來源：MJJCN.com / dazeddigital.com 編譯：Badthriller
我要說的關於邁克爾•傑克遜的最重要的東西就是他是一個非常開明、超級聰明的傢伙，改變了娛樂的標準。我對他的第一個記憶是小時候在電視前，看他表演。我媽沒有落地電視 —— 我們有一台立式的老電視，我記得跑得很近很近，完全被他迷住。是《我們跳我們叫》（Let’s Dance Let’s Shout）那首歌，我被電視黏住了。看他表演是非凡的體驗。從那之後，他重新設定了藝人的標準。我想不起來在那之前或從那以後看過任何東西像這一樣，無論從音樂上還是從視覺上。
即便如此，那個年紀的我沒有想過做受邁克爾激勵的音樂，我根本沒想過做音樂，那不是一個選項。我那時住在佛吉尼亞的公共住房裏 —— 不習慣那麼想。那不是什麼你覺得自己可能有一天會做的事情。那個年紀住在那個地方，你知道自己喜歡什麼，什麼樣的關係比較靠譜。你知道自己覺得音樂有魅力、藝術有魅力、電影有魅力，但不太能培養那種魅力，或者覺得那是你生命中的可能性。那是關於邁克爾很棒的東西，他做的事似乎難以置信的棒，他一直都非常特別。
當然，那時的我沒有客觀看待音樂。是什麼樣就是什麼樣。從沒想過拿邁克爾和當時的其他藝人做比較，不用說、毫無疑問他天生就與眾不同，你不想錯過。1982年《顫慄》（Thriller）專輯發行時我9歲，他那時肯定是唯一引起我注意的藝人。那發行時毫無疑問：你想變得像他一樣，你想穿得像他，想像他那樣跳舞。不是說他之前就不吸引人：對我而言，“瘋狂”（Off The Wall）時期的造型也很棒，西裝、蝴蝶領結和蓬蓬頭。那風格很棒，他一直都有很棒的造型。一離開“傑克遜五兄弟”（Jackson Five），他就真正開始展現自己，去54錄音室（Studio 54）這樣的地方，見各種人，跟他們合作磨練技巧提高自己。他學華特•迪士尼（Walt Disney），發展對動畫片、老電影和有趣書籍的愛，他了不起的風格隨之演變而來。
他完全發展了自己的一套時尚風格。他從不穿錯什麼，每次穿衣打扮簡直就是在發表宣言。我能解碼或破譯嗎？不，我不能。關鍵在於，他做事不是一時興起。他穿的每件衣服、做的每件事情都經過深思熟慮 —— 他知道自己會得到什麼回應，所以利用這些作出了費解的宣言。我不能告訴你他在想什麼。比如這張照片裏，1988年他在登機，這是“飆”（Bad）時期 —— 他風格另一個很棒的時期 —— 他戴著雷朋墨鏡，穿著軍式夾克。我能告訴你，這背後有一些複雜的想法，他腦子裏可能想表達什麼，但我不敢大膽告訴你是什麼。我們只要知道他是一個娛樂圈的超級偶像，是不可模仿的。
腦袋裏這麼想著，我不能說我是努力想跟隨他的風格。我也戴雷朋墨鏡，但是因為它們的經典造型。它們很酷，是法國人會說的“巴巴酷”（baba-cool），一種上世紀60年代的時尚風格，有點像“波西米亞風格”。但那就是它們對於我的意義，不是對於他。他是個特別的人。我們有過聯繫，交談過幾次，我之前去過他那裏，許多年前他為《採訪》（Interview）雜誌採訪過我。他是我遇到過最天才、有趣、麻煩纏身和開明的人，真的很有幸可以直接接觸他。但他也很神秘，我不能告訴你墨鏡對於他象徵著什麼，因為他建立起難以跨越的障礙，以免被更深的理解。
關於他的風格，我想我能說的就是，我真正關注的不是表面上的東西，而是他的態度。我看向他的時尚解放感。邁克爾可以做他自己，並表達自己。那是我努力實現的價值，我認為這完全屬於他。關於他的個人風格，他完全在做自己。當你說邁克爾•傑克遜和他的時尚品味，你得知道自己在做什麼，我不確定自己知道。我從他的書上撕下一頁，根據具體情況行事。我們都覺得自己是獨立的個體，當翻閱平時的雜誌看每個人是怎麼看起來像其他人時，這很容易。想真正定義你自己就很少見了：拒絕向批評你的人屈服，頑強地做自己，無論別人說什麼，就是這樣。那就是邁克爾和他的風格，是我真正尊敬的東西。
Pharrell Williams talks us through his childhood obession with Michael Jackson
"The most important thing I have to say about Michael Jackson is that he was an incredibly enlightened, super-intelligent guy who changed the standard for entertainment. My first memory of him is being in front of the TV when I was a child, watching him perform. My mom didn’t have a floor model TV – we had one of the older ones that stood on a stand and I remember running as close to it as I could, totally mesmerised by him. It was the “Let’s Dance Let’s Shout” record and I was glued to the television. It was a phenomenal experience just to watch him perform. From then on, he reinvented the standard of what being an artist was about. I can’t think of anything I’d seen before that point, or that I’ve seen since for that matter, that even comes to being anything like it, musically or visually.
That said, at that age, I never thought about making music inspired by Michael. I didn’t think about making music at all. Thinking like that wasn’t an option. I was in the projects in Virginia – there was no custom of thinking like that. It wasn’t that so-and-so did something and you thought you might do it one day. At that age, in a place like that, you know what you love and what you feel an incredible relationship to. You know that you think music is magical and art is magical and movies are magical, but there isn’t much around to cultivate that magic, to make it even seem like a possibility in your own life. That was part of the amazing thing about Michael. What he did seemed impossibly magical. He was always just something completely special.
Of course, back then, I wasn’t looking at music in an objective way. It was what it was. It didn’t cross my mind to think of Michael comparatively to other artists of the time; it was just an unspoken, undisputed thing that he was inherently different, and something that you did not want to miss. He was definitely the only artist at the forefront of my attention by the time Thriller dropped in 1982, when I was nine. By the time that came out there was no doubt: you wanted to look like him, you wanted to dress like him, you wanted to be able to dance just like him. Not that he hadn’t been impressive like that before: for me, the Off the Wall look was amazing too, the suit, the bow tie and the afro. That was a great style. The point is that he always had really good style. As soon as he left the Jackson Five he was really expressing himself; going to places like Studio 54, meeting people, working to hone the details that improved him. He was studying Walt Disney, developing his love for animation, old films and interesting books, his tremendous style evolving along the way.
He definitely worked out his own vernacular in fashion. He never wore anything by mistake and was literally making a statement every time he got dressed. Could I decode it or decipher it? No, I couldn’t. The thing is, he didn’t do things on a whim. Everything he wore and everything he did was calculated – he knew the reaction he would get and was making intricate statements with it all. I couldn’t tell you what he was thinking. In this image, for example, where he’s boarding a plane in 1988, during the Bad era – which was another amazing time for his style – he’s wearing Ray-Ban Wayfarers and a military jacket. I can tell you that there would have been some complex thought behind it, and that he would have had a statement in mind, but I don’t have the audacity to try and tell you what that is. We just have to walk away knowing that he was a super iconic figure in entertainment, and one that was inimitable.
With that in mind, I can’t say that I’ve ever strived to follow his style in a literal way. I wear Ray-Ban Wayfarers too, for example, but just because of their iconic shape. They’re cool. They’re what the French would call baba-cool, a 1960s fashion term which sort of translates as bohemian. But that’s what they mean to me, not to him. He was a special guy. We were associates, we had a couple of conversations, I visited his place before and he interviewed me for Interview magazine many years back. He was the most talented, interesting, troubled and enlightened human being that I’ve ever come across and indeed been fortunate enough to experience first-hand. But he was also enigmatic. I couldn’t tell you what the sunglasses symbolised for him because he put up incredible barriers, impenetrable parameters that prevented a deeper understanding.
The thing I think I can say I do look towards, in terms of his style, is not anything literal, but just his attitude towards it. I look to his sense of fashion liberation. Michael was a man who felt free to be himself and express himself. That is a value I strive towards and that I attribute to him completely. In terms of his personal style, he has definitely done his own thing. You’ve got to know what you’re doing when you’re talking about Michael Jackson and his fashion taste and I’m not sure I measure up. I’d say I tore a page out of his book in terms of marching to the beat of your own drum, though. As much as we all feel like we’re individuals it’s very easy, when thumbing through the average magazine, to see how everybody kind of really looks like everyone else. The attitude of really defining yourself in that way is a rare thing: refusing to give in to your critics and doggedly doing your own thing, no matter what anyone says, is what it’s all about. That’s what Michael was all about and what his style was all about. It’s something I really respect."
The text are taken from Ray-Ban's book 'Untold Stories: Legends'
"The most important thing I have to say about Michael Jackson is that he was an incredibly enlightened, super-intelligent guy who changed the standard for entertainment. My first memory of him is being in front of the TV when I was a child, watching him perform. My mom didn’t have a floor model TV – we had one of the older ones that stood on a stand and I remember running as close to it as I could, totally mesmerised by him. It was the “Let’s Dance Let’s Shout” record and I was glued to the television. It was a phenomenal experience just to watch him perform. From then on, he reinvented the standard of what being an artist was about. I can’t think of anything I’d seen before that point, or that I’ve seen since for that matter, that even comes to being anything like it, musically or visually.
That said, at that age, I never thought about making music inspired by Michael. I didn’t think about making music at all. Thinking like that wasn’t an option. I was in the projects in Virginia – there was no custom of thinking like that. It wasn’t that so-and-so did something and you thought you might do it one day. At that age, in a place like that, you know what you love and what you feel an incredible relationship to. You know that you think music is magical and art is magical and movies are magical, but there isn’t much around to cultivate that magic, to make it even seem like a possibility in your own life. That was part of the amazing thing about Michael. What he did seemed impossibly magical. He was always just something completely special.
Of course, back then, I wasn’t looking at music in an objective way. It was what it was. It didn’t cross my mind to think of Michael comparatively to other artists of the time; it was just an unspoken, undisputed thing that he was inherently different, and something that you did not want to miss. He was definitely the only artist at the forefront of my attention by the time Thriller dropped in 1982, when I was nine. By the time that came out there was no doubt: you wanted to look like him, you wanted to dress like him, you wanted to be able to dance just like him. Not that he hadn’t been impressive like that before: for me, the Off the Wall look was amazing too, the suit, the bow tie and the afro. That was a great style. The point is that he always had really good style. As soon as he left the Jackson Five he was really expressing himself; going to places like Studio 54, meeting people, working to hone the details that improved him. He was studying Walt Disney, developing his love for animation, old films and interesting books, his tremendous style evolving along the way.
He definitely worked out his own vernacular in fashion. He never wore anything by mistake and was literally making a statement every time he got dressed. Could I decode it or decipher it? No, I couldn’t. The thing is, he didn’t do things on a whim. Everything he wore and everything he did was calculated – he knew the reaction he would get and was making intricate statements with it all. I couldn’t tell you what he was thinking. In this image, for example, where he’s boarding a plane in 1988, during the Bad era – which was another amazing time for his style – he’s wearing Ray-Ban Wayfarers and a military jacket. I can tell you that there would have been some complex thought behind it, and that he would have had a statement in mind, but I don’t have the audacity to try and tell you what that is. We just have to walk away knowing that he was a super iconic figure in entertainment, and one that was inimitable.
With that in mind, I can’t say that I’ve ever strived to follow his style in a literal way. I wear Ray-Ban Wayfarers too, for example, but just because of their iconic shape. They’re cool. They’re what the French would call baba-cool, a 1960s fashion term which sort of translates as bohemian. But that’s what they mean to me, not to him. He was a special guy. We were associates, we had a couple of conversations, I visited his place before and he interviewed me for Interview magazine many years back. He was the most talented, interesting, troubled and enlightened human being that I’ve ever come across and indeed been fortunate enough to experience first-hand. But he was also enigmatic. I couldn’t tell you what the sunglasses symbolised for him because he put up incredible barriers, impenetrable parameters that prevented a deeper understanding.
The thing I think I can say I do look towards, in terms of his style, is not anything literal, but just his attitude towards it. I look to his sense of fashion liberation. Michael was a man who felt free to be himself and express himself. That is a value I strive towards and that I attribute to him completely. In terms of his personal style, he has definitely done his own thing. You’ve got to know what you’re doing when you’re talking about Michael Jackson and his fashion taste and I’m not sure I measure up. I’d say I tore a page out of his book in terms of marching to the beat of your own drum, though. As much as we all feel like we’re individuals it’s very easy, when thumbing through the average magazine, to see how everybody kind of really looks like everyone else. The attitude of really defining yourself in that way is a rare thing: refusing to give in to your critics and doggedly doing your own thing, no matter what anyone says, is what it’s all about. That’s what Michael was all about and what his style was all about. It’s something I really respect."
The text are taken from Ray-Ban's book 'Untold Stories: Legends'
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