In a recent interview for the Guardians, here a pertinent question which get the answer that is deserved!
You recently told Rolling Stone: “I can’t make a wack track because I know what wack is.” But most people panned your 1993 single with Michael Jackson, .
You know, I was dancing around in the clouds with Michael Jackson. However wack anyone thought Whatzupwitu was, there’s not a lot of people that have footage of themselves dancing around in the clouds with Michael Jackson. I do have that for ever.
And obviously you’d known Michael, and imitated him in your standup about a decade before collaborating.
Yeah, I knew Michael for years and years before that track came out. What’s interesting, when you watch that routine from Delirious when I’m doing Michael Jackson jokes, that was actually the first time anybody even did a joke about him. It’s not mean-spirited at all, it’s just all about how he was so sensitive. And then I sang. Michael loved Delirious, it was playful and fun.
How’d that compare to Saturday Night Live, where you imitated Stevie Wonder while stood right beside him?
Michael and Stevie were people that I knew, and they were part of my social circle. I was able to play around and poke fun – they would never get mad. If you look at it, and compare it to the stuff that people are doing now, it’s totally not mean-spirited. And going back to what I was saying, people are allowed to not like something. And maybe a lot of people did think Whatzupwitu was wack, and that’s what’s cool about music: you have a visceral response to it, and you either like it or you don’t, as soon as you hear it. The good thing about that is that if you come with a hot track, they’re gonna like it. So just because somebody didn’t like a track I put out, that never stopped me. I’ve always written, recorded and produced – I never stopped doing it. I stopped putting music out, but I didn’t stop making it. Then it got to now where if you listen to Whatzupwitu and then you listen to Oh Jah Jah, you can tell that I’ve been in the studio working at this.
SOURCE: The Guardian
