Since I last posted I’ve:
- Moved to London, like a lot of graduates who have nowt to do
- Had two jobs (a barman again, then an admin/registrations monkey for a transport conferences company)
- Still not moved out of my auntie’s (moving is a slow process)
- Fell down some tube stairs knackering my knee up for around a week
- Read a lot of Milan Kundera & Vonnegut
- Enjoyed some Ottolenghi
- Possibly had swine flu
- Won a pub quiz, then moved to another where the record is so far 3rd (exciting times)
That’s as exciting as it gets about. Nah, its been good, I’m now looking to get settled and doing some exciting things. As well as comment on stuff I see to keep me occupied during lunchbreaks. So I thought it might be a good idea to reopen this blog… (and to store some more youtube videos I’d like to watch again someday…)
…Soon anyway. I just need to get my life in gear, and hope that one job springs forward and grabs me. Or I just move anyway and wing it. I quite like that idea, on the one hand its good to have security on the other… its excitement isn’t it?
Michael Jackon’s death is a bizarre sort. Watching the… fanfare? mourn-fest? griefpalooza? of his valedictorian, you can’t help thinking that despite the many brilliant songs, some good deeds and avoiding all speculation about his private/personal life, this is all a bit too much. Creating a senate proposal to make MJ an ‘American legend’? Rev. Al Sharpton (the smallest man on earth) claiming that MJ invented racial equality? John Mayer’s jaw dropping to the floor in an extended wanky SRV-doing-MJ guitar tribute? The whole thing just strikes of what it essentially is… stadium rock; fanfare; and often very see-through; a little false and very much idol worship.
So who is actually in the gold coffin Usher caresses whilst taking a very sorry steps and shaking his head? It almost doesn’t feel like a person, but instead a symbol; with a strained, diluted personality. He becomes a Disney-esque fantasy figure; perfect and open to interpretation. Michael Jackson certainly wasn’t the first to help to fight racial oppression in America. And nothing like an official ‘American legend’ exists, so do we create this position just for Michael Jackson? It all smacks of facelessness, tributes for the sake of tributes. Michael Jackson was a great performer, but this ceremony isn’t necessary, nearly everyone on the planet seemed to give their own forms of tributes the very moment he died.
What lurks behind this is his promotion company AEG Live, here given a big-up from Magic Johnson, which appears to have sold the tv rights to this event the world-around. And this is no different from other tributes: Daily Star adverts claiming ‘The Truth About Michael Jackson’ in tomorrow’s edition; Michael Jackson 1958-2009 300 page tribute magazines put out at an alarming rate costing £9.99 a time; HMV reducing Michael Jackson’s Greatest Hits to £4.99 to maximise sales etc etc etc. It’s essentially a form of disaster capitalism; but capitalism reveling and reeling to make as much money as possible from the ultimate capitalist symbol himself. Michael Jackson, the celebrity, was faceless; tabloid-fodder, and seemingly personality-less.
Of course, a deeper person existed there, yet all we know of MJ is not himself at all, but an idea of the performer and not the person. That, essentially, is what this valedictorian and the whole furore is about; rather than a tribute to an actual person. Michael Jackson wrote and performed some fantastic songs, but this is crazy.
I think I’ll miss it a lot.
