 |
| Michael Jackson - Thriller |
Michael Jackson - Thriller Lyrics and Youtube Music VideosAlbum:
Thriller Released:
1983 It's close to midnight and something evil's lurking
In the dark
Under the moonlight you see a sight that almost stops
Your heart
You try to scream, but terror takes the sound before
You make it
You start to freeze as horror looks you right between
The eyes
You're paralyzed
'Cause this is
Thriller, thriller night
And no one's gonna save you from the beast about to
Strike
You know it's thriller, thriller night
You're fighting for your life inside a killer
Thriller tonight
You hear the door slam and realize there's nowhere
Left to run
You feel the cold hand and wonder if you'll ever see
The sun
You close your eyes and hope that this is just
Imagination
But all the while you hear the creature creepin' up
Behind
You're out of time
'Cause this is thriller, thriller night
There ain't no second chance against the thing with
Forty eyes
You know it's thriller, thriller night
You're fighting for your life inside a killer
Thriller tonight
Night creatures call
And the dead start to walk in their masquerade
There's no escapin' the jaws of the alien this time
(They're open wide)
This is the end of your life
They're out to get you; there's demons closing in on
Every side
They will possess you unless you change the number on
Your dial
Now is the time for you and I to cuddle close
Together
All through the night I'll save you from the terrors on
The screen
I'll make you see
That it's a thriller, thriller night
'Cause I can thrill you more than any ghost
Would ever dare try
Girl, this is thriller, thriller night
So let me hold you tight and share a killer, diller
Chiller
Thriller here tonight
That it's a thriller, thriller night
'Cause I can thrill you more than any ghost
Would ever dare try
Girl, this is thriller, thriller night
So let me hold you tight and share a killer, diller
Darkness falls across the land
The midnight hour is close at hand
Creatures crawl in search of blood
To terrorize y'awl's neighborhood
And whosoever shall be found
Without the soul for getting down
Must stand and face the hounds of hell
And rot inside a corpse's shell
The foulest stench is in the air
The funk of forty thousand years
And grizzly ghouls from every tomb
Are closing in to seal your doom
And though you fight to stay alive
Your body starts to shiver
For no mere mortal can resist
The evil of the thriller
Writer/s: TEMPERTON, RODNEY LYNN
Publisher: Universal Music Publishing Group
Lyrics licensed and provided by
LyricFindThriller Song Chart This is a rare pop song with a horror theme. Halloween novelty songs like "The Monster Mash" had been around for a while, but this was the first hit song with year-round appeal containing lyrics about creatures of the night who terrify their victim. At the time, Michael Jackson was one of the least frightening people on Earth, so the video had to sell it. John Landis, who worked on the 1981 movie An American Werewolf In London, was brought in to direct. Landis had Jackson turn into a Werewolf in the video. Vincent Price, an actor known for his work on horror films, did the narration at the end of the song, including the evil laugh. Price's rap includes the line "Must stand and face the hounds of hell." This was inspired by the most popular Sherlock Holmes novel to date, The Hound of the Baskervilles by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, in which Sir Henry Baskerville's family is supposedly cursed by a bloodthirsty, demonic hound. Price's personal friends, Peter Cushing and Christopher Lee (who appeared in several horror films with him), starred in a loose 1959 film adaptation of it. It was the first Sherlock Holmes film shot in color.
Price recorded the central spoken section in this sing on his second take, after it had been written by Rod Temperton in the taxi on the way to the studio for the recording session. (thanks, Brett - Edmonton, Canada) The music video is considered the most famous music video of all time, at least by the Library of Congress, which added it to its National Film Registry in 2009, the first music video in their registry.
The video was a cultural milestone, introducing elaborate choreography, costumes and dialogue into the format. It also introduced the concept of the long-form music video, where a mini-movie was made for a song, then edited down for the short version. The long version of "Thriller" runs nearly 14 minutes, but had remarkable longevity, easily racking up over 100 million views when it showed up on YouTube. MTV usually ran the short version, which ran a little under five minutes but still contained about a minute of non-song content in a storyline that omits most of the movie the couple is watching at the beginning.
With its famous graveyard dance, the video started the trend of group dance scenes in pop videos, forcing even non-dancers like Pat Benatar to front a group of dancers in their clips.
The video owes a debt to Alice Cooper, who in 1975 created a movie based on the stage show for his Welcome To My Nightmare tour. Cooper's production was based on an entire album, but it also used a horror theme and was narrated by Vincent Price. Rod Temperton wrote this song. Once a member of disco group Heatwave, he also wrote Jackson's "Off The Wall" and "Rock With You." Most homes had VCRs in 1983 and sales of videos were big business. Along with the Jane Fonda workout tapes, you could buy a VHS or beta copy of Michael Jackson's Thriller, which included the full video and also "The Making of Michael Jackson's Thriller," a behind the scenes documentary. This tape became the best selling music video at the time, and was later certified by Guinness World Records as the top selling music video of all time, moving nine million units. Part of its appeal was the price, a mere $24.95 at a time when movies on tape cost much more.
The video distribution deal was through a company called Vestron, who approached John Landis about selling the film directly to consumers, which turned out to be very profitable. The timing helped, as the video was released a few weeks before Christmas. The video won for Best Performance Video, Best Choreography, and Viewers Choice at the first MTV Video Music Awards in 1984. The show was hosted by Dan Aykroyd and Bette Midler. Thriller is by far the best selling album in the world. In the United States, it was overtaken by The Eagles Their Greatest Hits 1971-1975, but reclaimed the title after Jackson's death. This was the last of seven US Top 10 hits from the Thriller album. The first single from the album, "The Girl Is Mine," reached its peak chart position of #2 on January 8, 1983. The song "Thriller" was released over a year later, on January 23, 1984, peaking at #4 on March 3. This lifespan of chart singles from one album was unprecedented, but so was the video for "Thriller." The clip was so effective that after six singles and a year of release, it boosted yet another track from the album into the Top 10. It also brought the album back to #1 on December 24, 1983 - it lost the top spot on September 17 to Synchronicity by The Police. Thriller held the peak position until April 21, 1984, over a year after it first went to #1 on February 26, 1983. Jackson, who was a Jehova's Witness at the time, insisted on a disclaimer at the beginning of the video reading: "Due to my strong personal convictions, I wish to stress that this film in no way endorses a belief in the occult." He asked for the disclaimer after taking criticism from Witness leaders who objected to the zombies and other creatures that violated their beliefs.
The whole Jackson clan was raised as Jehova's Witnesses, but unlike Scientology, celebrities do not get excessive special treatment, and followers were asked not to idolize Jackson, as adulation should be given only to God. After further conflict, Jackson cut ties with the Jehova's Witnesses in 1987. The video cost about $500,000 to make, and Jackson's record company had intention of paying for it, since the album was on the downswing and they had already financed videos for two of its songs. According to John Landis, Jackson really wanted to turn into a monster, so he offered to pay for the clip himself. Landis took on the project because he saw it as a way to revive the short film genre, which he loved.
Jackson didn't have to pay for the video out of pocket because they made deals with Showtime and MTV to cover the costs. Showtime got to air a one-hour special with the "making of" documentary and the 14-minute film before it was broadcast anywhere else. When MTV heard about this, their executive Bob Pittman decided that losing a Michael Jackson video to Showtime was unacceptable, and paid $250,000 for the exclusive broadcast rights once Showtime's window ended. MTV was founded on the principle of not paying for videos, so Pittman got around this by paying for the documentary, even though the money was really used to pay for the film. Because of a disagreement over royalties, Vincent Price's rap was not included in the 7" single version of the recording. Vincent Price, while a guest on the Johnny Carson's Tonight Show, laughingly stated that when he did the narration for "Thriller" (at the request of Michael Jackson who was a big fan of Price) he had a choice between taking a percentage of the album sales or $20,000. Price was well along in his career, so he took the $20,000. He was good-natured about it when Carson told him he could have made millions off of the royalties due to the vast number of copies sold even at that time. Price laughed heartily and said: "How well I know!" (thanks, Jonnie - St. Louis, MO) Before the 14-minute short film of Thriller aired on Showtime or MTV, it was screened at the Metro Crest Theater in Los Angeles. This screening took place on November 14, 1983, in was a gathering of stars, including Diana Ross and Eddie Murphy. In 2008 Thriller 25, a special 25th anniversary edition of Thriller, was released. The re-recorded album debuted at #2 on the Top Comprehensive Albums chart, where catalog titles mix with current best-sellers. This made it the highest-charting catalog album in the history of the Top Comprehensive Albums survey. Despite selling 166,000 copies in its debut week, it was not eligible for the main album chart as Billboard considered it to be a catalog or oldies album, and Billboard publishes a special chart just for catalog albums. The version of the song in the video is different from the one on the album, which you need to account for if you're planning to stage a Thriller Dance. On the album, the song begins with a series of spooky sound effects that don't lend themselves to dancing.
Editing the song for the video was a challenge, since producer Quincy Jones wouldn't release the master tapes. In the book I Want My MTV, John Landis explains how they got around this restriction. "The song was five minutes long, and I needed it to be 12 minutes for the video," he said. "So Michael and I went to the recording studio at three in the morning. We walked past the guard - 'Hi, Michael.' 'Hi' - put the tracks in a big suitcase and walked out with them. Then we drove across Hollywood, duped them, and put them back." Originally this song was going to be called "Starlight Love" and on some demos its titled "Starlight Sun." In the UK this has become something of a chart perennial, regularly charting each year in time for Halloween. Rod Temperton recalled that when he wrote this song he envisaged "this talking section at the end and didn't know really what we were going to do with it. But one thing I 'd thought about was to have a famous voice in the horror genre to do the vocal. Quincy (Jones, producer)'s wife knew Vincent Price, so Quincy said to me, 'How about if we got Vincent Price?'" (Source Q magazine August 2009).