Stress to Impress

Watching Michael Jackson's very strange yet uniquely beautiful memorial service, so many moments stood out for different reasons. It was difficult to watch yet I couldn't turn my eyes away from the screen. This man that so many people, specifically the media, teared down for so long is suddenly praised as the greatest thing since sliced bread - specifically by the media. What is wrong with this picture?

Unlike Bill O'Reiley, I believe he should have been receiving praise this entire time. While I do agree that the media coverage is somewhat bizarre, it is only because these are the same newscasters that acted like Michael Jackson was the biggest disgrace in the world only six or so years ago. I 100% do not believe that any allegations against him are true and while it shouldn't be okay for someone with three young children to take a heavy dosage of prescription pills on a daily basis, none of us are in the same league as Michael Jackson and I can say that I get heart palpitations just from figuring out where to eat out sometimes so I can't imagine the kind of stress the most famous figure in American culture could accumulate. It's the oldest story in the book: we Americans love to bring our heroes down to the ground only to raise them up again in death. It's incredibly morbid. Consider how happy Mr. Jackson would've been if he could have seen all the sincere love pouring out of so many millions of people's hearts and souls while he was alive. Maybe he wouldn't have felt that he needed to impress everyone so much with these final 50 concerts that clearly did him in - not the physical exertion but the stress to impress.

On a much lighter note, I was surprised to see John Mayer perform. I have no idea who came up with the idea, although he mentioned that the family specifically requested him, but it turned out so much better than I expected. John Mayer has this strange natural ability to make certain people repulsed when he opens his mouth and other swoon to the high heavens. While I don't fall into either of those categories, I would place myself in a smaller category of people who are such weirdos they practically consider him a member of the family. When a person's voice is in your ears since you're 13 years old, they solidify a certain piece of your heart - whether you want them to or not. I worry for John Mayer the way I would for my cousin when she makes foolish mistakes. Hearing that he would be performing on the memorial service and then seeing the title "Human Nature" flash on the screen made me nervous - I didn't want to hear his whispery voice and high notes at that minute. For the first time in my life I was happy to not hear John Mayer sing.

The vocal absence within one of the most melodic, beautiful, haunting songs in Michael Jackson's catalog paid more homage to the king of pop than any other performance that afternoon and I'm so proud that John Mayer was the one to do it. I can only imagine how insanely electric that performance would've been if it were a Michael/John duet. I can picture Michael going up to Mayer as he played a killer solo and bopping his head along to the beat with microphone in hand wearing some fantastically flashy outfit. That's really, really sad.

To stray totally away from that element of the performance, why was John Mayer looking so good? What did he do? I feel like it's incest to say this but he looked unbelievably attractive - more than ever. The vest, the blue shirt and tie, the hair.. I think I'm going to hang a picture of him in my boyfriend's closet so he knows exactly what a guy should look like.

Just kidding.

And on an even lighter note, I am obsessed with Guitar Hero, made it to the medium level successfully and then found this picture on the internet:


John Mayer playing Guitar Hero.