'We are the world'

THE YEAR was 1985 when I first watched the TV documentary on how the song, “We are the world,” was made, line by line, note by note, part by part. While watching the final version being sung by 45 pop artists, individually in parts and as a chorus, plus the images of hunger and poverty, I had a very profound experience. The earth broke open, the landscape in my heart moved and I sank to the floor and wept.

Being more of a classical music listener, I was not a Michael Jackson follower, but I can say that I bought at least one Jackson recording, and that was “We are the world.” I still have the “USA for Africa” album in cassette tape (no CDs then) where it is the lead song. (USA stands for United Support of Artists.) There are nine other songs (not by Jackson) in the cassette but it was “We are the world” that I played over and over. Buying the album meant taking part in a huge fund-raising for a cause. And every time I played the song and sang along, I felt one with the world and the universe. It became my anthem.


(It’s playing on my player now and it still sounds good. Those who were born yesterday can watch the hows of it on YouTube.)

Now we know that it is not just the singer and the song that move us, it is also the images and imagination that go with the song. That’s what MTV is about.

So that was in 1985, the year the album was released and the year of the killer drought that devastated very poor African countries and their people. Hunger and death stalked the continent. That was also the year that a political groundswell was building up in the Philippines and Filipinos were in anticipation of something earthshaking to happen. Our hearts were raw and ready.

As Eric Caruncho, the Inquirer’s resident pop and jazz authority, wrote the day after Jackson died, “For a certain generation of Filipinos, the ’80s will be remembered for two epochal events: The Edsa People Power Revolt and the release of Michael Jackson’s ‘Thriller’ album.” Jackson would come to the Philippines for a huge concert in 1996.

When “We are the world” came to be, Jackson was 27 years old. He co-wrote the song with Lionel Richie. Director Quincy Jones, in his invitation note to participating artists, said that they were to “check their egos at the door.”

I watched the video again on YouTube, and I saw that Jackson did not dominate the recording. He had his parts, but Ray Charles, Bruce Springsteen, Stevie Wonder, Cyndi Lauper and Diana Ross had more moments.

At that time Jackson had long graduated from his little-boy hits (“Ben” among them) and he was fully an adult in his gilded military jackets with quivering epaulettes. He could also look menacing enough in his dark get-up as he stalked alleys with his “Thriller” zombie pack. His skin was still brown but his nose already looked chiseled.

Until his sudden death last week, Jackson, a father of three un-mothered children, had always remained a man-child who fancied himself to be Peter Pan. Dogged by child molestation cases (of which he was acquitted), wearing a strange reconstructed face and skin color he was not born with, he became reclusive, an oddity. Then he announced next month’s concert tour that would end all concert tours. The world waited.

Before it could all come about, his heart stopped. He was 50. But with his sudden death, the music and the dance came alive again, if not more alive. The world mourned but also celebrated like it never did for anyone.

Well, long before Jackson died, Cebu’s orange-clad prison inmates have been dancing to his music and getting millions of hits on YouTube.

Suddenly I want to know more about him. How many writers will write the story of his life? Who will play him in the movie? The world has a lot to learn from the King of Pop’s life and death, not to mention his dance, his music. Where were these all coming from?

It’s interesting to know how “We are the world” was written, how the words were chosen, how the artists’ sometimes conflicting views were dealt with. The recording was done during and after the American Music Awards in California. Jackson skipped the awards to record the chorus that would serve as guide to the other artists.

And so that piece of advocacy music hit the charts and became number 1.

Excerpts:
There comes a time/ When we heed a certain call/ When the world must come together as one/ There are people dying/And it’s time to lend a hand/ To life, the greatest gift of all
We can’t go on/ Pretending day by day/ That someone somewhere will soon make a change/ We are all a part of/God’s great big family/ And the truth, you know love is all we need
(Chorus) We are the world/ We are the children/ We are the ones who make a brighter day/ So let’s start giving/ There’s a choice we’re making/ We’re saving our own lives/ It’s true we’ll make a better day/ Just you and me…

But I discovered that Jackson’s “Earth Song” is just as powerful especially now that Planet Earth suffers war and devastation:

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/ The crying Earth the weeping shores?
What have we done to the world/ Look what we’ve done/ What about all the peace/ That you pledge your only son/ What about flowering fields/ Is there a time/ What about all the dreams/ That you said was yours and mine/ Did you ever stop to notice/ All the children dead from war/ Did you ever stop to notice/ The crying Earth, the weeping shores?
I used to dream/ I used to glance beyond the stars/ Now I don’t know where we are/ Although I know we’ve drifted far…

Michael, child of the universe.