Michael Jackson’s death anniversary: Musicians on how the legend impacted them

The last of the superstarsGary Lawyer musicianI used to live in the United States in the early 1980s when he was on the rise with Jackson 5 He was the last of the major individual superstars starting with Frank Sinatra or Elvis PresleyHis music was the driving force and precedes the performances I am yet to see a performer a dancer like him He made the Moonwalk iconic and much of the stuff he did defined him Sometimes the way he presented the song superseded the song itself I remember being in the front row in Mumbai for his concert in 1996 and being completely blown away by his stage presence It was unbelievableThe phenomenal arrangements and albums with Quincy Jones were brilliant Surprisingly he never played an instrument He would just mouth the tunes he had in his headRecco My favourite is the album Off the Wall that blew me away with its great production and it is very funky This was Michael Jackson before he became a phenomenonMy fatherrsquos iconYashraj musicianThe main reason for his phenomena is that he was the definition of true artistry Be it the performance aspect music videos art direction or the music he was one of the greatest of all time In a generation where music distribution was truly limited Jackson had a global impact My father Manish Mehra was a huge fan of MJ and I got hooked onto his music when I was five or six years oldThe music drew me in then the stories and the buzz made it more interesting That mythos is something an artiste dreams of I remember hearing the anecdote where Michael Jackson couldnrsquot play an instrument and recorded all the sounds through acapella vocals The video recently surfaced and it is such a magical thing to witnessOne of my fondest memories was from when MJ came to India My dad went and got a Thriller jacket stitched to wear to the Delhi show Thatrsquos the love I have inherited for himRecco I love the Thriller Super Deluxe edition with william Akon and Kanye adding to itHe touched the soulSharon Prabhakar singerI had the honour of doing the opening act for Michael Jacksonrsquos show in Mumbai He was way ahead of his time Nothing in current music comes close From Billie Jean to Thriller there are wonderful songs As a lyricist and composer he could create a storyMichael managed to touch the worldrsquos soul There was a lot of empathy for him If you had watched him perform that moment was the pinnacle of his powers He was so into the performance that nothing else mattered It was pure talent He had the voice and the lyrics were not banal There was a structure to his compositions His melodies hooks and thought concepts were iconicI never got to meet him though because of the tight security He came on stage performed and went off That opening act remains an iconic moment for me I remember people were crying in the audience If the world had ended after that moment people would have accepted itRecco Heal the world The way you make me feel Billie Jean and Thriller are my picksA generational iconTarana Marwah AKA Komorebi singerI heard of Michael Jackson through my school competitions and annual days in Scindia School in New Delhi We would practice and sing Michael Jackson songs The first time I sang MJ on stage was in my teens for a theatremusic experience where I sang The way you make me feelBoth my parents were fans Even people you wouldnrsquot expect to have heard of Michael Jackson had heard of him He was a part of everything back then Even when he died the mystery around his death was such a big story It was on the news in India His life his music and his death were so influential on our generationHis works are extremely musical Many artistes today are less about music and more about celebrity culture For him being a celebrity was an aftereffect of how much talent there was He is the only person whose music justifies the celebrity status around him I understand the comparison with Taylor Swift but I feel that there was a natural ease about Michael Jacksonrsquos performancesRecco My favourite would be Stranger in MoscowUnderrated classics from MJgtgt Give in to megtgt Who is itgtgt Blood on the dance floorgtgt The lady in my lifegtgt Blue gangstagtgt Tabloid junkiegtgt Mamarsquos pearlAdd to your MJ collection hereThriller album jacket Pic CourtesyWikimedia commonsgtgt Used Michael Jackson Thriller vinyl LPLOG ON TO calcuttarecordscomCOST Rs 3499Pic Courtesyetsycomgtgt Michael Jackson unisex canvas shoesLOG ON TO etsycomCOST Rs 3456gtgt Michael Jackson series Andy Warhol wall artLOG ON TO tallengestorecomCOST Rs 663 onwardsPic Courtesykavipoetryartgtgt MJ inlight lampLOG ON TO kavipoetryartinCost Rs 549