From the Yakima Herald-Republic Online News.


Posted on Friday, June 26, 2009

More Michael Jackson, the day after


 

Just after a day after Michael Jackson’s death, I may have been right about my previous prediction.

I took a quick look at the iTunes store and saw that seven of his records are current on iTunes Top Albums list, while five of his songs are on its Top Songs list.

Other thoughts:

• I can’t forget to note that Jackson has the honor of having the best-selling album of all time. “Thriller,” which came out in 1982, featured hits “Billie Jean,” “Beat It,” and, of course, the title track. No record has managed to surpass it to date.

Jackson also held several other records according to Guinness World Records.

• After I wrote the previous entry, some of my co-workers noted that I should’ve mentioned Elvis.

They're right. After seeing all the marathons on the radio stations and MTV and the flood of “RIP” and “I miss him” on Facebook and Twitter, I think his death is more comparable to Elvis. After all, Jackson is known as the “King of Pop” while Elvis was known as the “King of Rock ‘n’ Roll.” (Not to mention that Jackson was briefly married to Lisa Marie Presley in the 1990s.)  

We know what happened after Elvis died in 1977 —his songs are still being played and bought to this day and his songs are being sung by all the Las Vegas impersonators.

Can you imagine? Michael Jackson impersonators in Las Vegas?

• Despite all the record-breaking sales, Michael Jackson was not great a managing his money — he owed a whopping $400 million at the time of his death.

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