Music and Stuff!!!

Tito Jackson of The Jackson 5 died Sunday of a heart attack at age 70 in New Mexico. Jackson breaking his father's guitar string was the catalyst that started The Jackson 5. Joe Jackson discovered his son's musical talent after scolding him for secretly playing his instrument. Mr. Jackson purchased Tito his own guitar and convinced him and his other sons, Jackie and Jermaine, to form a musical group. One year later, in 1964, Marlon and Michael joined the band. The Jackson 5 released their first single, Big Boy," in 1968 on Steeltown Records, a local record label. Joe Jackson managed to get his sons a record deal with Motown in 1969, and from there they became teen sensations thanks to hits like "The Love You Save," "ABC," and "I Want You Back." The Jackson 5 traveled the world and performed for such luminaries as the Queen of England. They were the first boy band, and their success produced Jacksonmania, where fans mobbed them wherever they went. The merchandise built around them included posters, coloring books, stickers, and their own Saturday morning cartoon. Tito Jackson did not play guitar on those Motown records, but he started writing songs, and his instrument was heard on recordings after they signed to CBS in 1976. Fans were treated to his guitar playing when The Jackson 5 performed live. Jackson played with his family throughout their changes from The Jackson 5 to simply The Jacksons. They still toured at the time of his death and were seen on social media last week acknowledging a memorial built for Michael in Munich, Germany. 

As The Jacksons, they had hits in the '70s with "Enjoy Yourself," and "Show You The Way To Go" while they were on the Philadelphia International label. The family also had their own variety show at this time. By the late '70s and early '80s, the group released their big single, "Shake Your Body (Down To The Ground)," and had further hits with "Can You Feel It," "This Place Hotel," and "Lovely One." They continued to release music until their last studio album, 2300 Jackson Street, which came out in 1989. In 1997, they were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. In 1995, Jackson's three sons, T.J., Taj, and Taryll, released their debut album, Brotherhood, as the group 3T.  They were signed to their uncle Michael's MJJ label and mentored by him. 3T was one of the biggest-selling groups in Europe, and their father Tito recorded a Jackson 5 tribute with them. 

In the early 2000s, Jackson embarked on a solo career and started playing in blues clubs with his band. B.B. King also handpicked Jackson to play in his band. Jackson had a hit record, "Get It Baby," with Big Daddy Kane in 2016 from his debut album, Tito Time.  He released his second solo album, Under Your Spell, in 2021. Jackson had recently moved to Claremore, Oklahoma, and had plans for an entertainment center in the Tulsa Arts District, a festival, and a documentary. 

Alan Oldham is what society now calls a multi-hyphenate, but in times past, the term was Renaissance man.

For the past three decades plus, he has been an innovative purveyor of electronic music and a comic book writer and artist extraordinaire. Oldham started his trek as an eclectic art fan during the ‘80s in his Detroit hometown. He combined his love of the German Expressionist movement in film, the clean lines of Art Deco-inspired objects and more to start writing the narrative and visuals for his characters. The first major result was his trench coat-laden hero JOHNNY GAMBIT. Oldham hit paydirt and was signed to Hot Comics out of Chicago in 1986. The company folded soon after and the character would have two more issues published in 1987-88 by Detroit’s Eclectic Press.

Oldham did not have any time to think about the next move for JOHNNY GAMBIT because he was busy creating the cover art for the first Detroit Techno releases from childhood friends like Derrick May and Juan Atkins. These same friends also supplied him with music for his influential Fast Forward radio show being broadcast on WDET. This writer remembers listening to Oldham play Detroit Techno, house music and industrial in the early morning hours as listeners would call in and get an education on the new sounds that have laid the foundation for today’s myriad of electronic artists. He also worked as a DJ for Mike Banks’ sci-fi and funk-dipped techno crew Underground Resistance. As the ‘90s moved on Oldham started making his own music and founded the Generator and Pure Sonik labels.

Today, Oldham is just as excited about creating as he was years ago. A current resident of Berlin, he still travels the world as a DJ and has had art exhibitions in several countries. He is having a rebirth of sorts with JOHNNY GAMBIT and a Kickstarter relaunch. The new graphic novel is bringing GAMBIT back with a remastered 2 CD set. I spoke with Oldham last month shortly after his set at the Charivari Music Festival in Detroit. We talked about GAMBIT, the early days of Detroit Techno, and what it is about the city that drove him to greatness among his many other career-defining moments.

“It just motivates you to push further so that’s one thing about Detroit. It’s not an easy place. No one’s going to pat you on the back and tell you good job. If anything, they will shit on you. So, it motivates you to push forward, to push internationally and outside of the city.“

How did you decide to bring Johnny Gambit back now?

I’d been working on the book for almost 15 years now. I started it in 2007 and it’s been kind of in the back of my mind to bring back JOHNNY. We did a run in the ‘80s and I didn’t get a chance to finish the original story because my publisher(s) went out of business and then time went by so I thought I’d just reboot it completely.

What was your original inspiration for the character?

Well, that’s a really good question. JOHNNY GAMBIT is basically the kitchen sink character for everything I liked at the time; Japanese animation, Japanese Manga, “Miami Vice,” “Love & Rockets,” the movie “Metropolis” by Fritz Lang, Art Deco design, prototype cars that were never made, and there was a comic back in the ‘80s called “Mister X” that was a huge influence.

I saw where Marvel later came out with the character in “Uncanny X-Men” #266.

There was a girl, well, woman now, that I met at the old Chicago Con back in ’86, and we became friends. Turns out she worked for Marvel so we stayed in touch. It turned out I was going to New York for my first visit back in ’87 and she invited me up to visit Marvel. That was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for me ‘cause you got to see the real Mighty Marvel bullpen with your own two eyes. So I got to NYC, went up there and I had a bunch of my old JOHNNY GAMBIT number ones with me and she introduced me to a few of the editors like Archie Goodwin and Carl Potts, and I was just leaving my comic as a calling card.

Fast forward to 1990, I’m at Todd Johnson’s old comic shop in Ferndale, and I notice a character named Gambit with the hair to one side and a trench coat. But they gave him powers and they changed it enough so where you can’t sue them. You know how it is, they take the idea and add just enough to it so they can say hey, we came up with this on our own. But the resemblance was uncanny, no pun intended. So yeah, there’s nothing you can really do about it. At this point, it’s just an interesting story. Read more.

The Real Thing was an anomaly when they emerged in their native England during the '70s as a group singing soulful pop music. The Beatles made Liverpool, England famous one decade earlier with their pop reign aptly named Beatlemania. But The Real Thing's breakthrough in 1976 with their single "You Are My Everything" made the British media dub them "The Black Beatles" since they too came from Liverpool. Their song "Children Of The Ghetto" would later be covered by Phillip Bailey and Mary J. Blige. On April 4th season 14 of AfroPop: The Ultimate Cultural Exchange will air their story with the documentary Everything: The Real Thing Story. Members of the group and British musicians Billy Ocean, Kim Wilde and David Essex discuss The Real Thing's legacy.

AfroPop will broadcast and stream on WORLD channel and stream on worldchannel.org. The series will also stream on WORLD’s YouTube Channel and on all station-branded PBS platforms, including PBS.org and the PBS Video app, available on iOS, Android, Roku streaming devices, Apple TV, Android TV, Amazon Fire TV, Samsung Smart TV, Chromecast and VIZIO.