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Earth Song: Michael Jackson’s failed call to environmentalism?
Earth Song came out in 1995 in the UK, and despite its reaching number one in the charts, its overriding message largely went ignored.
“What about sunrise
What about rain
What about all the things
That you said we were to gain
What about killing fields
Is there a time
What about all the things
That you said was yours and mine…
Did you ever stop to notice
All the blood we’ve shed before
Did you ever stop to notice
This crying Earth this weeping shore?”
Was Michael Jackson’s “Earth Song”, released in 1995, a missed opportunity for a serious raising in awareness for the global environmental cause?
Yes, according to 83% of Huffington Post readers who voted on an online survey that Jackson’s “Earth Song” is “pretty great, his environmental message still applies today.”
Michael Jackson was famous for his socially-conscious music, but “Earth Song”, his big, bold environmental call-to-arms, is often overlooked. Still, by sheer dint of his reach, the song might have made Jackson a kind of super-sized Al Gore, a decade before An Inconvenient Truth.
“Earth Song” is arguably the most popular green-themed tune ever. It remains Jackson’s best-selling song in the UK – bigger than “Thriller” or “Billie Jean”. But the song, and its lavish globe-trotting video, barely registered in the US.
Record executives at Epic apparently didn’t think it had much life in the US. Perhaps the themes of ecological destruction weren’t suited to pop radio in the US market, or the song’s musical approach – gospel, blues and opera – was considered too offbeat for American audiences.
Not only was the song never released as a single in Jackson’s home country, but the dramatic music video – shot in four different places and depicting man-made ecological devastation and renewal – was only rarely played on American MTV.
Was the singer too much ahead of his time?
Whatever the answer, the text at the end of the “Earth Song” certainly still rings true today. If anything it almost isn’t strong enough. The pity is that even in the UK, the actual message behind it all didn’t seem to penetrate.
Read Vita Europe’s account of G8 countries environmental status
Huffington Post TreeHugger blog
Nessuno ti regala niente, noi sì
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