ruins of history, Jackson fashioned himself out of one group and family alone. If the Gothic is politically subversive, then the fellow wasn't (note pic) (nor can he serve as a one-man argument for horror being reactionary).
PS: I don't like his music much. It's got to be said, some of us never did, no matter the eulogies and the onrushing pitchforks.
I'm too old to be Gothic in the usual walking-around-the-mall-dressed-in-black sense, and old enough that I remember Michael Jackson mostly from A-B-C, rather than Thriller.
I don't think I ever associated him with the Gothic esthetic. (As far as Thriller goes, the credit belongs to Quincy Jones and John Landis. Jackson's personal life, however, is his and his alone. As fucked up as it was, though, it lacked the gravitas of true gothic -- more Tobe Hooper than Jean Rollin.)
On the other hand, if there were an author qualified to deal with the dark side of growing up in the ghetto of Gary, Indiana with a fucked-up father, I'm sure someone could manage a helluva story using Michael as a model.
I don't think Mark Harris has given his views on Michael Jackson's death yet (someone let me know if I'm wrong), but that's who I'd turn to for a summation of the gothic impact of MJ.
Posted by: HP | June 27, 2009 at 00:02
I enjoyed reading this post. Thanks for a wonderful job!
Posted by: Acai | February 25, 2010 at 20:37
very informational... educative as well, i read and felt like reading over and over again....good job!
Posted by: Acai Max Cleanse | July 01, 2011 at 10:47