With Halloween around the corner, a local radio station in L.A. is trying to break the world record for the biggest Thriller danceoff ever.  I’d heard it about for awhile but at this point I feel like I’ve done more than my part to pay tribute to his memory.  I still don’t plan to see ‘This Is It’ in the theaters; I just don’t see how it can possibly measure up to the experience that was being at the memorial. 

Anyway as I was driving home from work tonight, I hear them hyping up the final rehearsals for this event tomorrow.  I don’t have anything too big planned for the evening, and I haven’t had the greatest week, so I’m mildly interested.  Then they announce the rehearsals are going to be literally a few blocks from my pad.  I mouth the words “Nah,” but the mischievous little boy grin is already creeping on my face.  No way I can make the actual dance-off Saturday, but as far as tonight goes, why not?  I talk a good game but it’s been awhile; how much of the Thriller routine do I still know (and more importantly, how much of it will my body still do)?

So I put on some comfortable clothes and head down to the dance studio.  There were two ‘classes’ if you will; the beginners class for those who needed to be baby stepped into the basics of rhythm, and the smaller room for the people who knew the dance who just needed to be refreshed.  I think we all knew which room I confidently walked into.  So it’s me, a few other guys, and a lot of women who in their dress and attitude appear to be professionally trained dancers.  No pressure. 

So we go through the routine the first time, and it is a 6 minute routine.   You know how in the video Mike is dancing with Ola Ray for the first five minutes?  Yeah, we didn’t do that part.  It was a 6 minute zombie routine.  So the first couple times through, it was a lot of “Oh we’re busting out the zombie step here,” and “Man, was that move really that fast in the video?”  Once we broke up the routine into smaller sections, well, it was over.  I was throwing jazz hands like nobody’s business!  Relearning that routine in two hours made me wonder how hard I could freak it if I had a couple days or weeks to rehearse it.  Very, very, very much like step practice for those of you who came through the BGLO system as I did.  I’m not in the best shape of my life, but I feel pretty damn good for my age (only my knees are begging to be iced).

Speaking of my age, I was 6 or 7 when that video came out?  But I remember it clearly; I was actually scared to watch it by myself initially so my Pops watched it with me.  My point is that I was there; I remember when it all went down with that video.  Half the people learning the routine with me were high schoolers, a couple kids younger than that.  There’s no way they lived through it; they’re experiencing this side of Michael as part of the history of pop culture and enjoying it.  Honestly the vast majority of the people in there weren’t even black; there were Latinos, the head choreographer was this white girl, there were some Asians in there, it was the melting pot.  MJ probably would have loved it.  I heard him say in this interview once that entertainers can be more powerful than politicians, because we can bring people together.  Well, if anybody’s art in my lifetime continues to do that, it’s his.

Anyway for those of you who are going to be out there tomorrow in the sun in your zombie outfits working it out, handle it!  I’m sure I’ll see you on the news.