Michael Jackson
Michael began his musical career at the age of 5 as the lead singer of the Jackson 5, in the early days Michael would be at the same clubs as big talented stars of there days, such as Jackie Wilson and would be learning from them even back then.In 1968 the Bobby Taylor and The Vancouvers discovered the Jackson five and from there they got an audition for Berry Gordy of Motown Records. The Jackson 5 signed for Motown and moved to California. Their first 4 singles, "I Want You Back", "ABC", "The Love You Save", and "I'll Be There" all made US No1 hits. The Jackson 5 recorded 14 albums and Michael recorded 4 solo albums with Motown. The Jackson 5 stayed with Motown until 1976, wanting more artistic freedom they felt they had to move on and signed up with Epic. The group name Jackson 5 had to be changed as it was owned by Motown, so they reverted to The Jacksons as they had be known in the early days. Brother Jermaine married Berry Gordy's daughter and stayed with Motown. Youngest brother Randy joined in his place. The Jacksons had a number of hit records and in total made 6 albums between the years of 1976 and 1984. Michael teamed up with Quincey Jones as his producer for his first solo album with Epic Records. The album titled Off The Wall was a big success around the world and the first ever album to release a record breaking 4 No. 1 singles in the US. In 1984 Michael won a record breaking 8 Grammy awards in one night. The awards were for his work on the Thriller album and his work on the narrative for the ET Storybook. In 1987 Michael released his much awaited third solo album, titled Bad, and lauched his record breaking first solo world tour. 1988, Michael wrote his first autobiography, Moonwalk, talking for the first time on his childhood and his career. At the end of the 1980s Michael was named 'Artist Of The Decade' for his success off of his Thriller and Bad albums. In 1991 Michael signed with Sony Music the largest ever recording contract and released his fourth solo album, Dangerous. He toured world again in 1992, taking his concerts to countries that had never before been visited by a pop/rock artist. Also Michael founded the 'Heal the World Foundation' to help improve the lives of children across the world. 1995 saw Michael release a fifth solo album, HIStory, which was a double album, first half new material and second half half greatest hits. Michael toured again over a legs covering a 2 year period. In October 2001 Michael released the album Invincible releasing only 2 singles including the big hit "You Rock My World". Shortly after the albums release there were rumours of a rift with Sony Music and a clear lack of promotion of the album. The second single "Cry" was released with a very poor music video which did not feature Michael and no other singles were released. In November 2003 a new single "One More Chance" was released as a single and was also a track on new compilaition album Number Ones. In March 2009, Michael annouced a shock comeback tour at the O2 Arena in London to start in July 2009, intially for 10 dates but the total grew to a sold out 50 dates with over 750,000 tickets sold. All sold tickets sold out within minutes of being released. On June 25th 2009 Michael Jackson died suddenly of a reported cardiac arrest. He was 50 years old.
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