The Victory Tour Debacle

The story about the Victory Tour is so complicated, so many things and people involved, circumstances and situations, it's hard to put it all down. But it's enough to say that the experience was not a positive for Michael, his family, nor the fans.

One thing is for sure, Michael, after years of putting out the image of the happy and wholesome Jackson family, was now being manipulated by his family and other unsavory people. Though that was not her intention, Michael's mother, in convincing him to tour for the sake of his brothers, despite his feelings against it. Don King, for making the promotion and tour a side show experience. His brothers, who only wanted to make a quick dollar, and lots of it, with little care, or concern, for the details. Lawyers, representing all sides, making an easy buck.

What was the real deal about the ticket debacle? Joe Jackson, Don King, and Chuck Sullivan, who was the head of Stadium Management Corporation, and who's family owned Foxboro Stadium, came up with this "brilliant" idea. Tickets for the tour would be $30 each, but you had to buy lots of four tickets. When you ordered the tickets, names would be chosen at random by a computer drawing using coupons cut out of newspaper ads. People had to send a $120 postal money order, plus a $2 service charge for each ticket, and the coupon, in a "standard Number Ten envelope" to the ticket printed in the advertisement. WHEW! BUT, that didn't guarantee you would get the tickets. See why people were upset? While acts like the Rolling Stones' and Bruce Springsteen were selling $16 ticket, Michael felt that their should have been $20, but he was outvoted. The tickets were too high for white middle-class kids, let alone kids from the inner cities.

If you got the tickets, you didn't know which show you were going to, until two days before the concert, and that's if there was not a delay in the mail. If there was, you could get the tickets after the concert.

Michael was besides himself. "We got to get as much as possible for the tickets," one of the brothers said. "The sky's the limit."

"No, " Michael argued. "That's not the way to do it. There is going to be a backlash. The ticket shouldn't be more than twenty bucks each. And the mail order idea is terrible."

The media, rightfully had a field day, though they didn't know what was happening behind the scenes.

Frank Dileo told Michael about his brothers, "Their only concern is their present. To make as much as they can, while they can. You have a career that's going to be longer than this tour. They probably won't."

But it was a letter, published in the Dallas Morning News that really struck Michael hard. Eleven-year-old Ladonna Jones wrote that she had been saving her pennies to see Michael's show, but she couldn't afford the four tickets. "How could you, of all people, be so selfish?"

"That does it." Michael said. He called a meeting with Joe, Don King, and Chuck Sullivan. "Change the ticket policy. It's a rip-off. You know it. I know it. Now change it. Or I won't tour."

They made plans to change the system.

There later was a press conference which Michael announced that the ticket system was wrong and would be changed. He also was going to donate the money that he made from the tour to charity, and two thousand tickets in each city would be donated to disadvantaged youths.

Michael said, "We've worked a long time to make this show the best it can be. But we know a lot of kids are having trouble getting tickets. The other day I got a letter from a girl in Texas named Ladonna Jones. She'd been saving her money from odd jobs to buy a ticket, but with the current tour system, she'd have to buy four tickets and she could,'t afford that. So, I've asked our promoter to work out a new way of distributing tickets- a way that no longer requests a $120 money order. There has been a lot of talk about the promoter holding money for tickets that didn't sell. I've asked our promoter to end the mail-order ticket system as soon as possible so that no one will pay money unless they get a ticket." This was implemented by the tour's third stop in Jacksonville.

Why did he decide to donate all his money to charity?" one reporter asked Frank Dileo.

"Because he's a nice guy," Frank replied.

Thank you J. Randy Taraborrelli "Michael Jackson- The Magic and the Madness" pages 364-368.

No Wonder, He IS Like A Kid !!

Michael had an interview with J.Randy Taraborrelli on August 22, 1978, at the Jackson's estate. The comments and actions seem to show the stunted growth of Michael socially, and educationally. One would start to think that they were conversing with a fourteen-year-old rather than a twenty-year-old. He wore a Jaws t-shirt, black jeans, safari hat, and bare feet. He was very thin, and spoke with a falsetto whisper. He had to be reminded by his mother to offer his guests something to drink. She was bothered that she found it difficult to get him to eat. But she did reveal that his favorite foods were hot apple turnovers and sweet- potato pies.
Michael seemed to be uninformed about the current events at the time, which showed the isolation he had from the world. "I don't know much about politics," Michael admitted. "Nothing , I guess. Someone told me recently that Gerald Ford was president. I remember when he was vice-president. But president? That I missed." He laughed at that, but he was serious.
Taraborrelli asked, "How do you keep up with current events? Do you read newspapers? Watch T.V.?"
"I watch cartoons, I love cartoons," he said as his eyes lit up. "I love Disney so much. The Magic Kingdom. Disneyland. It's such a magical place. Walt Disney was a dreamer,like me. And he made his dreams come true, like me. I hope."
He said that he did not read newspapers. "See, I like show business. I listen to music all the time. I watch old movies. Fred Astaire movies. Gene Kelly, I love. And Sammy [Davis]. I can watch these guys all day., twenty-four hours a day. That's what I love the most. Show business, you know?"
He finds that his biggest challenge professionally is to live up to his father's expectations. But, his professional and personal challenges are the same because,"I just want to entertain."
He expressed that he really didn't have any friends to confide in. However, it was clear that he did have a crush on one person in particular. Miss. Diana Ross. "...I can tell my deepest, darkest secrets to [her] because I know she won't tell anyone, not another living soul." Whether that was true or not, anyone who has had a crush on someone knows fantasy can be a replacement for reality.
When joined by his brothers, Michael talked about the strange incidents that have occurred on the property. Girls getting cut just to get a glimpse of the superstars , fans jumping over the gate and coming into the house. One did this and sat down in the den, where the the brothers found her, and said that God had sent her.
Once an entire family got into the house and took a tour of the house. Helping themselves to looking at their private things.
But then the interview took a turn to becoming uncomfortable for Michael, when nicknames came up.
"Mike has a nickname, Jackie mentioned. "It's a real good one."
"Don't, Jackie, " Michael warned.
"We call him....Big Nose!" The brothers all laughed, uncaring that Michael was embarrassed.
"Yeah, Big Nose," Marlon repeated. "What's happenin', Big Nose?" Michael seemed to curl up inside and hardly said anything for the rest of the afternoon.
But the brothers weren't the only family members clueless about the devastating effect that name calling does to a person. Joseph was just as brutal, though he didn't , on this occasion , say it to Michael to his face.
"Marlon told me about what happened. You're not gonna write about Michael's nickname, are you?" he asked. "He doesn't like that nickname they gave him. Liver Lips."
"Liver Lips? They told me his nickname is Big Nose," Taraborreli replied. He said he didn't know how he was going to handle the situation.
"Oh, yeah," Joe said "That boy's so sensitive about his nose. Do you see anything wrong with his nose?"
"No., not at all."
"Me neither," Joe said. "But that's all he ever talks about. His damn nose. Threatened to have it fixed. What can he do with it? I told I'd break his face if he ever had it fixed." he laughed. "You don't fix something that ain't broke. He's got a great nose. It looks like mine."
Michael summed up his life later with these revealing words. He was talking about his character the Scarecrow in The Wiz.
"What I like about my character is his, I guess you can call it, his confusion. He knows he has these, uh, these problems, I guess you can call them. But he doesn't exactly know why he has them or how he got that way. And he understands that he see things differently from the way everyone else does., but he can't put his finger on why. He's not like other people. No one understands him. So he goes through his whole life with this, uh..." he paused, "confusion."
"Everybody thinks he's very special," he concluded thoughtfully. "But, really, he's very sad, He's so so sad. Do you understand? He asked urgently, "Do you understand his sadness?"

Thank you, J.Randy Taraborrelli - "Michael Jackson -The Magic and the Madness" pages 215-222.

On This One, Joe Was Right

The CBS Records Group seemed to be attractive to Joe Jackson because of the black artists in its Epic label. Their distribution and promotion reputation was also highly regarded as top-notch. Ron Alexenberg, president of Epic, was interested in the Jackson 5 since he worked under Motown's Ewart Abner. He felt that Berry Gordy had not utilized the full potential of what the Jackson 5 had to offer. He and Joe began to negotiate for the Jackson's toward signing on to Epic and Alexenberg went to Walter Yetnikoff, president of CBS Records. Yetnikoff felt that the group was not hot property, but Alexenberg assured him, "Trust me. This group isn't finished. It hasn't even begun yet."
The deal was struck. The group receive a "signing bonus" of $750,000, plus an additional $500,000 "recording fund," used to produced the group's albums. They were to be paid $350,000 per album. The advance money from CBS was to be paid from royalties, but the royalty rate was 27 percent of the wholesale price for records in the United States. At Motown, they were paid only 2.7 percent, and the group's expenses and studio time was deducted from that, leaving them with almost nothing. To show what a significant deal this was, in 1975, an album retailed for $6.98 , $3.50 wholesale. The Jacksons at Epic would make 94.5 cents per album sold in the United States. At Motown, the group made 11 cents worldwide! Do the math! After each of the group's albums sold over $500,000, the royalty rate increased to 30 percent, or $1.05 a record.
Of course, there was a catch. Yetnikoff would not allow the brothers to write, produce, or choose their material. After much debate, the agreement was that the brothers could choose three songs per album, and an unwritten clause that if the group submitted three good songs, they could be up for consideration.
Michael was amazed that the group was worth so much, that this is the kind of contract that other well known acts were used to. He admired his father's courage and strength to come up with what was best for their careers and future. "I have to admit it. This is one incredible record deal. My father has done an amazing job for us."

Jealousy Towards A Ten Year Old

While being interviewed by Oprah Winfrey, Michael stated that when he was younger, he used to hear people refer to him as a forty-five year old midget. He claimed that he never thought much about it. People used to ask him did he know he was that good when he was younger. He said he never thought about it, he just opened up his mouth, and out came this voice.

In actuality, Michael was upset by these references. Once, a performer said to another before a talent show that they better look out for the Jackson Five," 'cause they got this midget they're using as a lead singer." His brother Jackie heard the remark and told his father, both of which found it funny. When Michael heard about it, he was upset and started to cry. "I can't help it if I'm the smallest." Joseph pulled him to the side and told him he should be proud that he was being talked about by the competition. "That means you're on your way."

Michael still didn't like being spoken about negatively by anyone, nor treated unjustly.

Thank you J.Randy Taraborrelli .

What made Michael different then the other Jackson children?

When Michael was five years old, his mother became a Jehovah's Witness and out of all of the children, Michael, LaToya, and Rebbie were the most serious about their religion.Because of the faith, the children were not permitted to socialize with others outside of the religion. The family was viewed by the neighborhood as being strange, that they thought they were better than other people, and when the neighborhood found out that they were Jehovah's Witnesses, some people were scared of them. Michael's voice was discovered at age four. Michael was a fascinating child. His mother felt that he was different from the other children in the family.

"I don't believe in reincarnation, but you know how babies move so uncoordinated? Michael never moved that way. When he danced, it was if he were an older person."

Michael, it appears, was a handful.When he was three, Joseph spanked him for something he had done. Michael took off one of his shoes, and threw it at his father. Apparently, Joseph held Michael by one leg upside down, and gave him an unforgettable beating .At first Michael was afraid of his father, but after all of the abuse, he grew to hate his father. Michael eventually started leaning more towards his mother. "Because of Katherine's gentleness, warmth, and attention, I can't imagine what it is like to grow up without a mother's love. The lessons she taught us were invaluable. Kindness, love, and consideration for other people headed her list."

J. Randy Taraborrelli, "MICHAEL JACKSON - The Magic and the Madness" pages 7-12

Where did the name "Prince" come from and why are Michael's children so fair complexioned?

Michael's mother, Katherine, was the daughter of Prince Albert Screws and Martha Upshaw. Her grandparents, listed in a 1910 census, were described as mulatto.

Thank you, J.Randy Taraborrelli for supplying this information from the book, "MICHAEL JACKSON - The Magic and the Madness."

A distant relative was a Choctaw Indian named July Gale, who fathered a a boy by a young slave named Gina. The boy was called Nero. July was called "Jack" and because his son was into slavery because he was born to a slave, Nero's name was called Nero Jackson.

Thank you, Christopher Anderson, for information from his book, "Michael Jackson Unauthorized."

These two book are the sources from which much of the information for this blog will come from. I will include statements from Michael derived from interviews, and pictures so that maybe everyone will have a clear idea of who Michael Jackson was.

So, no, Michael was not taking the name Prince as a tribute to the Artist, but to pay tribute to his grandfather. You will also see how it is highly possible that the coloring of his children is so light. Which proves again, Black people can produce many different shades depending on the race it mixes with.