No One Can Fill this Crown

I'm not jumping on the bandwagon here and pretending to be a fan after he's gone. I'll be honest with you, before I found Marilyn Manson, my idol was Michael Jackson.

I don't care what anyone has to say about him and I really hope TV and talk shows let it go for a while before making crude statements about this. I don't know nor care what he did in his personal life, all I know is that there are still Michael Jackson records (yes, the vinyl discs) and CDs in my room. It doesn't really matter what genre of music you are into, it's just very easy to find yourself liking something MJ did.

I was watching Michael Jackson's Thriller music video the first time I learned how I got my middle name Vincent. I asked my mom who did the narration of the video and she told me it was Vincent Price. So from that point forward I associated my name with Michael Jackson and MJ as a werewolf dancing with zombies. This explains a lot about me in a lot of ways really, such as my enjoyment of darker things in the world. Particularly, things like vampires and horror movies.

I remember being ages 5 through 9 and dancing around in my mom's room to her records such as Off the Wall, Thriller, Bad, and I personally owned Dangerous, Blood on the Dance Floor, and the History, Past, Present, and Future collection all on cassette. I still have MJ's Moonwalker movie on VHS.

My favorite MJ song is actually on that tape. He did a music video for a song called Leave Me Alone, and it was groundbreaking to me as child. I had never heard a song like that before and visually the video was very unique. Michael danced with his pet monkey while wearing a ball and chain in prison. He even danced with the skeleton of an elephant. The whole time he was on a ride - the ride he was on was himself (very Freudian in a way). Turns out his body was the whole amusement park and I remember him getting up from the ground, breaking apart the park and shoveling off the circus that was on top of him. These images are still very vibrant in the photographic memory of mine.

I'm very disappointed I never saw him in concert. I was anxious about his upcoming and was hopeful for a Dallas stop. I really wish MJ could have regained some of his dignity before passing on. I feel that people more recently will remember him for some unfortunate events surrounding his life rather than the extraordinary and talented performer he was. He had a voice that was smooth, affectionate and angelic, and dance moves that no one can match or duplicate.

MJ was a childhood icon to me, and I feel like a building foundation for my love of music has been removed from my life. Nothing will ever replace the memories of me wearing one glove and pretending to be MJ when my parents weren't home. I have absolutely no shame saying that.

R.I.P. Michael.