World Music Awards 2006 – What REALLY happened!

If being a Michael fan was a legible job, I often wonder what would be in it’s description; loyal defend? campaigner? supporter? justice fighter? All come with the element of being ready for battle. As a fan it’s become our recognised role to fiercely defend Michael whenever and where ever possible and more importantly, to set the record straight in the face of lies and fabrication.

As today is the 11th anniversary of the show, I felt it the perfect opportunity to finally set the record straight about something that well and truly made want to scream. The subject? The World Music Awards 2006 and the wide spread claims that Michael was ‘booed off stage,’ which is 100%, categorically untrue and I know this because I was there. Sadly what is the greatest day of my life, second only to the day I met Michael, which co incidentally was the day after the world music awards, was ultimately a catastrophic day for Michael and in order for me to debunk the booing claims I need to outline the events that led up to the claim.

In the weeks leading up to the show, it was rumoured in the press that Michael would be attending the World Music Awards which was set for Earls Court London on November 15th, 2006. Using some very helpful insiders, I was able to confirm that Michael was 100% confirmed to attend and it was seen to that my friends and I were able to purchase tickets before they went on sale.

Finally, the news was out, Michael was coming and tickets sold out in record speed. Understanding the fans, Michael himself put a down payment on 200 £30 tickets that were available only to the fans. This was his very public return and he wanted his fans there. The press circuit persisted with its stories of Michael performing and honestly, it was the longest 2 weeks to wait until show day.

When show day arrived, the tension among the fans was at fever pitch. Everybody just wanted it to be time for the doors to open and the atmosphere was no less intense as we queued to enter Earls Court. Ours was the first block in and Rihanna was still sound checking so after we’d taken our seats, we were asked to leave again and were held in the corridors surrounding the main arena. We were taken in to be seated once more and before we even had the chance to sit, we were again taken out as the ‘show isn’t ready yet’. After an hour, we were eventually able to take our seats and watch fans from across the arena file in. The feeling was electric! Having been outside Michael’s hotel all night, I was so tired I fell asleep only to be awoken by the sound of a guitar and Beyonce shouting ‘World Music Awards!!!!’ I jumped out of my seat and the stage was lit with….then the lights went out and we waited 25 minutes before anything happened. Eventually Beyonce returned shouting ‘World Music Awards’ and we were off! However, a smooth sailing this was not and with more stop starts than a game of Rugby, the show had been filming for just over an hour and we’d had 2 performances and 2 awards. This was mainly due to Lindsay Lohan being the presenter and ultimately being unable to present! It seems after various attempts the show organisers just ditched her and used the voice over instead.

Despite all of this, it was still not enough to dampen the enthusiasm for Michael.

Each time an artist came out to perform, won an award or was on stage to present. The fans chanted for Michael. Singer Katie Melua was visibly angry when on winning an award the entire auditorium chanted “Michael, Michael, Michael” and it wasn’t long before people taking to the stage realised that they could only win us over by mentioning Michael’s name.
Eventually Chris Brown came out to perform Thriller and through out the performance many of us high anticipation for Michael’s appearance on stage, yet it didn’t come. What was evident is after hours waiting, we were clearly in ‘the Michael section’ of the show and he would be coming soon. He eventually arrived on stage to an over-whelmed crowd, received his award along with a passionate speech and with a tiny dance move, he was gone.

Following his exit from the stage, the fans were ready and the chants kicked in “Michael, Michael, Michael” rang out from every single pair of lips in that arena. Then the voice over came to life “Now Ladies and Gentlemen would you please give it up for….Rihanna!” I’m sorry, WHAT?! Rihanna? NO! We want Michael. As Rihanna appeared under a spotlight on the stage the entire audience let out a chorus of boos. We’d just had Michael, we were expecting his performance (something those inside were unaware he’d denied on the red carpet outside) and you give us Rihanna. We were not a happy crowd and so we booed. We booed Rihanna, we booed the organisers, we booed the voice over, the one person we wasn’t booing was Michael! We wanted him on stage and no one else!

To her credit Rihanna went on to perform the entire song, although she looked visibly pissed off, something that wasn’t edited out of the playback. And yes, in hindsight I’ll agree, it was unfair of us to boo her, it wasn’t her fault where she was positioned on the bill and I’m sure Michael wouldn’t have approved of us booing a fellow performer. However, to put in to context, we’d waited HOURS as segments were re-filmed, sets were changed and Lindsay Lohan continued to fuck up. We were of the belief that Michael Jackson was going to perform, for us, for the first time in years! And after you’ve had him on stage for 3 minutes, you wanted him back and no one or nothing was going to be good enough. We’d have probably booed the Queen if she’d have walked out at that moment. Following Rihanna’s performance, Lindsay Lohan returned to the stage to a further chorus of boos from the entire arena. It’s safe to assume had she not introduced Michael to the stage at that moment, she’d have been sacrificed by the MJ hungry crowd.

When Michael did walk on to the stage the applause was thunderous! Shaking hands with some of the choir, he took his place and sang his line “We are the World, we are the children”. With that line complete, the response was so deafening that it was hard to hear the next. All around me people were crying, screaming and cheering hysterically, it’s like nothing I’ve ever experienced and was mirrored closely 3 years later at the This Is It London Press Conference. If there was one rogue person booing in a remote corner of the arena, they were about as recognisable as a droplet of water in the Mediterranean Sea! Frankly put, there was no booing. Not for Michael.

The aftermath saw fans outside hugging, crying and chants of “King of Pop” ringing outside of Earls Court, we were agreed that it was short, yes, but Michael was amazing! By the next hour most were outside Michael’s hotel where we cheered him as he came to the window, he looked happy and was bobbing to our chants and…Kissing a mystery woman on the cheek. It was absolutely wild!

At 3am we went to grab the paper and they indeed confirmed that Michael was back and wowed the World Music Awards. I bought them all (for the pictures) and tried to get a few hours sleep. Awaking at 10am, which is not good, especially when Michael was in town, there was just enough time to wash, eat some beans on toast and head out to the hotel. On route we stopped in the shop for supplies and in horror we saw the front cover of the papers had CHANGED!

They suggested that Michael had disappointed the fans to the point where we had booed him off stage. In the following days the press ran with the story claiming that fans had had enough of Michael and that many walked out of the awards in protest. All complete fabrications, all lies.

It was 2 years later that I decided to talk to people about the World Music Awards and understand what happened. One thing I kept thinking was this; there is a grand, glittered stair case the performers were coming down on yet Michael comes on from a side curtain with his chief of security in tow. That’s not the actions of a Michael Jackson performance. Also when he walks on to the stage he appears to be already singing, although nothing is heard. He walks up to the choir shakes hands and looks visibly lost, yet ever the show man is just going with the flow. I spoke with 2 sources who spent the entire evening with Michael as part of his entourage and they told me that, Michael was correct, the performance claims were a rumour, that he had not agreed to perform, although useless spokespeople had failed to set the record straight. The story goes that Michael returned to the wing of the stage to watch what he believed to be a tribute to him, only to be greeted with the sound of a 60,000 crowd chanting his name having been introduced by Lindsay Lohan. Michael looks confused as he’s handed a microphone and his manager steps in telling Michael they were leaving and telling WMA producers that they will sue for this! I’m then told that Michael insisted that the fans were calling him and he couldn’t disappoint them. Meanwhile, we are the world has been playing out for over a minute with fans looking left and right, everyone asking “Where is he?, what’s going on?”. Eventually Michael appears from that side curtain and the performance plays out. It’s my understanding that Michael was tricked into performing and organisers had held this fundamental point from him until it was too late to turn back. My source then told me that Michael was raging in the car on the way back to his hotel continually asking “Why would they do this to me??!”

Suddenly everything was falling in to place; the fact he entered from the stage side, the fact security joined him on stage as they’d obviously not planned for this, the fact the event program was cancelled but when it became available on ebay some months later, lists Michael as a performer, the fact Michael was so unsure of what was going on he walked around the stage shaking hands and throwing his jacket in to the crowd. Then at the end you see him asking where he’s meant to exit. Also
there were no rehearsals as fans followed him everywhere in the days leading up to the show.

But Michael being Michael put on a show, sharing his voice with the world publicly for the very last time. And it was beautiful…and very loud (despite what the press claimed after) he smiled at the end and looked genuinely happy with the adulation he was receiving. The crowd were a mixture of screams and tears. I was on the floor.

Later claims by an author of a ‘pro’ MJ Book would also offer that Michael was a mess before entering the stage, in a ball on the floor in front of Beyoncé, crying and delirious, this was also branded ‘absolute rubbish’ by those I spoke to who were with Michael. They informed me that he was a bit annoyed because he was constantly called for his awards acceptance and each time he and his entourage arrived at the stage they were told that they were not ready for him yet and he’d have to return to the dressing room, but there were no tears, no laying on the floor and absolutely no drugs!

Naturally being a fan of Michael, it doesn’t take an expert to establish a lie from the truth, but this was the first time is seen and experienced first hand just how much the media are willing to fabricate to meet their own agenda. It was extremely distressing for all involved. This was Michael’s return to the European stage for the first time since the trial and since the Brits in 1996 where things were also unfortunate for him. To suggest that we would boo him was a low blow especially due to the real response he received. Obviously the TV playback was edited beyond belief. They completely overdubbed all the ‘Michael Michael’ chants for each artists and took out the boos for Rihanna, but one thing they couldn’t change was the footage of the fans crying, screaming and smiling.

What’s most irritating is that, as per usual, nobody was held to account for the false booing claims, journalists were not made to retract their story and so to quote a line from ‘Billie Jean’…”the lie becomes the truth” and sadly, it has by and large stayed that way. But as we continue to strengthen and honour Michael’s legacy, it’s important to set the record straight as and where we can. I hope for this issue, one can now say that for the purpose of knowledge, this record has been well and truly straightened.

Pez Jax

Source: MJVibe.com

This article has been edited and reproduced from Issue 19 of Iconic Magazine. Please do not copy or translate without permission of the author. Thank you.