Michael Jackson (37 page)

In truth, the relationship between Michael and Quincy rapidly deteriorated during the recording of
Thriller,
especially when Quincy would not give Michael a co-producing credit on ‘Billie Jean’ and ‘Beat It’. The demonstration tapes
Michael had recorded of both songs – before Quincy worked on them – sounded almost exactly like the final product. Michael felt
it was only fair that he be given co-producing credit, and additional royalties as well. Quincy disagreed, much to Michael's
chagrin.

Closer inspection of
Thriller
as a whole revealed an ambitiously crafted work that moved in a number of directions. The suburban, middle-of-the-road calm
of ‘The Girl is Mine’ was the antithesis of the rambunctious ‘Beat It’, another highly charged Jackson composition in which
Michael augmented his crossover rhythm-and-blues style by employing a harder-edged rock-and-roll sound. Some reviewers felt
‘Beat It’ was a shameless quest to attract hard-rock fans; the track featured Eddie Van Halen, whose band Van Halen was a
preeminent rock group, on searing guitar bridges. While the tune was more of a marketing concoction – in the past, Michael had
never shown any particular fondness for straight-out rock and roll – ‘Beat It’ would still find acceptance among rock fans.

On the other hand, if the funky ‘Wanna Be Startin' Somethin'’ sounds like a distant relative of
Off the Wall
's songs ‘Don't Stop 'Til You Get Enough’ and ‘Working Day and Night’, the similarity occurred because Michael wrote them
all during the same period. In ‘Startin' Somethin'’, Michael pointedly revealed his feelings on gossips and unwanted babies,
and all to a bulleting bass and shuffling percussion. The tune's centrepiece, a climaxing Swahili-like chant, gave the song
an international flavour. It was difficult to listen to Michael as he spat out angry lyrics about hate and feeling like a
vegetable and not wonder about his state of mind at the time.

There were other stand-outs: the moody and introspective ‘Human Nature’, written by Steve Porcarro and John Bettis, was an
expansive pop ballad whose sheer musicality kept it from being mushy. The funky ‘PYT’ (standing for ‘Pretty Young Thing’),
credited to James Ingram and Quincy Jones, and the sultry ballad ‘Lady in My Life’, by Rod Temperton, were both efforts to
beef up
Thriller
's R&B direction. ‘Lady in My Life’ was, by the same token, as close as Michael had come to crooning a sexy, soulful ballad
since his Motown years. Perhaps that was why it required so many takes before the lead vocal was to Quincy Jones's liking.

The title track, ‘Thriller’, was its own animal. The song said much about Michael's fascination with the supernatural and
the lurid. ‘Thriller’ is a typical Rod Temperton song – melodic, with a fluid bass line and big, mind-imprinting hook. The lyrics
had excitement and intrigue, and the song concluded with a stately rap by the master of the macabre, Vincent Price. ‘Thriller’
would have been even more compelling as the title track of a concept album, but
Thriller,
the album, had no actual focus. It was just a bunch of great songs. Even the album's cover art, a photograph of a casually
posed Michael uncharacteristically dressed in white jacket and pants, seemed incongruous. However, it's the picture many people
refer to when discussing his plastic surgery, saying, ‘If he had just stopped there, he would have been fine!’

With
Thriller,
Michael and Quincy had successfully engineered glossy, authentic versions of pop, soul and funk that appealed to just about
everyone. However, no one in the music business expected the public to take that appeal so literally. At some point,
Thriller
stopped selling like a leisure item – like a magazine, a toy, tickets to a hit movie – and started selling like a household staple.
At its sales peak, CBS would report that the album was selling an astounding 500,000 copies a week.

To the press, Quincy acted as if he knew
Thriller
was going to be huge. ‘I knew from the first time I heard it in the studio, because the hair stood straight up on my arms,’
he said. ‘That's a sure sign, and it's never once been wrong. All the brilliance that had been building inside Michael for
twenty-four years just erupted. I was electrified, and so was everyone else involved in the project. That energy was contagious,
and we had it cranked so high one night that the speakers in the studio actually overloaded and burst into flames. First time
I ever saw anything like that in forty years in the business.’ What in the world was he talking about, speakers bursting into
flames? Quincy is nothing if not a good showman. In truth, of course, he had predicted two million in sales, a moderate hit,
for Michael, and much to Michael's dismay.

‘What did I tell you?’ Michael crowed to John Branca when it was clear that
Thriller
had taken off in an astronomical way. ‘I
knew
it. I just knew it.’ John could only smile.

By the end of 1983,
Thriller
would sell a staggering thirteen million copies in the United States and nearly twenty-two million worldwide. At the time,
the all-time best-selling album was the original soundtrack to
Saturday Night Fever,
with worldwide sales of twenty-five million since its 1977 release. It wouldn't be long before Michael toppled that record;
he had already achieved one milestone: until now, no other solo album had sold more than twelve million copies.

In addition to his personal achievements, Michael had single-handedly revived a moribund recording industry. When people flocked
to the record stores to buy
Thriller,
they purchased other records too. As a result, the business had its best year since 1978. As Gil Friesen, then-president
of A&M Records said at the time, ‘The whole industry has a stake in
Thriller
's success.’ Michael's success also generated new interest in black music in general.

Ultimately, Thriller would go on to sell more than fifty million copies wordwide; it would spend thirty-seven weeks at number
one on the
Billboard
charts, which was amazing. In the UK, it also hit number one and stayed on the charts there for an incredible 168 weeks!
(The release of
Thriller
marked the first time an album was number one in the USA and the UK at the same time.) Also, prior to
Thriller,
no other album had ever spawned seven Top Ten singles: ‘Billie Jean’, ‘Beat It’, ‘The Girl is Mine’, ‘Human Nature’, ‘Wanna
Be Startin' Somethin'’, ‘PYT’ and ‘Thriller’. All of the songs sold hugely, right around the world.

CBS made at least sixty million dollars just on
Thriller.
Michael fared well too. According to, John Branca, Michael had ‘the highest royalty rate in the record business’. That rate
escalated along with the sales, but averaged 42 per cent in the wholesale price of each record sold, or about $2.10 for every
album sold in the United States – thirty-two million dollars on
Thriller
's domestic sales alone. Roughly fifteen million dollars more was made in foreign sales. Those figures, of course, did not
include the royalties for the four songs he penned on the album.

Michael Jackson was, at twenty-five, a very wealthy young man. He had certainly come a long way from that 0.2 per cent royalty
rate Motown once offered him.

The more
Thriller
was heard – and it was possibly the most played record of all time, both privately and on the radio – the better it sounded.
Michael and Quincy had achieved their goal: to many listeners – whites, blacks, highbrows, heavy metal fans, teeny-boppers,
parents –
Thriller
was the perfect album, every song an exercise in pop music production, every arrangement, every note in perfect place. This
achievement made Michael more than a hero; the music industry promoted him to higher ground, almost sainthood. Of course,
in entertainment circles these days, even the most untalented artist who sells huge amounts of product becomes a ‘visionary’.
However, Michael's phenomenal sales, along with his astounding talent, established a precedent of excellence with
Thriller
– and one that he would secretly attempt to surpass for the rest of his career.

Joseph Jackson is known among his friends and associates as a man given to overextending himself by investing in unsteady
business ventures outside of the careers of his children. Of course, some of the investments have been profitable. For instance,
a limousine company he owned did manage to turn a profit. More often, though, Joseph would lose his investment and then some.
For instance, he once started his own record company, which cost him a small fortune. He had also invested a great deal of
money in producing and managing singing groups, perhaps to prove that he could do for others what he had done for his sons.
However, none of his acts ever amounted to much, if anything. And who in his circle would ever forget ‘Joe-Cola’, his own
soft drink – which also failed in the marketplace? One had to give him credit for trying, though. He was never afraid to take
a chance, invest in what he thought might be a good idea and take it all the way to fruition. After all, that's how he got
The Jackson 5 to Los Angeles, and to Motown, wasn't it?

By the beginning of 1981, however, Joseph was having financial problems serious enough to warrant his wanting to sell the
Encino estate. It's a tribute to him that he never attempted to siphon money from his children's income to solve his own financial
problems. ‘I'd say we were among a fortunate few artists who walked away from a childhood in the business with anything substantial – money,
real estate, other investments,’ Michael would say. ‘My father set all these up for us. To this day I'm thankful he didn't
try to take all our money for himself, the way so many parents of child stars have. Imagine stealing from your own children.
My father never did anything like that.’

Joseph may have been a lot of things, but he wasn't was a thief. He took care of his children's investments, and if they lost
money – and all of them did, except for Michael and Janet – it may be because they have inherited Joseph's penchant for bad investments.
It wasn't because they didn't receive money that was owed to them.

Joseph found the perfect buyer for his Encino estate: his own son, Michael.

One might wonder if Joseph first examined the ramifications of his offer to Michael before he made it. No doubt, once he changed
roles from owner to tenant, his relationship with Michael would change as well. Barring unusual circumstances, in most familial
situations, the heads of the family provides the lodgings; when the children become adults, they move on to their own homes.
Changing roles in a basic way can often contribute to family dysfunction. Joseph had always held fast to the theory that a
father should be able to control his children – no matter what their ages, their desires, their expertise. Being so determined
to be in charge, it's surprising that Joseph never realized how threatened he would eventually feel by having to live in his
son's house – especially when it had once been his own. Of course, Joseph was dealing with Michael, and he knew and understood
Michael's gentleness towards Katherine, if not towards him. He knew that Michael wouldn't kick them out of the house. In the
end, Michael paid about $500,000 for his equity in the estate. Katherine and Joseph owned the other half. Eventually, Joseph
would sell his quarter to Michael, leaving 25 per cent to Katherine. One might also wonder if he had considered that the next
time Katherine wanted to evict him, it might be a lot more likely that he would have to leave since she and Michael owned
the estate, not him.

Once he took over part-ownership, Michael decided to completely demolish and rebuilt the house. The address may have remained
the same, but the new estate – Michael's estate, which took two years to finish – became palatial in scope. What sweet and poetic
justice it was that Michael was able to destroy the house in which he had so many bad memories and, from its ashes, raise
a new one, perhaps fresh with possibilities for the future. While on tour in England a few years earlier, he had become enchanted
by the Tudor-style mansions he saw in the countryside. When finished, the estate was – and still is, today – indeed, special.

The brick-laid drive opened to an ornate three-tiered white fountain in front of a Tudor-style home. All of the windows of
the house were made of leaded stained glass with bevelled panes. When Michael was in residence, the Rolls-Royce that Tatum
O'Neal helped him select sat parked in front of the four-car Tudor-style garage opposite the home. (Michael was still uneasy
about driving; he would much rather take an hour-long detour than have to drive on the freeway in Los Angeles. ‘I can't get
on them,’ he complained, ‘and I can't get off them, either.’)

A large ‘Welcome’ sign appeared above the garage doors. In the centre of the garage structure stood an oversized clock with
Roman numerals. Upstairs, on the second floor of the garage, a visitor entered a three-room picture gallery with hundreds
of photographs of the Jackson family on the walls and even the ceilings.