George Michael Singer
acrylics and mixed media on canvas, 2018
photo© Fine Art America and artist© Melanie D, Bulgaria
When Jim was here, we talked about the WHAM documentary that’s airing on Netflix. I haven’t seen it, though it’s one of the things I intend to watch.
Today’s song challenge is “a song you like by an artist no longer living.” It was a shock when George Michael died on Christmas Day 2016–too young at 53. In my music television watching heyday, a video with George Michael would stop me in my tracks. I’ve done a lot of research about the evolution of music videos from the 1960s forward (why else? for the Neverending Saga) though of course, they weren’t called “videos” then and were usually shot on 35mm film even after video tape came into existence and “music videos” became part of the common vernacular. George Michael’s videos were art, and I remember them well.
I also haven’t watched The Super Models on Apple TV+, but the holdup on that one for me is that it features the female models who were in George Michael’s “Freedom” video: Naomi Campbell, Cindy Crawford, Linda Evangelista, and Christy Turlington. However, Tatjana Patitz, born on this date, March 25, 1966, in Hamburg Germany, was also in the “Freedom” video, died last year in January, and isn’t part of the documentary. Because of the video, she became my favorite of the group, so I haven’t had the heart to watch it yet.
Why doesn’t George Michael appear in the video? He told MTV, “I made decisions a couple years ago to change the way my career was going and my life was going by not appearing in the videos, by not being interviewed, by not doing press. Basically, letting my music kind of do what it’s going to do.”
We don’t see him, but his presence still dominates the video (also, probably a lot of people gasped when his leather jacket gets set on fire).
Hmm, George Michael, eh? He does have a lovely voice, but I wasn’t appreciative of that at my age at the time of Wham!’s break-up. He just began his solo career and I didn’t at first realize they split up. It took me longer for his music to grow on me, but when that happened, I really liked his music more.
I’m picking on Shawn Mendes today though. Maybe that’s aftershocks due to the flooding covid record and cd influx breaking the solitary confinement mold. Others include Jamie Cullum, Jacob Collier, Linkin’ Park, Davy Jones, etc.
But now I realize the singer has to be dead, so I’ll say Linkin’ Park’s Chester Bennington.
Davy Jones is also tied there too.