The wonderful Tracii Macgregor at Gargamel Music hepped me to this latest project put together by New York hip-hop DJ/producer/scene-vet Rich Medina. Like any device, the mash-up/remix can yield a good amount of garbage (Gaga vs. Bieber, etc.), unless the sources are well-chosen and assembled.

It hardly gets better than pop king Michael vs. Nigeria’s Afrofunk prez Fela Kuti—much has been made of how Fela and James Brown mutually influenced each other, so the R&B/Afrofunk connection is hardly a surprise. Medina’s put together 10 rounds of it for The King Meets the President in Africa, which is downloadable for free. Unfortunately, the videos below are uncredited—if Rich did these as well, I’d consider him even more of a badman talent than I already do.
 

Thriller vs. Zombie from MJ Fela on Vimeo.

Billie Jean is Shakara from MJ Fela on Vimeo.

 
Ever found yourself wondering what became of all of Michael Jackson’s exotic pets? Of course you have! From the Telegraph:

Few will need reminding that Jackson’s highest-profile pet was a chimpanzee named Bubbles. After rescuing him from a research centre in the early Eighties he took him on his Bad world tour.

Bubbles wowed fans by mimicking his moonwalk on stage and the two became inseparable. At Neverland, the ape slept in a cot in the singer’s bedroom and used his lavatory.
However, after the birth of Jackson’s son Prince Michael Jnr, Bubbles – who was growing into moody adolescence – was deemed potentially dangerous and moved to a sanctuary for Hollywood animals.

For the past six years he has resided in Florida at the Center For Great Apes. Half of the money needed for his care – which costs £12,000 per year – is still provided by Jackson’s estate.

‘Michael owned Bubbles all these years,’ says Patti Ragan, who runs the centre. ‘He would visit him, but he couldn’t handle him any more.‘Chimps that appear on television are almost always very young. When they grow up they get very big and have huge canine teeth. They become very dangerous so can’t work around actors and entertainers.’

The reporter, Ewan Flectcher, apparently couldn’t resist adding:

The chimp, like his owner, is also very fond of children.

‘There are some youngsters in his group, little kids, and he loves to play games with them,’ she says. ‘He likes to be groomed by the others in his group and sometimes he’ll groom them.’

For more about Jackson’s other pets, including Thriller the tiger, read: Michael Jackson’s menagerie (Telegraph)

Plus video: THE REUNION OF THE CENTURY: La Toya & Bubbles! (dlisted)

 
If, like me, you have major problems detaching yourself from King of Pop weirdness, this was a big week for you.  A series of answering machine conversations purportedly of Jackson babbling druggily about his finances was just released in Britain to The Sun newspaper.  Here are some highlights:

“It is Michael calling.  It is very important, I want that 150 in that account for me, because…I am very concerned about my life.  I am hearing a lot of stories that (name withheld) is still trying to sabotage…me…I want to be away for a while where they can’t find me.”

A second message adds, “It is Michael.  It is 4:30 in the morning here that’s why I sound very sleepy and I’m really worn out…but please check the message I left a day or so ago.  I am very concerned.  I don’t trust that man.  We think he’s bad, we think he is Italian mafia.  Please…we must be smarter than him.  So please, help me with this…I wanna be away…I don’t want to be in Neverland right now.”

WTF?  Italian mafia?  Anyway, now it’s coming out that Jackson’s long-isolated (and frequently masked) children, Paris and Blanket (or someone in their circle), have been uploading clips of themselves to the YouTube.  Blanket appears to be a fan of Star Wars, and Paris, evidently, likes…monkeys (but hopefully not chimps).

So, maybe, so far, so good?  Keep it up, kids!  Despite the nuttiness of your possibly non-biological father, you two seem entirely normal! 

 
Michael Jackson’s Kids Are Big Hit on YouTube

 
Though this clip has been around for some time, I think this latest version is of the best quality.  This is from a James Brown concert in 1983, in which the hardest working man in show business invites both Michael Jackson and Prince to the stage for a little improvisation.  Michael woos the ladies, while Prince - well you’ll just have to watch.  If you blink you might miss him ride in on the back of a gigantic body guard dressed in a leopard wrestler’s outfit.

 
The first round of child sexual abuse allegations were leveled against Michael Jackson in ‘93.  Amid all the “avalanches of dirt,” Jackson found an unlikely ally in the Academy Award-winning actor, Maximilian Schell (Judgment At Nuremberg, The Black Hole), who wrote the King Of Pop a gushy fan letter that appeared on the back page of the Hollywood Reporter:

MAXIMILIAN SCHELL

NOV, 19 1993
TO: MICHAEL JACKSON
(SOMEWHERE ON THIS PLANET)

DEAR MICHAEL,

I AM DEEPLY ASHAMED—FOR THE PRESS, FOR THE MEDIA, FOR THE WORLD - I don’t know you - we met only ONCE on one of those Award-Dinners (“ENTERTAINER of the DECADE”) - We shook hands - you were kind and polite - I don’t think you knew who I was - HOW SHOULD YOU? OUR WORLDS ARE TOO FAR APART - (I am more, “CLASSICAL” - minded -) but I looked into your eyes—THEY WERE KIND—

You are a great artist and I admire you - my little daughter (she is 9?Ǭ?) LOVES YOU! DEEPLY - SHE EVEN WANTS TO MARRY YOU! (-“BUT HE NEVER CALLS ME!”) SHE IMITATES YOU ALL THE TIME - and quite well -

WE ALL LOVE YOU

I would like her more to listen to MOZART - but she loves YOU! AND I RESPECT HER TASTE!—

THAT YOU SURVIVE THIS AVALANCHE OF DIRT THROWN AT YOU - I ADMIRE TREMENDOUSLY -

THANK YOU FOR WHAT YOU ARE!

GOD BLESS YOU

Maximilian Schell

P.S. “ONE CAN ONLY SEE GOOD WITH THE HEART - THE ESSENTIAL IS INVISIBLE FOR THE EYES - (“THE LITTLE PRINCE”)

To see a copy of Schell’s actual missive, check out Letters Of Note

 
Here’s a Japanese television reenactment of a Usain Bolt running victory.  Watch and try to not have your head explode as you tease out the possible cultural meanings of the “runner up’s” wearing of what appears to be a Michael Jackson mask.

 
(via JapanProbe)

I’m shocked—I shouldn’t be, but I am—shocked at all the Hollywood celebs who are standing up for Roman Polanski. I think Polanski is a truly great film artist, a genius, I really do and I have sympathy for a man who went through what he went through with the Manson murders, but this does not excuse what he did. Towering cinematic great, yes, but he’s also a man who drugged and anally raped a 13-year old child! Time doesn’t really erase a crime like that—or shouldn’t.

I thought it was poor taste when everyone suddenly had amnesia about Michael Jackson, too. Musical genius, sure, but it was the first time I ever found myself 100% in agreement with Bill O’Reilly, I just could not stomach the sight of people lauding this kiddly fiddler like he was fucking Gandhi!!!  It stank to high heaven and so does this Polanski episode. Once again, I find myself in agreement with O’Reilly and even with his guest, the utterly insufferable, Dennis Miller. I don’t like it any more than you do, but they ARE right:

[An old friend of mine, Michael Kurcfeld, introduced Polanski and Miller in Paris. Miller refers to this in the clip.]

Not long after I watched the above segment, I then read an article on the Daily Beast titled Polanski’s Victim And Me by the celebrated novelist Robert Goolrick. It’s a horrifying, eyes wide-open confessional so skillfully written it breaks your heart. Trust me, you won’t be on the fence about Roman Polanski’s fate after you read it. Bravo to Goolrick for the essay. I think it will set a lot of people straight on this one.

 
Japan Probe alerts us to a recent Moonwalking Championship, held, presumably, before the death of Michael Jackson himself.   To make more seamless the homage, some of the contestants opted to perform in blackface—a stylistic choice that still has the power to shock (witness the Mad Men “moment” of three weeks ago, here).

 
More Illuminati nuttiness today, courtesy Vigilant Citizen, and YouTube’s FarhanK501.  In the case of Ms. Gaga, Vigilant Citizen exposes the pop star as a possible extension of Project Monarch (i.e. mind-controlling) sneakiness.   Well, of course she is, what else could all that “butterfly” imagery be about?!  And have you noticed all her “eye-covering?”  That’s eye-of-Horus stuff, right there, if you ask me.  Still not convinced?  Play “count the pyramids” in the following commercial for German television.  What’s “Ms. Germanotta” selling?  I have no idea, but, hmm, I’m now suddenly recalling my life as a Green Beret.

 
Regarding the still oddly-unburied Michael Jackson, FarhanK501 echoes what sister La Toya‘s been claiming all along: MJ was murdered.  Not for his money, though.  No, dodging “Satanic rituals,” but still reluctant to “say too much” to Ed Bradley, Jackson, it seems, was about to blow the lid off the Illuminati conspiracy itself…or at least Aspartame.

 
But what’s going on here, really—why tether MJ to the Illuminati? 

Well, the reasons are probably as sad as they are simple.  Heroes die, and for often all-too-worldly reasons: loneliness, self-loathing, drug-dependency.   And that’s the last thing we want from our heroes: some suggestion that they’re mortal, of this world, one of us.  So let’s all erase what we’ve learned about the dangers of propofol, shall we, and remember Jackson’s higher purpose here: ripping the veil off a centuries-old, artificial-sweetener-promoting conspiracy.
 
Spotted via Coilhouse: Lady Gaga, The Illuminati Puppet

More Uh-Oh: How Not Dumb Is Gaga In The New Yorker