Return of the King

When The King passed there was a rare occurrence of international mourning, we can all say where we were when we heard the news. I was sitting playing Counter Strike with a friend when The Last Junker rang me and told me that there was very strong speculation that the man had died. I told the friend that I was playing with what had happened, he was gutted and we both went off the game. Needless to say it was a very long 2 hours of internet speculation, with rumours flying left, right and center over what had happened and all news sources quoting other news sources over the "death" to keep themselves safe in case it was just a rumour. The news was finally confirmed and the world was left with one less icon.

Shortly after I got wind that Snoop Dogg was doing a live video podcast (I'm still not entirely sure where or how I heard about this) where he'd be playing Jackson songs and doing his thing. I had lost a lot of respect for Snoop over recent years as he took selling out to a whole new level, his music suffered and he just wasn’t the musician or person he should have become. This changed that night as he bust out classic after classic, old Jackson with new Jackson and lots of less familiar tracks. When I joined the video chat there was only 50 other people watching (there was a counter of all the people in the room), at the height of it there was well over 2000 people watching the stream and, more importantly, listening to the songs.

Even before his death we were hearing Jackson tributes all over the place, he was a man who had so much influence that nearly everyone wanted to show their gratitude. After his death there was many, many more, some good and some bad, with memorable ones being Sways's "The King Full Stop" and Cymarshall Law's "R.I.P. Michael Jackson". People were also dedicating entire albums to the man and many mixtapes were released, which is essentially what I am here to talk about.

The first mixtape I want to talk about was released a few years ago and was a collaboration between Rhymefest, Mark Ronson and to an extent, Michael Jackson (I remember hearing somewhere that he'd actually approved it, though I can't seem to find the source now). The mixtape, entitled Man in the Mirror, consists of Jackson songs being used as backing tracks for Rhymefest who is spitting about his life, times, Jackson and his influence on him. They also have some samples of Jackson talking, taken from various interviews and sources, that they have then talked over to form the illusion that Jackson is in the studio with them, which makes for some funny conversations between the three. After Jackson's death Rhymefest re-released this mixtape with 3 bonus tacks added. Both versions were released as free downloads and the re-release is al available as a CD for those who wanted to have a hard version of the mixtape. Both are available here.

The second mixtape was released at the end of October and I finally got round to listening to it recently. This one is brought to us from the masterful DJ Jazzy Jeff, who most will remember as being the Fresh Prince's DJ and also appearing as himself on the show that most people grew up with. This one will probably be a lot more accessible to Jackson fans than the previous mixtape as it is essentially just a huge playlist of Jackson songs. The mix contains a few rare remixes that don't stray too far from the original versions, it should also be mentioned that this doesn’t play that many remixes and stays on course by playing mainly Jackson originals. The list contains lots of songs that many people would not expect to see on the list that would be unfamiliar to the more mainstream Jackson audience, This however doesn’t mean that there is no classics that we've all come to know and love on the list. Jazzy Jeff brings us a perfectly lengthened mixtape here that seems to tick all the boxes and will certainly have Jackson fans applauding his efforts. Mixtape available here.