Nostalgia Sunday – Pop Star

June 29, 2009 - 6:48 AM by

Do Israelis know from the Jackson-5? Puh-leez! This is the country whose government banned the Beatles from performing in the early Sixties on the grounds that they were a degenerate influence on the nation’s youth. But they did know Michael Jackson. In the mid-Seventies, with the advent of third radio broadcaster Reshet Gimmel, which played pop music, and pirate radio station The Voice of Peace, Israelis did become exposed to the international pop music. “Maariv LaNoar”, a weekly magazine for young people, reinvented itself as the local version of “Tiger Beat” with covers like this one:

michael_jackson_maariv_lanoar

Israelis tended (and still tend) to be exposed to Euro-pop, rather than good old American rock and soul but Michael Jackson was a massive musical crossover artist, with huge cultural influence all over the Middle East. Once “Thriller” hit, every country had their own ringleted version of Michael Jackson. Israel too*.

michael_jackson_izhar_cohen

His Pied Piper persona already in full-swing, Michael Jackson held particular appeal for the younger set (by this I mean people who are now in their late Thirties) and in the mid Eighties you couldn’t go to any wedding or bar mitzva without the kids breaking out into song: “Triller! Tee lai lai… la lee la la la la la la la la la la la la… Triller! Tee lai lai…” and so on, ad infinitum.

But by the late Eighties, Israel’s media had fallen into lock-step with its international counterparts and stories about Jackson — whom “Spy” magazine once described as “the American version of Prince Ludwig of Bavaria” — focused on the weirdness.

michael_jackson_maariv_lanoar_1995

And then, in 1992, speculation began that he was coming to perform in Israel. And he did in 1993.

michael_jackson_rosh1_1992

During the past decade, new albums like “History”, regularly made the mainstream Israeli press, like this cover of Yediot Aharonot’s weekend supplement from 2002 of Jackson pulling his famous crotch-grab move. Famous but not original; the move was copped from Prince-produced Minneapolis band The Time, who doubtless stole the move from some other uncredited act.

michael_jackson_yediot_2002

Now Michael Jackson is dead and, as a good friend posted the other day on Facebook, in-between all the big hits, “the airwaves are filled with a whole ouevre of repetitive music that we fortunately never had to listen to.” Because our memories are not of Euro-perception post-”Bad” crap. We over-forties remember the J-5 hits, the Jacksons and, of course “Off The Wall” — little of which are being played here. Sadly, Israeli radio — whose knowledge of soul music is limited to the Blues Brothers movies parts 1 & 2 — is as usual, regurgitating only what it knows, not doing any research and depriving listeners of that truly joyous, wonderful music. Personally, I blame it on the boogie.

*Izhar Cohen, he of the Eurovision Europop mega-hit A-ba-ni-bi.

Tags: , , , , , , • Category: General, History and Culture, Music, Nostalgia Sunday, Pop Culture 

Comments

3 Comments on Nostalgia Sunday – Pop Star

  1. dana on Mon, Jun 29th 2009 10:17 AM

    2. It’s not that the radio stations don’t do any “research”, it’s simply because they know how most people aren’t really into genres like soul, country, motown, etc. It doesn’t make anyone’s taste more superior, it just shows that specific music genres aren’t universal. You can find some wonderful and talented artists in almost any type of music, it’s just that Michael Jackson had the American fame to help him get his name out there and have his music distributed world-wide.

  2. David on Mon, Jun 29th 2009 4:37 PM

    3. Actually, I’ve been hearing “Don’t Stop Till You Get Enough” on the radio quite a lot since Friday, as well as “Rock With You” so someone has got their hands on “Off the Wall..”
    And I even heard them play the J5 version of “Never Can Say Goodbye” yesterday – looks like Youtube is bringing Israel retro-actively up-to-date, so to speak…

  3. Nostalgia Sunday – Lahiton and the Hit Parades | ISRAELITY on Mon, Apr 9th 2012 12:33 AM

    4. [...] cool cover art — look no further than the BookSefer site with prices ranging from NIS 160 (Michael Jackson in his “Bad” phase) down to NIS 70 (Izhar Cohen in his Michael Jackson in his [...]

Leave a Comment





© 2012 ISRAELITY | Sitemap