The Return of the Jackson 4

[skooldem1]

Well I always thought it was strange that after "Thriller" the Jackson brothers dissappeared from the music scene. On the other hand, Rebbie, Laytoya, and Janet all pursued their music careers. If we can rule out that Michael had them blackballed, can it be possible that they were put on "payroll"- maybe Michael said I will pay you, you don't have to work anymore? Did he "retire" them? Off course this is all speculation.

[dvus7]

Well I always thought it was strange that after "Thriller" the Jackson brothers dissappeared from the music scene. On the other hand, Rebbie, Laytoya, and Janet all pursued their music careers. If we can rule out that Michael had them blackballed, can it be possible that they were put on "payroll"- maybe Michael said I will pay you, you don't have to work anymore? Did he "retire" them? Off course this is all speculation.

Ok!!! We agree that they disappeared......now answer the "HOW" & "WHY"? Janet, Latoya did not have recording contracts with CBS!!!!

[juicefree20]

As I have no desire to have it appear as though I'm slamming anyone by dissecting facts as regards the music, much less point out things which should be readily obvious to anyone who was hanging out in clubs or DJing back in the 80s let me ask you a few questions...

1. Does the term "emotional blackmail" mean anything to you? Have you never been in a situation where someone put you on the spot despite the fact that they already knew how you felt about a certain situation? But by calling you out in a public situation, they figured that they could embarrass you or manipulate the court of public opinion by placing you in a situation where you might look bad if you were to say "no"?

Manipulations such as this are attempted all of the time, not just in music, but sports, acting & everyday real life. It's called an attempt at a coup aka a power play. Sometimes it works, sometimes it backfires.

So the fact that someone claimed to be it the studio, or holding up posters holds no particular weight with me. I've seen
small-time promoters put the names of artists on fliers & announce that they would be performing on a show in order to sell tickets to the unsuspecting. The problem is two-fold...1. The artist has no idea that this person has made these claims & 2. People don't comprehend what they read. Ever see one of those "Special Invited Guest" fliers, which has as much value as a roll of used toilet paper because such a statement doesn't mean that an artist agreed to anything, it doesn't even mean that the artist even knows the person from a hill of beans, much less received the invite. It's just another old parlor trick that people employ in order to manipulate people & to separate them from their money.

So any announcements that were issued by anyone NOT named Michael Jackson held no water with me because if the announcement was that grand, we'd have heard it straight from Michael first & no one else. Please, let yourself not
be deceived by wishes & dreams that 99% of the time were proven to be untrue.

And have you ever considered the fact that perhaps it was all of those empty proclaimations & statements which seemed to put Michael on the spot that is/was DIRECTLY responsible for him NOT reuniting because he didn't appreciate the very public attempt to manipulate him into doing something before he, himself was ready to do so?

Very few of us like being manipulated behind closed doors, much less publically & tend not to react positively to such an attempt. With that as fact, why do you not view that as a possibility as well?

2. Did you ever stop to consider that it may just be the desire to create a "Thriller" of their own that served to hold the brothers back, proving to be their very undoing? I have but one word to say & I want you to consider it very carefully. The word for the day is "Victory". If you can tell me the problem with "Victory", then you'll be halfway to understanding why I say that this has nothing to do with any conspiracy, but was a rather obvious conclusion.

A few other thoughts before closing...

Jermaine was talented & just as you pointed out about Janet, NOT tethered to Michael, Epic, nor SONY [[he recorded for Motown & Arista) & even did "Tell Me That I'm Dreaming" with Michael onhis LP which came out AFTER "Thriller" [[one hell of a great song too!). So as he was a viable artist in his own right & UNTETHERED to Michael, exactly why is it that he didn't continue down that solo path?

Exactly how is Michael responsible for that?

Am I supposed to believe that Michael was so powerful that he was able to flip argurably the most powerful executive in music against his brother?

As I recall it, Arista was pushing Jermaine, even had him do duets, one specifically with Whitney Houston. So it's obvious that by teaming Jermaine with someone the magnitude of Whitney, that Clive was behind Jermaine. Hell, he even found a way to have Michael record "Tell Me I'm Not Dreaming", not on Epic but on Jermaine's LP on ARISTA. So how badly was Michael trying to be to Jermaine when he recorded a duet with him & not even on his own label, but on the label of his brother? Do you know how many string usually have to be pulled to get ANY label to allow their megastar to record a potential smash for a competing label?

So, since we know that just as with Janet, Jermaine wasn't tethered to SONY, Michael nor anything remotely related to Michael, then exactly what happened at Motown & Arista? Having had a degree of success in his own right, why wasn't he pushing his own tours, instead of always talking about touring with Michael? As he had a solo career independent of his brothers, why wouldn't he have played up that aspect & sold himself, as opposed to playing up tours which would've found his spotlight & own star somewhat reduced?

Or can it be that those constant declarations about reunions that never were, press conferences & behavior on the reality show give more insight about the situation than any conspiracy theory ever could?

You mentioned the song "Word 2 The Bad", which as I recall it wasn't written by anyone named Michael. Perhaps the need to have written such a song may give still more insight as regards why things played out as they did, as well as an underlying condition which would make any possible reunion with somewhat untenable for Michael.

And that's only what we KNOW about. How much more do we NOT know about that situation?

It may be easier to blame all of this on Michael but most often in these situations, those that know certainy don't tell. But from where I sit, it's rather unfair to attempt to blame Michael for creating a conspiracy when at no time have I ever heard one of them state such at thing.

Not even LaToya when she was with Jack Gordon.

Now if you have a link to corroborating information you'd like to share which proves me wrong, I'd be perfectly willing to admit my error. But Dvus, I've talked to enough people about situations such as this & have been around some situations as they unfolded & I've learned a few things.

1. Truth is usually stranger than fiction
2. Just when you think you know the truth, you really DON'T know the truth
3. It is what it is

and finally...

4. Despite what fans want, sometimes, you just can't go home again

Very often, your biggest enemies can be people who share your same address.

Just something to consider.

[juicefree20]

Skooldem

There are a few things which have traditionally served to break up groups.

In the case ot The Jacksons, I believe that it most likely came down to creative differences. If you saw the reality show, then simply think back to how the recording of a mere ONE song played out. Remember how the brothers had one agreement about the song, only to arrive at the studio to discover that despite having agreed to finish it together, that the song had already been done.

Now in many groups, that has proven to be true. In this case if that scenario is true, imagine being Michael who has a very strong idea of how he wanted his music to sound. It's obvious that his instincts as regards his music has proven to be correct. Now imagine placing yourself into a scenario where you have to deal with a guy who has never written, much less produced a hit on his own & he's telling you how it SHOULD be done.

Can you imagine Michael tolerating the nonsense that was shown in that studio on that show?

I can't.

Furthermore, can you imagine what it must feel like to be viewed as a "bread winner" & to know that the fortunes of family members most likely hinge on your willingness to work with them, or not & not really wanting to deal with things that only those involved know about, things which fans are not privy to?

Beyond that, I don't believe that it was any conspiracy on behalf of Michael that held the brothers back. What I believe happened is that after "Thriller" their little brother had become so huge that they didn't believe that they could possibly top that without him.

So since I've said that much, I might as well go all the way with the 1st post that I wrote, but held back. And if we're being honest, then much of what I say is going to have the ring of truth to it. SO, I'll close this one & go straight back to 1983-84 & reminisce about how things seemed to be playing out back then...

[juicefree20]

WHOAAA!!! Time's slipped by pretty fast. Gotta go visit my mother in the hospital. When I get back I'll finish up. I haven't been here in awhile & have been enjoying this dialog.

And despite a difference of opinion, no one's even getting mad in this thread

Gotta love it

[dvus7]

WHOAAA!!! Time's slipped by pretty fast. Gotta go visit my mother in the hospital. When I get back I'll finish up. I haven't been here in awhile & have been enjoying this dialog.

And despite a difference of opinion, no one's even getting mad in this thread

Gotta love it

@ juicefree.. hope that you Mother recovers with Godspeed!!! No, I am not going to get mad, cause this is a "healthy" discussion!!

[dvus7]

@ juicefree...In regards to "tell me I not dreaming", It WAS not released as a single!! And a video was not made!! i.e. Michael's power move..I had read in the Waker Yinekoff[[sp) book, that Michael came to him and told him to tell Arista they could not release it as a single, casue he was afraid of "over-exposure"!!!THE END of "tell me I'm not dreaming"!!!

[smark21]

Maybe one reason why the brothers didn’t tour until after Michael died was because the offers they got were on the oldies/county fair/Indian Casino circuit and they wanted more and/or were holding out for Michael to rejoin them so they could do another “Victory” tour. Not that the Victory tour wasn’t something of a PR disaster, especially in how tickets were sold for that show.

[juicefree20]

Smark...

Now we're getting closer to the truth. A tour without Michael simply wouldn't have made economic sense. When you're going to book a group minus it's primary lead who is as dynamic & had the charisma & stage presence that Michael had & expect to replace that energy with a lead singer who simply wasn't Michael would've been an exercise in futility.

And despite their various talents, the truth is that most in any audience wouldn't be thinking nor focusing on the 4 or 5 brothers whom were onstage, but rather, moreso on the one brother who WASN'T onstage.

And the comparisons would've been coming fast & furious, as would've people lamenting the fact that Micahel wasn't there. Unfortunately for them the truth is that they needed Michael on that stage in order to be viable. Michael didn't need to do that & it must've been a bitter pill to swallow for at least one of them as my next post will illustrate.

[juicefree20]

Dvus,

Thank you for that positive vibe, it's much appreciated & tough gal that she is, she seems to be coming along nicely. Frankly, I enjoy going back & forth with you because you never turn these discussions into a personal war. We just toss around out various viewpoints & if we don't agree, it's not the end of the world & it's nothing personal, just varying opinions & that's cool.

Now what I plan to do is kinda give a synopsis of what I believe happened to the brothers & their careers, beginning with Jermaine, then The Jacksons. But before doing so, I just want to leave you with a few lines from a song that you mentioned earlier. And I want to to think about what those words are really saying, as well as why they were ever said where the public could hear them before they were altered. I believe that they revealed more about the person uttering them, than they do about the person whom they were written about. I'll add my commentary as I go along.

Leaving out the most offensive lines, let's start by analyzing the following lines...

''It didn’t matter you always play me off. You only care about what you want
You don’t care about how it’s done, You only think about you, your throne
Be it right or wrong...''

Now understand that this was written by someone who had his own career happening. Someone who chose NOT to follow his brothers toward their own destiny, no pun intended [[well maybe just a little!) With that as fact, if you have your career & I have my career, exactly why would I be wrong for focusing on my career while you focus on yours? No one's joined at the hip & we're not kids anymore. What seems to be being suggested here pretty much can be suumed up thusly..."I want you to do something that you don't want to do & you're wrong because you won't do what I want you to".

Moving along...

''It ain’t about you takin’ my pie. You been takin’ for a long time
If you don’t care, I don’t care If you keep
Well I ain’t thinkin’ ’bout you''

Well obviously there's more than a little thinkin' 'bout going on & there's an awful lot of denial happening for a person who says that they don't care. Nevertheless, skipping the repetition, let's move forward a bit...

''Thinkin’ about that pie that you’ve been takin’ from me
From a brother to another brother hard to believe
Lost and don’t know it yet you still show it
Givin’ seems to be harder than it is to receive''

Now considering that we're talkin' about 2 grown men who have separate careers, exactly what pie is anyone taking from anyone? Consider that statement for a moment & think about what it's really saying. What I get from that statement is that Michael wouldn't tour with them, didn't want to be bothered with the trip that was sure to follow if he did & somehow, that equated to ''someone taking his pie''? Which is basically saying nothing less than "Yo, I can't make this money without you & since you won't do it, you're cheating me out of what I deserve to get".

So much for "God bless the child".

And keeping it brief, let's simply skip to the end which is straight out of the book named "How NOT to win friends & influence ones sibling to see things your way"...

"But meanwhile, I continue to smile, cause in the back of my head,
I know you’re still a child
You say that your a man, but that will never be..."

Now after reading this edited & sanitized version of the song that you mentioned earlier, who really seemed to have the vendetta here & honestly, when you read those words, what do you think was really behind them?

I believe that the answer is clear & I believe that it was not so much anything that Michael did, but the fact that he had become so large & didn't choose to play any reindeer games that precipitated this salvo.

What do you think?

Here's a link to the lyrics as written for reference...

http://thecount.com/2009/08/07/jerma...i1341363358255

[juicefree20]

Now let's discuss the music & try to come to a consensus as to why things went the way that they did. I'll give my opinion about what I believe happened with Jermaine's career, followed in another post by what I believe happened with The Jacksons. It may not necessarily be sweet, but I believe that it's honest, fair & I believe that what's on the vinyl will support what I'm saying. First...Jermaine's career & sticking purely to what's in the grooves in relationship to what was happening musically back then. Let's forget the 1st LP & deal with the 70s by moving directly forward to 1973.

To begin with, I want to give some major props to Jermaine because as regards his music & his talent, Jermaine was no joke at all. So here's an overview of his career from 1973 up to the "Thriller"/"Victory" era.

As far back as his "Come Into My Life" LP from 1973, it was obvious that he was talented. I liked his versions of "You're In Good Hands Now" & "Does Your Mama Know About Me". In the bicentennial year, this brother rocked N.Y.C . with his LP "My Name Is Jermaine" which featured a pretty nice-sized club hit named "Let's Be Young Tonight" which if you hooked it up just right, went pretty well with "Down To Love Town" by The Originals. "Bass Odyssey" was another favorite, as was "My Touch Of Madness".

His 1977 LP felt like a bit of a drop-off to me, with only "You Need To Be Loved" catching my attention. I thought that it was one bad-assed jam & it seemed to me that "There'll Never Be" by Switch did more than borrow than borrow from it. Either way, in my opinion, this was one hell of a song.

Now to me, he hit his 70's peak with 1978's "Frontiers" LP. I liked the Disco-Funk of "The Force", a song that judging from their exit from the dance floor, none of the customers in my club seemed to like as much as I did. He did a credible cover of Stevie's "Isn't She Lovely". But for me, the true gems from that LP were the ballads "Je Vous Aime Beaucoup" & the beautifully arranged & sung "Castles Of Sand".

Now, we hit 1980 & while coming up with some damn fine songs, he hadn't really come up with a blockbuster along the lines of anything that he'd recorded with his brothers & certainly nothing on-par with Michael's "Off The Wall". Enter Stevie Wonde & The "Let's Get Serious" LP.

The single "Let's Get Serious", with all of it's Stevie-tized vocal inflections & azz-kicking groove was a certifiable smash. Number 1 R&B & from the perspective of Motown, a #9 Pop hit, which helped propel the LP to $1 R&B & #6 Pop. I also liked the hot groove known as "Burnin' Hot", as well as the mellow "Where Are You Now" & "You're Supposed To Keep Your Love For Me".

So up to his 1st LP of 1980, things aren't looking too bad & he's still getting his props from the music fans. Lets see what happens from here...

[juicefree20]

Now we're approaching the end of 1980, & the LP "Jermaine" was released& to be honest with you, unlike the title of my favorite song from that LP, the pieces DIDN'T fit. To be perfectly honest with you apart from the song "The Pieces Fit" & the mellow ''All Because Of You'', I can't think of any other song from that LP that did anything for me, nor my crowd. I can tell you that as a DJ, that was a very disappointing development because after "Let's Get Serious" & "Burnin' Hot", we were expecting some serious heat from Jermaine on that next LP.

Instead of giving us heat, we got the singles "You Like Me Don't You" & Little Girl [[Don't You Worry)" which after the heat that was "LGS", were rather curious choices for releases. Obviously I wasn't the only one who felt that way as the LP peaked at #17 R&B & #44 Pop.

Next was 1981's "I Like Your Style" LP & frankly, I didn't at all!

The fall-off in overall quality was frightning, as the music seemed to be seriously adrift in need of a rudder. There was nothing from this LP that I could use for my crowd & frankly I can't rememember a solitary song from this LP being remotely memorable.

1982 gave us the "Let Me Tickle Your Fancy" LP & I have to admit that as I don't care for that particular style of pseudo-New Wave, I hated that song. A Devo fan, I wasn't & never will be. The only song that I really liked from that LP was "Very Special Part". And despite this LP somehow going to #9 R&B, it proved to be his final LP on Motown.

Strangely enough, it was after the "Thriller" Lp that I felt that Jermaine upped his game again, when he moseyed over to Arista & released his "Dynamite" LP in 1984. My favorites from that LP was the oriental-sounding dance cut "Come To Me", which was my jam. The ballad "Do What You Do'' was good, as was "Oh Mother" & his duet with Whitney, "Take Good Care Of My Heart".

Now as for the aforementioned, "Tell Me I'm Not Dreaming". We know that that was the monster from that LP. But truthfully, I didn't really think it strange that it wasn't released as a single & I'll tell you why I didn't.

Back then, record companies had fallen into the annoying habit of sometimes holding off on releasing what they knew to be a hot song in order to drive LP sales. Singles sales were great, but tell me, would you rather sell 2 or 3 million 45's or 12''s for $1 - $4.00, or would you rather sell 2 or 3 million LPs for $6.99?

My belief then was that they knew that on the strength of "Thriller", as well as the fact that the two brothers had joined together to make a hot & very desirable song, that not releasing the song would force our hands, therefore forcing people who only wanted the song to have to buy the entire LP in order to get it.

Having fell victim to that particular brand of record label B.S. before & since that time, today I still believe that that was the reasoning. From a purely economic standpoint, they stood to gain more money by keeping the people waiting for a single release, knowing full well that the demand was going to force people to buy the LP when there was no single forthcoming.

That's called a "win/win" situation for the label, as well as the artist simply because LPs meant "mo' money, mo' money, mo' money". I can't tell you how many times record labels held back hot singles from even those of us whom were in record pools. A lot of record companies began doing that back then & I believe that a lot of DJs from that era can certainly back me up on that.

But while true that it wasn't released as an A-side in its own right, we DJ's bought the 12'' of "Do What You Do" & flipped it because the object of our desire was on the B-side.

When we wanted the instrumental version of the song, we first bought the 45 of Dynamite", flipped it, then taped it to a crappy 12" that we'd gotten from the record pool [[just as we'd previously done with "That Girl" & "Tell Me Tommorrow"), until those LPs were released & in this case, until the 12'' of "Dynamite" was released. And purely on the strength of radio & club play, it hit #4 on the Dance Charts. This song was so smoking that it received the seal of Robert Palmer, who blessed it with one of his synth-funk covers.

As I plan to cover The Jacksons in another post, I'll keep the focus on Jermaine's career, then deal with what was happening with The Jacksons around this time in the post about them. But for now, I'll continue Jermaine in my next & final post about his career...

[juicefree20]

I won't go over the rest of his LPs on an LP to LP basis, but what I remember happening next was that it seemed to me that Jermaine was being steered into a Pop ballad direction ala Lionel Richie moreso than into the edgy street music that Michael & the Hip-Hop & Electro-Funk upstarts were creating.

We began getting duets with Whitney, Pia Zadora & by that time, whatever heat he had created with songs like "Let's Get Serious" & the like had cooled off considerably. He seemed to be being marketed to an entirely different crowd & I believe that THAT, more than any machinations by Michael is what affected his career.

To my ear, it was all about the music & a simple listen to his LPs will show that his music simply wasn't in tune with what was happening in the streets, much less was being played on the radio. It seems as though he was being marketed to a more "upscale" crowd & in the process, they turned him into a MOR/Proto Rock artist.

Not exactly the best way to hang with "The King Of Rock, Pop & Soul", much less Whodini or Doug E. Fresh. Simply stated, it seemed to me as though they were trying to create another Lionel Richie & in the process they took away his heat & they took away his edge. Seriously, what was his last relatively big hit? Yet another ballad, "Don't Take It Personal". A truly great ballad, to be sure, but a ballad nonetheless.

Michael didn't need to conspire to kill Jermaine's career. Why would he have had to do that when sorry-assed song selections & misdirected focus on the part of his label had already effectively killed his career.

As a quote from the book "Sweet Soul Music" stated about the Pop leanings of one of our most prolific Soul singers ever, "It's called upward-mobility honey. Everyone suffers from it."

And unfortunately, many times careers are killed in the process.

Sorry, but the music is what it is & it says what it says. And what it told me then & still tells me these 25-30 years later is that some bad decisions were made as regards his career. It simply seems as though they didn't want to let Jermaine do Jermaine, but simply wanted a male Whitney Houston, hoping that he'd blow up like she did. Michael simply couldn't have stopped anyone's music from being played nor sold if it was what the people wanted to hear & buy. An entire industry was going to buck Clive Davis in order to appease Michael?

That's not how the industry has ever worked. There's no single entertainer who's THAT powerful in a multi-billion industry

Listen to most of those Arista LPs from 1984 forward & tell me what your really think about what you hear. Do you hear "fire" or anything that remotely reeks of "star-quality"? Does that music hit you like compositions by Murphy/Frank, The Calloways, Jam/Lewis, Rod Temperton, Quincy or Kashif? Or do you hear songs which while pleasant enough, are about as spicy as matzo balls soaked in water? By 1989, the thrill of "Let's Get Serious" & even "Tell Me That I'm Dreaming" seemed to have been about as distant as The Nixon Administration was.

Sorry, but the ears don't lie. If anyone conspired to kill Jermaine's career, it wasn't Michael & the relatively tepid sales of his LPs & singles seem to prove that to be the case. His talent was wasted on that label & when he didn't become as large as Whitney Houston, it was too late for him to rebound because he had been left behind by folks who began remembering him more for being a member of The Jackson 5, than a guy who once had a pretty damn promising solo career in his own right.

Can't blame that one on Michael because he didn't write, produce, arrange, nor release even one of those misguided MOR ballads. There was no "conspiracy" involved, if only because they was really no need for one to have existed. It simply wasn't in the grooves & no one has to attempt to kill that which has already been declared D.O.A.

That's what my ears told me, as well as remembering that that's simply the way that it was.

[destruction]

Juicy Juice,

Talking about longevity....dude, you ain't lost a comma over the years......

Holla.

[juicefree20]

Hey Des,

How you been man.

I'll get at cha in the afternoon. Hope that Princess & the gang are well.

Enjoy the 4th & toss a few on the grill for me!!!