Necrophilia

I have no comment to make on the life and career of Michael Jackson. None. This post is about the bizarre phenomenon of ‘death as a career move’.

When John Lennon was murdered, his records shot to the top of the charts. I wouldn’t have minded too much if they’d been any good, but his solo career was in the doldrums and Double Fantasy was full of tediously dull songs. But the man was dead, so the public turned off its critical faculties and bought whatever was available.

Elvis Presley got a similar bounce a few years earlier, but we were fortunate that (unlike Lennon) he didn’t have a new album out at the same time.

But in the Internet era, you don’t actually need any new material, and no one has to wait for their next trip to HMV to buy the music – by which time the fuss might have faded and common sense have had the chance to set in. After all, if you’ve spent 10, 15, 20 years not being prepared to spend money on someone’s music, why should that change just because the singer is dead? Did the music magically improve? Of course not.

No, when a purchase is only a click away the impulse to buy seems to be irresistible. Which presumably is why Michael Jackson’s albums (in various editions) occupy the top 14 places on Amazon UK’s sales chart less than 24 hours after his death.

The mischievous part of me almost hopes that this is all a ruse to help pay off some of Jackson’s debts, followed by a ‘miraculous’ recovery that generates even more publicity and cash. But this is undoubtedly the real deal, and goose that laid the golden egg is definitely dead. And lots of people will be left with CDs gathering dust after one or two plays, minor victims of their own inability to deal with the death of someone they never met.