— Ro Newton
The video for the Michael Jackson single "Bad" premiered on August 31, 1987 on an MTV special. Being from Canada, we had MuchMusic, which didn't have much crossover with the more well-known music station south of the border, and the video didn't air until later. When, I'm not sure but it wouldn't have been long after. It seemed like a big deal and so I sat down and watched all eighteen minutes of it. I wasn't the biggest fan of Jackson but I did recall how the promo for "Thriller" had been such an important event that I nevertheless passed me by four years earlier and I wasn't about to miss this second coming of a cultural wave.
As I say, I wasn't a big MJ fan but he was too big to ignore, especially back in that era. Huge as he had been in the early eighties, his world tour and Moonwalker film seemed to make him seem even more of a megastar. The fact that the new LP wasn't selling as well and its accompanying singles weren't charting as high seemed like just an afterthought. Just as he had with Thriller, he released an absurd number of singles from his latest album that stretch in my mind from "Bad" in the autumn of '87 all the way to "Liberian Girl" in the summer of '89. It comes as something of a surprise, then, to discover that there was an earlier record intended as a taster for the new LP. Nine singles spread over two years as he milked it for all he could.
It's easy to forget about "I Just Can't Stop Loving You". As Ro Newton says, Jackson didn't bother with a video, a practice that was still happening at the time but one that was surprising coming from a man who did groundbreaking promos for "Billie Jean" and "Thriller". It also had a fairly brief chart stay, as Bad's title track quickly took over. I'm not sure a lack of a 12" mix mattered much in the scheme of things, what with it hardly being dance record, but for certain it was a low key release, edging Jackson gradually back into the spotlight. Given that he initially had Barbra Streisand and Whitney Houston penciled in to duet with him, it may not necessarily have been intended to get the Bad ball rolling in this fashion; had either of them agreed to appear on it, it's easy to imagine "Another Part of Me" getting the nod as the opening single instead; "I Just Can't Stop Loving You" would've had a video to go with it and fans would remember it much more fondly.
Michael Jackson was capable of many things but one thing he could never really pull off was slow songs. Okay, I might give him "I'll Be There" back when he was just a lad in the Jackson 5 and, in a pinch, "Ben" from right around the same time. Listening to them both now, they aren't quite as good as I remember them being and I'm even tempted to say that Mariah Carey's cover of the former is superior. But they're both still decent and convincing, which is more than can be said for the likes of "She's Out of My Life" and "It's the Falling in Love". Both of these songs are from Off the Wall, an album with a stellar first side ("Don't Stop 'Til You Get Enough" is still his finest moment) but a boring flip, largely populated by slushy old love songs. (The fact that his very so-so cover of Paul McCartney's "Girlfriend" is the side's high point says all you need to know) Thriller isn't quite as strong as Off the Wall but it does benefit by having fewer slow songs and by having them better spread out among the tracks people actually want to listen to. Though it had a nice melody, "Human Nature" was certainly more tolerable sandwiched between "Billie Jean" and "P.Y.T." than had it been placed in between a pair of weepies.
All that said, "I Just Can't Stop Loving You" is a passable effort and there are worse singles that he chose to release later on from Bad. Songwriter and backing vocalist Siedah Garrett fills in well enough for Streisand and Houston. These more famous guests would have undoubtedly tried to leave a mark of their own on the recording but the restrained approach is much better suited to the material. This is not a duet of contrasting individuals who want different things but people with a passion for one another. It might as well not even be a duet but since it is, why not utilise a female singer who kind of sounds like Michael Jackson? As the song begins to wind down, you scarcely notice Garrett anymore and it starts making sense why they didn't give her an artist co-credit.
Jackson had this irritating tendency of repeating the tricks that made him successful. Seven singles were released from Thriller, nine from Bad. (Remarkably, another nine were siphoned off of 1991's Dangerous; "Black or White" and "Remember the Time" are the only ones I can recall) An absurdly lengthy promo for "Thriller" which begat one for "Bad". (Again, he did this for "Black or White"; did ever occur to him that the novelty of these excruciatingly long and boring videos had worn off?) Where he had it right was in trying new things. He hadn't done a film surrounding his music before so that was fine (I mean, I've never actually seen it) nor had he released a modest little ballad that was only sort of a duet to little fanfare. I guess when you're locked away in Neverland, you might lose the ability to read the room and realise that people might be starting to get sick of you. The Bad period was only just kicking off and I was already tired of him.
~~~~~
Also Reviewed This Fortnight
New Order: "True Faith"
With all due respect to Ro Newton, she wasted her SOTF on an average MJ record. There are worse new releases (The Colourfield's version of The Monkees' "She" is utterly wretched; it would be their final release which was a sad end for Terry Hall's third group when he was able to go out on a high note with both "Ghost Town" and "Our Lips Are Sealed" with previous units) but the latest from New Order buries the competition. They had already put out a series of excellent singles by this point but "True Faith" was their first since "Blue Monday" to seem like something really special. Not only is the music as stunning as anything they'd ever record but this is their one song that really connects with teenage angst. As Newton points out, their sound was getting poppier but that's not a bad thing if, like me, you prefer The Best of New Order to Substance. If not, you can have your indie darling New Order and I'll have my indie-mixed-with-some-pop New Order. Happy?
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