A few days ago, I was listening to one of Eddie Murphy's gleefully un-PC standup acts on mp3, one where he talked about singers getting all the, um, women. He berates a couple of targets like Luther Vandross and Mick Jagger, and then gets around to Michael Jackson:
'Now Michael Jackson can sing -- and is a good-looking man,' he says, before tossing in the punchline that Mikey isn't the world's most masculine guy.
Yet his hilarious routine, pegged on Michael's 'Sensitivity', is only funny because of Murphy's spot-on mimicry -- not because Michael, in the 80s when this schtick was recorded, was anything to snigger at, at all.
As The Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame puts it, Michael Jackson 'has enjoyed a level of superstardom previously known only to Elvis Presley, the Beatles and Frank Sinatra.'
Damn straight. And -- putting it politely -- he could dance the pants off all them other legends.
Michael turns 50 today, August 29. Here's wishing the Moonwalker the very, very best.
Text: Raja Sen
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