By December of 1972, the Jackson 5 have gone 12 months without a top 10 hit. The singles from Looking Through the Windows all landed outside of the US top 10. Skywriter’s three single releases failed to break into the top 40. Early in the business, you have what we call haters. After our first four, then we started having songs that didn’t make it to number one.
And people used to come up and say, “You guys are finished.” >> No, we all had the same thing then when we branched off. It was different thing which in which we respected. It’s my brother. It just hurt my feelings a little bit because I know my staple in the group. I’m a part of that band just like anyone else in the band.
Things Things were changing right away. We We felt it. There were ways that your older brothers can exact revenge that don’t necessarily have to do with what happens on stage. You know, Michael got teased more. >> bothered by it, the worse it got. Michael, you were compared a male young version of Diana Ross.
>> >> I sound like her? No, I never heard that one. The Jacksons were typical siblings and teasing could get heated, but everyone got some. Okay, this is your gentleman is Randy Jackson. He’s the youngest and the ugliest member of the Jackson 5. And what’s the excuse for you so ugly? Cuz I take after my big brother Tito.
My sister, she talks like a rat. >> >> Janet loves to eat. Yeah, well, the whole family calls her a “donk”, which is short for donkey. They call me “donk” cuz they said my body shape like a donkey. We’ve always called her that since she was a little girl. Joseph knew how to transform insecurities into psychological warfare.
His main target was Michael. And they they they used to call me “big-nose” and stuff. He would tease me about how I look. God, your nose is big. You didn’t get it from me. And on top of it, you got to go on stage in the spotlight. Hundreds of thousands of people and just It’s hard. Years later, Michael Jackson was still in his feelings.
Walter Yetnikoff recalled a conversation he had with Michael in his book Howling at the Moon. Michael called, “I’m not happy.” “How can you not be happy? You own the world.” “My brothers want me to tour with them and I don’t want to.” “Then don’t.” “But my mother says I should.” “Do you always listen to your mother?” “I try to.” “Then tour.
” “When I was a kid, they never stopped teasing me.” “So you’re angry.” “Very.” Maybe Joseph was trying to keep Michael humble, but the teasing just made Michael more resentful and isolated. But I broke out real bad. My skin broke out real bad. It was tough. Especially when everybody calling you real cute for a long time.
I just wouldn’t let them see I I wore hats. Kept my head down all the time. Michael’s quiet now. When he was younger, he wasn’t that quiet. But I don’t know. I think the stage might have done that to him. You’re talking, you know. But Michael was still going on. That’s what separated him from the rest. You know what? I always felt that the children was happy for Michael.
They would be excited when his record go number one. There wasn’t any jealousy. You know, people keep thinking that the family is separate, but that’s not true. We write on magazines, we always shoot photos with my mom and my dad and all of us standing there and what we did at home. >> Five bathrooms, six bedrooms, gold records lining the walls, a sunken living room that felt more like the Brady Bunch house.
The house in Encino had everything. I’m the oldest, but I’m 22. I’m Jackie. I’m 19. >> 10 to 22. I’m Marlon, I’m 16. I’m Jermaine, I’m 18. Mike, I’m 13. Randy, I’m 10. Three years and it still feels warm. Katherine keeps the house grounded, refuses to let her sons turn into something artificial. There are parties full of industry faces, but there’s still a sense of a family holding itself together.
My father’s whole thing was to keep the family together. Knowing that we’re in Hollywood with the attorneys, the lawyers and the accountants, the vultures, they didn’t look at the tree being forest whole, but take a branch here and there. My father’s whole thing was keeping us together. Michael’s solo successes had teen magazines predicting his exit from the Jackson 5.
As it wore on, it absolutely did cause friction. Suddenly songwriters want to write songs specifically for Michael. Berry Gordy was looking for Michael’s follow-up to Ben. It needed to be a smash and not threaten the momentum that Michael was building. Artie Wayne was part of the Warner Brothers team. He had been trying to get a song through to Michael Jackson.
Artie pitched a Christmas song. When Motown asked about it, he quickly came up with Little Christmas Tree as the title. He told Gordy that it was written by himself and funk lord George Clinton. Motown was curious. A Christmas song by Michael Jackson written by George Clinton? George Clinton hadn’t even been contacted.
After a quick debrief, George Clinton signed on as co-writer and agreed to the two-day deadline. Wayne and Clinton spent the weekend on the song. After two days, it was done. Michael was excited. He rushed to the studio to cut the vocal track. The Little Christmas Tree is an instant classic. I just heard it for the first time myself. It’s emotional.
Michael was perfect for the song. The lyrics lament a love that ended on Christmas, and now he’s alone like the last tree in the lot. The lyrics were prophetic. Berry loved the song, and Motown bought it. But Gordy ultimately decided not to release it. A failed single might affect Motown’s chances of a sweep at the Oscars.
Joseph Jackson was furious. We were going through voice changes and You don’t pick up on voice changing like this. You can especially in your music, you hear it right away. Michael’s voice is changing. Not all, but some was saying that they’re not going to be the same band that they were when they were younger and all these other elements that we had to face.
>> >> This is the story of a child who transformed a family, a family that transformed a generation, and how fame transformed Michael Jackson. This is the Thriller effect. The industry was moving beyond bubblegum pop. Philadelphia soul and edgy funk were rising.
The Jackson 5 wanted a new sound. They demanded Gordy’s attention. Mr. Gordy has done the most unusual thing, and that is to succeed in the record business. He was the founder and he is the president of Motown Records. >> >> And he has some of the hottest acts in show business today. Motown still had some of the best songwriters in the business, and its hitmakers were now superstars.
By the 1970s, Stevie Wonder was guiding his own career. Marvin Gaye had a massive glow up. Motown built an empire on the strength of its music. Berry Gordy guided Motown through a decade of chart dominance in the 1960s, but as of 1973, it was clear Gordy had moved on. Motown was successful, but scattered. The Jackson 5 felt the shift.
The shift was complete when Berry Gordy did something that his artists weren’t ready for, Motown created a film scoring division that would be devoted to creating music for outside studios and its own original film properties. This I wanted to >> >> evolve into something more than just a record man.
That I want my artist to experience every aspect of entertainment. There’s no limit to where they could go as well. >> This would mean new budget allocations, new release schedules, new priorities. For Suzanne de Passe, the Jackson 5 was no longer her priority. >> >> Suzanne de Passe, the brilliant young Motown exec that guided their careers from the start, was picked to head Motown’s new film division.
Suzanne de Passe At the end I wouldn’t say as much, but during the beginning stages till at least halfway through he was there. I’m making that album. It became my responsibility. We went into the studio on Friday morning and didn’t leave until Monday afternoon. And the winner is Diana Ross for Lady Sings the Blues.
Thank you to the Hollywood Foreign Press. Thank you very much. >> Diana Ross was Rookie of the Year in Hollywood. >> The truly talented ladies nominated for best performance by an actress. Liza Minnelli in Cabaret. Diana Ross in Lady Sings the Blues. And the winner is Liza Minnelli. Did you cry when you didn’t win an Oscar? Yes, I did.
Because I wasn’t really honest with myself. I kept saying I don’t care if I get Academy Award. And when they said someone else’s name it really hurt me. It was important for me to win that. I wanted to. >> Were you there? Yes, I was there. I was holding on to my husband on this side and Berry Gordy on this side.
I mean, I tried to hold the tears back, but I just couldn’t. One fifth of the Jackson 5, Michael Jackson. He’s introduced by legendary actor Charlton Heston at the Oscars. That year I wrote the song Ben. It was a huge success. It went to number one in America. I had a call one day from his father to say if you want to speak to Michael you have to go through me.
And it suddenly had a different atmosphere. We still stayed in touch. My father didn’t want him to venture off. He felt it would break up the group, and he wanted to keep the brothers together. Michael was doing his own thing, and the other Jackson was writing songs. My father wanted us to grow as a band and as musicians, and he was fighting for us to write a song or two on our future albums.
Cuz at that time, we had been writing songs for years. >> I write songs on the piano. Well, I Jermaine and Tito, they play guitar. I play drums, basically bass and piano. I play drums. You do play a We do we do play a piano. We write separately and also we write collectively. We have listening sessions, so In order to move on and progress, Joseph said he wanted the children to get credit for their writing, and they couldn’t do that at Motown.
>> Motown had been used to having success with the brothers. They felt if it’s not broke, why try to fix it or change it or whatever. >> The Jackson 5 were young and eager professionals on stage, but they were green and inexperienced songwriters. And I’m not interested in experimenting too much.
And I got a lot more to lose now than I had to lose before. So, they were producers, they were writers, they were the machinery. Motown’s staff writers and producers were writing and producing the songs for us, meaning we were doing what they heard. The power Berry Gordy wielded over Jackson 5 releases was overwhelming.
Each album contained at least two existing Jobete Music Publishing compositions. The Jobete publishing catalog hit would circulate on Motown artists’ albums for years. Motown covered their own songs hundreds of times. Those covers kept the Jobete cash cow fed. A brand new song by a brand new songwriter without a hit making pedigree was a risk that Berry Gordy was not willing to take.
Never Can Say Goodbye is a great example of why Berry Gordy continued to have confidence in the Motown machine. Never Can Say Goodbye was covered almost immediately by other artists. Berry was all about covers. Motown’s publishing arm stayed flush with cash because of covers. >> >> Isaac Hayes, covered the Jackson 5 recording of Never Can Say Goodbye.
I thought it was great cuz I like to see it, you know, other people do our tunes. He went to Motown. And he got permission to do Yeah. Yeah. I barged into Hal Davis, the producer of the Jackson 5’s office and say, “I got a song for you. Just give me 5 minutes.” Hal Davis, he heard Never Can Say Goodbye and said, “I want that song.
” And their producer bought it and brought me to Hollywood to sign the deal. That’s how I sold Never Can Say Goodbye. Songwriters like Clifton Davis were definitely capable, but they couldn’t write smash hits at will like Norman Whitfield and Barrett Strong. >> Norman Whitfield in Motown, he used to throw a bunch of musicians in a room and they’d say, “Play.
” From that, he’d come up with a hit and then he would get into trouble because a lot of these musicians would want residuals and percentage. You didn’t write this, we did. So, I wrote Papa Was a Rolling Stone and a lot of those big hits back then. There was no hired gun capable of reproducing the success of Holland-Dozier-Holland.
What happens is when you depend so much upon a particular writer, you begin to get a particular thing, then you have to realize the talents of the artist. Stevie Wonder, genius. Talking Book, Songs in the Key of Life, fantastic. And hearing his music made me say to myself, “You know, I think I can do this.
” Michael has always been a fantasist, a dreamer. I knew him as a kid dreaming of this great everything. He listened to everybody and everything. He wanted to be a superstar. Study the greats and become greater. I’m doing Motown sessions. Every Sunday, we’d write a song. I’d take it into Hal Davis. I’d go to his office.
He said, “That’s good, but I don’t hear that right now for any of my artists, but keep them coming.” And we did this practically every week. Then he called me and said, “Michael’s looking for something a little more modern, a little more like Stevie.” I’d love to have been on those sessions. Those were over at Sound Factory.
But he wasn’t there, by the way. No vocalist at Motown sessions. Joseph’s ambition was always out-sized, but when the Jackson 5 signed to Motown, they became Berry Gordy’s project. He pushed Joseph to the side, relegating Joseph to a glorified stage mom. Joseph was never comfortable with Motown’s role for him.
It was clear that Joseph resented Gordy’s takeover. After all, Joseph built the Jackson 5. He drilled them before anyone knew who they were. Joseph Jackson was the man who molded the Jackson 5 into the professionals that the world adored. He didn’t need Berry Gordy. In this life, you have a winner or you’re a loser. You’re either willing to fight for it. Yes, sir.
In the home in California, we still never forgot what my father said. Think it, see it, believe it, make it happen. You should be writing your own songs, producing your own records. Now, we can ask Motown to renegotiate our contract. >> of contract do you think you’re going to get? >> The group did just kind of disappear, and it seemed like that they were over with.
And what kind of value do you think they have on us these days? I never dreamed that there would be any life after that for the Jackson 5. The Jackson 5 had 2 years remaining on their Motown contract. Joseph and his partners began covertly planning for a future without Berry Gordy. Joseph and Richard Aarons opened offices at 6255 Sunset Boulevard.
He hired Joyce Moore as secretary. I moved to Los Angeles to work out of Joseph’s office. You know, he was into the business of their careers. And to build that act from nothing was huge. Joseph’s first step toward preparing for a post-Motown Jackson 5 was to found his own record label. He called the project Ivory Tower Records.
He was chasing the American dream. While Joseph was chasing the American dream, Berry Gordy was chasing Oscar gold. Shall we have a look at your new film, which is Mahogany? And I’m going to be You’re going to be a big success, and you can And the boss had a major preoccupation, making his second movie. Mahalia was one of the most exciting projects I’d ever done.
I ultimately became the director. >> >> Diana Ross at that time was my super superstar. She had to have that stardom up there. From Joseph Jackson’s perspective, Motown abandoned the Jackson 5. The group’s closest liaison to Gordy was reassigned. Marketing for films were prioritized over album and singles releases.
The group was not making an impact on the charts. Worst of all, the songs on their albums were picked to serve Motown’s Hollywood agenda. It was bleak. I’m your manager. Who cares what Mr. Gordy says? Made a deal with the MGM Grand. We’re going to play Vegas. Joseph Jackson is about to go head-to-head versus Berry Gordy.
He’s violated the Jackson 5’s contract by signing on to play Las Vegas. He’s opened his own management office. It’s about to get nasty. Meanwhile, The Thriller Effect is back with season 2, and so is Michael with the biopic. Very exciting time. Thank you all for staying with us and supporting the Patreon and the YouTube memberships. So, don’t say goodbye.
Next episode, it’s the making of Dancing Machine, Jermaine’s hectic wedding, and Joseph has a secret. Can you guess? Let me know in the comments if you know what Joseph could possibly be hiding from the rest of the Jacksons. You know what to do. Settle it in the comments.
Disclaimer : This content may be created by AI for entertainment purposes. Any resemblance to real persons, events, or places is coincidental.
