Michael Jackson-Thriller: The Music Videos

"At some point,'Thriller' stopped selling like a leisure item-like a magazine, a toy, tickets to a hit movie-and started selling like a household staple." -J.Randy Taraborelli (Michael Jackson biographer)



Billie Jean
(Written, arranged and composed by Michael Jackson, Produced by Quincy Jones)

"A lean, insistent funk number whose message couldn't be more blunt: 'She says I am the one/But the kid is not my son.A sad, almost mournful song, but a thumping resolve underlies his [Jackson's] feelings" Christopher Connelly-Rolling Stone



Beat It

"Jackson's voice soars all over the melody, Eddie Van Halen checks in with a blistering guitar solo, you could build a convention center on the backbeat" Christopher Connelly-Rolling Stone

Thriller

"Well, it was a delicate thing to work on because I remember my original approach was, 'How do you make zombies and monsters dance without it being comical?' So I said, 'We have to do just the right kind of movement so it doesn't become something that you laugh at.' But it just has to take it to another level. So I got in a room with [choreographer] Michael Peters, and he and I together kind of imagined how these zombies move by making faces in the mirror. I used to come to rehearsal sometimes with monster makeup on, and I loved doing that. So he and I collaborated and we both choreographed the piece and I thought it should start like that kind of thing and go into this jazzy kind of step, you know. Kind of gruesome things like that, not too much ballet or whatever" -Michael Jackson talking about the music video

Billie Jean-Motown 25

"It was a moment that crossed over in a way that no live musical performance ever had. There was a messianic quality to it" Steve Daly-Entertainment Weekly