Episode Transcript
[00:00:17] Speaker A: Hey MJ friends, welcome to the it's all for Love podcast. I'm Cheryl Mazza, the Healing Dancer, your host. This podcast is all about Michael Jackson and how he continues to inspire love in the world and inspires us to live our best lives. In this episode I am speaking with Otis King Jr. From Marlton, New Jersey. Otis tells us how he looked at Michael Jackson as his guidance counselor at times and would turn to his music and his videos to get through tougher times in life and still does. Otis also mentions that one of his favorite songs is Stranger in Moscow because of the line Happy Days will drown the pain. It is amazing how most of us still turn to Michael and his music to get us through the tougher challenges in life. We are so fortunate to have had him and his music in our lives. Otis and I also talk about how we can't help it but stop and dance when we hear Michael Jackson when we're out in public or at work. And I'm sure that we are not the only ones that do that. If you are watching on YouTube, please make sure to like this video and subscribe to the channel. Also please leave us a comment and let us know how much you like this episode. If you are listening on any other podcast platform like Apple, Spotify, Amazon or whatever platform you're listening on, please make sure to subscribe there. And I would absolutely love it if you left me a positive review. If you are interested in being a guest on this podcast, please reach out to me. I would absolutely love to talk with you. You can find me on Facebook and Instagram at it's all for Love podcast or you can email me@mj it's all for love gmail.com. also in the show notes there will be a link to schedule a coffee chat with me if you are interested in being a guest so that we can have a little chat before and we can go over everything you need to know about the podcast.
Thank you so much for watching and for listening to it's all for Love. Hello and welcome to the it's all for Love Podcast. I am Cheryl Mazza the Healing Dancer, your host and today we have Otis King Jr. From Marlton, New Jersey with us and he loves movies, music and cooking and he's also a self taught freestyle dancer. So welcome Otis to the it's all for Love podcast. I'm super excited to talk to you and to hear your Michael story.
Thank you for being here. How did you and I meet? It was at the church, right?
[00:02:53] Speaker B: Yes, for the Passion Way and.
[00:02:56] Speaker A: Yes, yes. And so long.
[00:03:01] Speaker B: Forgive me, but. But before that, I had no clue who you were.
[00:03:05] Speaker A: But that's okay. I did. We didn't know each other before that. Yeah. Even though we went to the same high school.
[00:03:11] Speaker B: Yeah. The same high school.
[00:03:13] Speaker A: Yeah. That's all right. That was a big high school. Not, you know, it was too big to know everybody, at least for me. I mean, too big. But yeah, we. We worked on the Passion Play together. I was a choreographer.
That was fun. That was fun times. And then we both discovered our love of Michael Jackson, that we loved Michael Jackson together. So that started the friendship. Yes. All right, so we're going to start off with the question that I ask everybody. Tell us your Michael Jackson story. Like, when did he first strike you in the heart?
[00:03:45] Speaker B: I don't. I honestly don't. Don't have a exact moment. It's more or less a number of moments.
The first time I saw him was probably the Motown 25 performance, you know, the one that put him up in that stratosphere. Pretty much.
[00:04:11] Speaker A: Yes.
[00:04:16] Speaker B: And ironically, that's the. That's the microphone performance that. That I watch almost all the time because it's. It's.
It's like you can't.
No matter how many times you. You watch that, you. You just can't take your eyes off it. It's like. It's like one of the.
I think it's the greatest solo performance of anybody that's ever done. The. The music. The music thing. There's a lot of duplicators, you know, And I tell people all the time, no, no, no.
[00:04:48] Speaker A: They try. They try. They can't.
[00:04:51] Speaker B: Because what. A lot of people seem to forget that. That Lily was his first. His first solo performance. Right before that, he was always performing with his brothers. And.
And I remember watching the last documentary on him, thriller 40.
[00:05:15] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:05:16] Speaker B: And.
And the funny thing was, I was only, like, maybe a couple months old when that show aired, so I didn't.
I didn't see that performance, like, a couple years afterwards.
I was like, maybe, maybe five or six. And I remember. And I remember.
I remember asking my. My father, I was like, oh, dad, who's that?
And he's like, that's Michael Jackson.
[00:05:51] Speaker A: The man. That's the man.
[00:05:55] Speaker B: When I was watching. Watching 40, they were. They were talking about it, and then they were saying after they did I'll be there, everyone was like, what? And they saw. They saw the brothers leaving, and everybody was like, what's going on here? Because.
Because apparently almost no one knew it. That that. That he was. He was. He was gonna do Billie Jean that night.
[00:06:24] Speaker A: Right?
[00:06:25] Speaker B: Everybody except for Barry Gordy, who. Who put the show on.
[00:06:29] Speaker A: Yes.
[00:06:30] Speaker B: So. And the funny part was the guy that was doing the documentary asked the guy he was interviewing and was like, who had the.
Who had the unfortunate task to perform after Michael that night?
And the guy goes, I don't know.
[00:06:51] Speaker A: Nobody remembers.
[00:06:55] Speaker B: So, yeah, that. And the first video I ever saw him do was a Thriller, obviously.
And. And no video has touched that since, in my opinion.
[00:07:06] Speaker A: But yeah. Oh, gosh, no.
Thriller. Thriller and Motown. Like. Well, there's a lot of iconic moments with Michael, but yeah, I. I agree. That Motown performance was like the iconic moment. That's what, like. I mean, he was like, huge. Even before that, you could tell he was a star. Even before that, everyone was like, omg.
[00:07:32] Speaker B: Yep.
[00:07:32] Speaker A: And what was that that I just saw?
[00:07:35] Speaker B: Yeah, the only. The only video that I would put in the same breath as Thriller is probably, you know, it's probably smooth.
[00:07:44] Speaker A: Yes. Yeah. Oh, gosh.
[00:07:48] Speaker B: The real Smokren. Not the one. The sped up version that they always show for some reason.
[00:07:54] Speaker A: Right? Yeah, yeah, the one from Moonwalker. That's what. Yeah, that's. That's the best one. Because, like, the full length. The full length videos are always the best. Yeah. Sped up one is just the song. So that's how I look at it. Yeah.
Awesome. So. So Michael captured you by you seeing him perform on.
[00:08:13] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:08:15] Speaker A: So how does he inspire you throughout your life? Or how has he, like, since then, since you first saw him? Like, how has he inspired you throughout your life?
[00:08:24] Speaker B: I often called him my guidance counselor in a way, because whenever I'm in a bad mood or whenever I'm just not in the right place, I just throw in either his music or watch one of his videos and I'm just in a better place after that.
[00:08:45] Speaker A: Yeah. Oh, my gosh. I agree. Yesterday I was. I was having a bad day and I just was like, what can I do to get out of this? I mean, put on some Michael. Put on some.
[00:08:56] Speaker B: Yep, absolutely.
[00:08:59] Speaker A: As I sing and dance in the car. Do you do that too?
[00:09:02] Speaker B: Oh, yeah.
[00:09:04] Speaker A: I'm like, I don't care what anybody thinks anymore. I don't care. So does Michael ever show up, like, magically in your life if you walk in somewhere and, like a song comes on or something will just come around to remind you of him? Just shows up in your life?
[00:09:20] Speaker B: For the most part, when I'm. Whenever I'm at a. I'm at a store and the and his music is playing it on the speakers.
[00:09:28] Speaker A: Yeah. Do you stop in the box?
[00:09:30] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:09:32] Speaker A: Me, too.
I don't care where I am. It happened to me at Best Buy one time.
I was with my husband and the. You know, the TVs that they have in, like, the big showroom there to show, like, all the sound systems and stuff.
Well, I think. I don't know if it was Beat it or Billie Jean came on one of those. And I just started dancing. And my husband was like, oh, my God, what are you doing?
He walked away from me.
I'm like, I don't care. It's Michael. How can you not dance? How can you not move?
[00:10:04] Speaker B: Yeah.
I remember when I used to work at Sears Essentials. That used to be Kmart before it eventually closed down.
I'd be working in the. In the garden center.
[00:10:19] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:10:19] Speaker B: And a Microsoft would come on. And I'm supposed to be working, but when the Microsoft come on, I just can't help it.
[00:10:28] Speaker A: You gotta take a dance break.
[00:10:31] Speaker B: What was funny is the person who was the security person will walk up to me. He's like, I saw you dancing on the. On the. On the camera.
[00:10:43] Speaker A: Like. Yeah. I'm not gonna deny it.
Oh, I love it. I love it. If you had to pick a favorite Michael Jackson song, what would it be?
[00:10:55] Speaker B: Oh, I. I have a couple, actually, I want to tell people. And it's kind of an odd choice, but. But I really like Stranger in. In Moscow.
[00:11:10] Speaker A: That's a great song.
[00:11:11] Speaker B: Yeah.
Everything from the. The melody. And there's one line he says that I always try to. Try to live by, and where he says, happy days will drown the pain. Yes, I. I. That. That line just hits me every time.
[00:11:28] Speaker A: Yes. Yeah. Oh, that is. I. Thank you. That I'm gonna write down because.
[00:11:36] Speaker B: And read.
[00:11:38] Speaker A: And it just brings you out of that.
[00:11:40] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:11:41] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:11:41] Speaker B: And that's one of my favorites off of Thriller. I always like them. Human and nature.
[00:11:50] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:11:51] Speaker B: And I. I always tell people that Michael was a. A poet because he. Because he could just put words together that just.
It would just.
It just relaxes you.
[00:12:04] Speaker A: Yes. Yes. Yeah. It brings you to that. Just like, almost like a meditative.
[00:12:10] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:12:11] Speaker A: You know, like, you don't have to actually meditate. You know, you just. It brings you to some kind of state.
[00:12:17] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:12:17] Speaker A: Just like, not in a trans. But, you know, calm. Yeah.
[00:12:23] Speaker B: Bad. Bad album.
Dirty Diana. Easily.
[00:12:30] Speaker A: Yes.
[00:12:33] Speaker B: Yeah.
Ask you something?
[00:12:40] Speaker A: Sure.
[00:12:45] Speaker B: Well, Battle was originally supposed to be a duet with him and Prince.
[00:12:50] Speaker A: Was it? I didn't know that.
[00:12:52] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:12:53] Speaker A: Really?
[00:12:54] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:12:55] Speaker A: See I think about Michael.
[00:12:59] Speaker B: Yeah. I found out a couple of years ago it was really supposed to be him and Prince, and Prince actually turned it down.
And do you think. Do you think that was the right song for them to try to collaborate or.
[00:13:17] Speaker A: Oh, gosh, I don't know. I think anything that they would have done together together would have been fabulous.
[00:13:27] Speaker B: Oh, yeah.
[00:13:28] Speaker A: Because I love them. I love them both. Obviously, Michael has my heart over Prince, but as performers, as entertainers, as talent together, that whatever they did together would have been amazing. I wish they would have done something together, but I don't know if. Bad. I don't. I don't know. I don't know if I would have.
I mean, I don't know if I could see Prince in that. No, I don't know.
[00:13:55] Speaker B: You know, I think I. I think the video would have had to look a lot different if it was friends. Because at first even said it was an interview with him and Chris Rock, and I asked him, I heard you. I heard you turned out bad.
Just looked at him and said, yeah, the. The Wesley Snipes character was going to be me. And the Chris Rock just started laughing.
It was like, yeah, play that video in your mind.
[00:14:27] Speaker A: Yeah, no, that. Yeah. Now that you say that, I definitely could not see Prince doing that. I think Wesley Snipes was the better choice for that.
[00:14:34] Speaker B: Oh, yeah.
I think the better song for them to do. To do. Would have been Together would have been. Would have been Dirty Diana.
[00:14:44] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah. And he could have played guitar, like. Yeah, exactly. Oh, that. Yeah, I like that choice.
[00:14:52] Speaker B: Dangerous.
I really like Will you be there.
I just think it's just.
It's so soothing, you know?
[00:15:05] Speaker A: Yes.
[00:15:06] Speaker B: Then there's one album that no one really talks about, which is Blown on the. On the dance floor.
My favorite off that one is Ghost, obviously.
Oh, I skipped one. History, Stranger in Moscow and Scream are my two favorites from that one.
You can't go wrong with him and.
And Janet on the same song.
[00:15:33] Speaker A: No, sorry. I was gonna ask you about another song that I know that used to like. Was it the 2000 watts?
[00:15:43] Speaker B: Oh, hell yeah.
[00:15:45] Speaker A: Only because it's like. It's not like a typical song that anybody would say about that, but the beat to that song is, like, insane. I love it. Yeah. Yeah.
[00:15:58] Speaker B: You'd be surprised a lot. A lot of people don't like it. And I'm like, I cannot like it.
[00:16:06] Speaker A: Yeah, it's different. That's why I like it. I mean. And like I said, the beat just kind of grabs me.
[00:16:12] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. Teddy Riley talking through the whole thing. It's just.
[00:16:21] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:16:22] Speaker B: But yeah. Invincible. I always don't. I mean, I've sent on my Facebook page all the time. People, in my opinion, just weren't ready for that version of him.
[00:16:33] Speaker A: Right. Yeah. I mean, that. I think album was very underrated too. And I'm not just saying that because I'm Michael Jackson fan, but I think that one came out when I was in college.
I can't remember.
[00:16:47] Speaker B: I came out at the beginning of my senior year in high school.
[00:16:50] Speaker A: That was like early 2000s. Right?
[00:16:52] Speaker B: 2001, I think. Yeah, 2001.
[00:16:54] Speaker A: Yeah. Okay. Yeah, I was in college, so I remember like listening to that album over and over again. And I think he came to New York.
[00:17:02] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:17:03] Speaker A: Signing. I was so mad because I went to college in Pittsburgh and I was like, darn it, I can't get back to New York.
So. Always missed out. Do you have a favorite Michael Jackson?
I want to say musical. There's only one Michael Jackson musical.
You know, short film. I'll just say short film.
I know hard.
[00:17:32] Speaker B: I mean, I gotta go with them.
With them. Thriller.
[00:17:37] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:17:39] Speaker B: Because it.
When it's basically become. Become the theme of Halloween, basically.
And my only, I guess you could say problem with it now is that some of the.
Some of the zombie costumes didn't age well. If you. If you watch it in 4K.
[00:18:04] Speaker A: Yeah. Yeah.
[00:18:07] Speaker B: I would say it looks kind of better in regular format because it was made in the 80s, so.
[00:18:14] Speaker A: Yeah. Yeah. No, I agree.
[00:18:16] Speaker B: Not a lot of 80 stuff. Age will anyways. Right.
[00:18:20] Speaker A: Yeah. Even though 80s was one of the best eras.
[00:18:23] Speaker B: Yeah.
And I always put some criminally in the same thing as the entire Moonwalker video because.
Because you got claiming Claymation part of it. I think it's hilarious.
[00:18:39] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:18:42] Speaker B: Where those clay people are just chasing them the whole time and he's. He's got the rabbits, you know?
[00:18:46] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
That's where. And then Speed Demon is part of that too. That. That video. I love it. Yeah.
[00:18:55] Speaker B: Another favorite song of mine, by the way.
[00:18:58] Speaker A: Yeah. Yeah. Don't play it while you're driving.
[00:19:00] Speaker B: No.
[00:19:05] Speaker A: Fun story. I did get pulled over playing that song, so. That's why I warn you.
Oh, gosh. So many good videos and songs, but what do you want the world to know about Michael Jackson?
[00:19:27] Speaker B: Just.
Just how great of a person he was, you know?
And I don't know if you know this, but. But on Facebook, I. I push. I push back on a lot of. I know. I know now that a lot of the posts Are. Are satire, if you will, but I'll push back on.
Like, one of the most recent one was JD Said Beyonce has overtaken Michael. I'm like, no, no, no.
Now I like Beyonce. I do. I really do. But no, and.
And you gotta give me a better reason for saying that other than. I think. I think. I think. I think JD Said Michael never did the.
That Coachella. That Coachella, I think it's called.
[00:20:26] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:20:27] Speaker B: I was like, all you gotta do is go back and remember. And Michael didn't need no Coachella. He was the Coachella.
[00:20:38] Speaker A: Exactly. Yeah. I was just gonna say that. Like, he. He didn't need to do that. Like, I mean, do it if he was here today, you know, Like.
[00:20:47] Speaker B: Yeah, I mean, he's basically. He basically did what Taylor Swift is doing now, except without social media.
[00:20:56] Speaker A: Exactly. Right. Yeah. Yeah, exactly.
[00:21:00] Speaker B: And he. He didn't need the Coachella and he.
As far as I remember, he didn't need a opening act.
[00:21:10] Speaker A: Right. Yeah.
[00:21:11] Speaker B: You go to Michael Jackson, you're going to see Michael Jackson.
[00:21:13] Speaker A: Yeah. You're going the whole concert with Michael. That. That is true. I never even thought that.
Oh, gosh. Wow. Oh, I wish I could have seen him.
[00:21:25] Speaker B: Oh, me too.
[00:21:27] Speaker A: One of those girls that fainted, though. I don't know.
[00:21:33] Speaker B: Actually, one of my favorite favorite moments of his was when they. Was when they first aired the Progress concert on hbo.
[00:21:41] Speaker A: Yeah. Yeah.
[00:21:44] Speaker B: Now young people laugh, laugh at. Laugh at the whole. At the whole passing out thing, but I'm like, no one's. No one's passing out over Taylor Swift, you know?
No one's passing out over Beyonce.
[00:22:00] Speaker A: No, no. And, you know, it's not like it was a bad thing. I think what it was. It. And I say this a lot and this is like maybe a little woo woo for people, but it was his energy.
[00:22:10] Speaker B: Yeah. I mean, his energy.
[00:22:12] Speaker A: He wasn't like, like, I don't know. I can't explain it. Like, I have chills right now just talking about it. Like, it would just be like too much for people to, like, take in. Yeah. And plus, you're like. You see the crowds of people that were there.
[00:22:26] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:22:27] Speaker A: I can imagine being like, it's hot out. You're like squished up against people. You can't freaking breathe. So. Yeah, I would pass out too, probably.
[00:22:36] Speaker B: I remember the beginning of that concert always got me, especially the first time I saw it, because now, now this. I know no other artist has done.
The fact that the man could stand completely still, not move one muscle, and still have a Stadium where people lose their mind.
Like. Like every time. Every time I watch that, I'm like, the man's not moving, right.
[00:23:11] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:23:12] Speaker B: And. And. And I remember he. He does that one move where he turns his head.
[00:23:20] Speaker A: Yeah. Louder.
[00:23:25] Speaker B: He takes the sunglasses off. It got even louder.
[00:23:29] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:23:30] Speaker B: And. And he does it one movie and goes in the. In the gym. And I'm like.
[00:23:38] Speaker A: It's like, mic drop already. He didn't even sing.
[00:23:43] Speaker B: And I remember saying that that night, at that moment, at 10 years old, at 10 years old, that I said, that is the baddest I've ever seen in my life.
[00:23:55] Speaker A: Amen. Amen.
Yeah.
[00:24:01] Speaker B: I got in trouble for saying it, but I'm like, hey. But now I'm like, hey. I'm sure. I'm sure both my parents agree with me when I said that.
[00:24:09] Speaker A: Yes, I'm sure they did. I'm sure they did. And I'm sure a lot of us do.
Is there anything else that you want to tell us about Michael and about how you feel about him or how he's impacted you or anything?
[00:24:21] Speaker B: You know, same thing.
Just how great of a person he was and how not just a great performer, but just a. An amazing humanitarian. You know, he had. He had the Heal the World foundation. And.
And I'm glad that. That it's still going on. The. I think. I think his son. Friends, is still doing it.
[00:24:45] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:24:48] Speaker B: I loved watching the funeral on tv, honestly.
[00:24:53] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:24:55] Speaker B: One. One moment from it. Well, two of them, actually, that I loved. That had me. I mean. I mean, I don't know about you, but.
But I was crying almost the whole time.
[00:25:05] Speaker A: Oh, yeah, of course.
[00:25:07] Speaker B: And. But there's two.
There's two moments that made. That made me laugh hysterically. One was when Magica Johnson and got on the podium and told the story of how. When. When they were discussing. Remember the Time, and.
And the chef comes out and goes, what do you want? And Magic said, I'll have the. The grilled chicken.
And he said, the chef brought him out the grill, the grilled chicken, but he brought out, Michael, a bucket of Kentucky Fried Chicken.
Imagine goes, and. And I. And I trip. And I tripped out. I was like, michael, you eat Kentucky Fried Chicken.
And he's right.
When we look at people, people like Michael, we don't think that. That they eat what we eat.
[00:26:03] Speaker A: Right?
[00:26:03] Speaker B: Yeah, we think. We think that they. They do everything. Everything. When you find out that they're just like us, you know?
[00:26:13] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:26:14] Speaker B: And another moment was when they were showing him singing who's Loving you? When he was 10 and Smokey Robinson came out and was like, I wrote that song.
And then he said, I thought, I thought I sang it. But then this 10 year old kid comes along and then he's like, I went to his brothers and his parents. I was like, oh, I want to see his, his birth certificate.
There's no way that this kid knows at 10 years old about hurting a woman.
[00:26:50] Speaker A: Right.
And he threw that song up. Yeah, yeah, yeah, that was. Those were some good moments from not so good Time, you know?
[00:27:03] Speaker B: Yeah.
And yeah, just how he was, how much of a great person he was. And one song that I'm glad people are finally understanding and finally get the message he was trying to send was Earth Song.
[00:27:22] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:27:24] Speaker B: Like, I remember when it first came out and no. Almost no one was feeling it.
[00:27:30] Speaker A: Yeah. Like, why is he singing about the Earth?
[00:27:33] Speaker B: I'm like, I mean, I mean, I mean, I get it back back then it was the, it was the 90s, you know, and if you weren't the, the flavor of the month, nobody wanted to hear you.
[00:27:46] Speaker A: Right. Right. Yeah. But he, he sung about a lot of stuff that's like even relevant now, you know? Yeah, that definitely. Earth Song.
Yeah, they're just timeless, timeless songs because he, he was more aware of what was going on in the world than most of us.
[00:28:03] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:28:04] Speaker A: Yeah. We're only just waking up to it now, right? How many friggin years later?
Well, thank you so much for talking with me.
[00:28:14] Speaker B: No problem.
[00:28:15] Speaker A: Our favorite person, Michael Jackson. I always love talking about him.
[00:28:19] Speaker B: Me too.
[00:28:20] Speaker A: Obviously why I'm doing this podcast.
And yeah, thanks for sharing your story and all of your amazingness. I will talk to you soon and we'll see you all later. It's all for love.
