we are the world

shut it.

i already know i'm gonna sound like the old crone, wheezing on: "back when i was a little noodle, i had to walk to school, uphill both ways, in the snow, no boots. mastodons and the jersey devil chased me to eat my homework (that was TYPED on onionskin PAPER!) and hookman drove the school bus."

i don't know if it's possible for anybody under 30 to understand the universality of the dead folks in my last post.

the average american home had one tv and there were only 3 major broadcast networks. evening news, local, than national, ran from 6-8. prime time tv was 8-11, and the more grown-up shows, like dallas, were on after 10. cable tv was scarce and did not have independent programming. this meant there were only 3 programs airing at any one time, from which to maximize, or negotiate, your viewing pleasure. so, after dinner was washed up and if your homework was finished, you sat in the den with your family and watched tv. lack of remote controls and viewing options meant no channel surfing. vcr's were not yet on the market, so you watched it live, or you missed it.

over 20 million households watched "all in the family" every week, for 5 years of its run.

shows like m*a*s*h, charlie's angels and laverne & shirley scored way up there too.

over 100 million viewers watched the series finale of m*a*s*h.

85% of all american households watched some or all of "roots", which ran for 8 consecutive nights.

johnny carson was the ONLY late night talk show on tv, so generations grew up watching ed back him up, night after night.

there were no dvr's or vcr's. no hbo, bravo or cnn. no internet. no video games. (pong got old, very fast, trust me.)

my mom may have been ironing or mending or sucking back a big tall vodka rocks, but she knew who the meathead was and same with lenny and squiggy. even if she wasn't really "watching", ya know?

am radio stations outnumbered fm more than 2 to 1 in the 70s, and long-format was in its infancy. satellite radio? huh? satellites were looking at the moon back then.

michael jackson sold more albums than anybody except elvis presley. "thriller" sold over 40 million copies. that album, and the video with 9 million units sold, remain the biggest selling of each of all time.

mtv didn't broadcast its first video until august, 1981. (yeah, we all remember who was 1st, but do you remember that pat benatar got 2nd play? "you better run", for the win, tyvm for playing.)

michael jackson was the 1st black artist played on mtv and that wasn't until "billie jean" in 1983. the video that killed radio? (well after they refused to air rick james who was topping the charts and rightfully bitching how racist the honchos were.)

mj, along with lionel richie, wrote "we are the world". 45 artists sing on that record. (madonna was invited but turned them down.)

over 12 million of those farrah swimsuit posters got sold. she posed at her house, and chose a one-piece to hide a childhood abdominal scar. (no word on how she got so nippley though.)

unless you were amish or mormon, did you not see "jaws", "star wars" and "rocky"?

80 years of radio and 40 years of television, most of us shared our evenings. our dads (stepdads, whatevah) worked 9-5, paused at the water cooler or coffee nook and had a smoke; we opened our lunch boxes and laughed about archie and his hebes or the fumbles of hot lips houlihan and frank burns. i don't have a single friend (of my age, ahem) who didn't see carol burnett as scarlett with the green velvet curtain rod dress and golden tassel hat or kojack's lollipop.

for those with vested interests, there is much gnashing of teeth and waving of battered wallets for the ongoing media splintering. the modes and options are staggering. the old record industry is dead, regardless that the record companies try to clobber the new organic model into submission. that singing genie is not getting stuffed back into the victrola box.

the viewing options for media boggles the mind of an ol' gal like me. (who wants to watch exploding mayhem on a tiny pc or handheld pda screen? yet, kids do.) i race along with net gossip and celeb news yet have little context and zero knowledge about who many of these plastic celebs might be. (audrina partridge? speidi? hayden panetierre? the american idol factory of belters? and that last, i know i'm a freak, cuz it seems like everybody watches that. between gaiken and glambert and who's the fat chick who now looks like meatloaf? i could care less. dunno what they even sound like.)

i'm not longing for back in the day. don't get me wrong. i loves me some tivo. but i can't help wonder if there is an assumption and tacit acceptance of greater difference between us all, than there once was, and that really is. if that's the fuel for the fire of red vs. blue and me vs. you.

then again, the breaking news of mj's death yesterday crashed twitter and aol instant messenger. google stalled and wikipedia froze for over 20 minutes. amazon downloads for his music rose over 700%. yeah. 700% , plus. cnn on-line and such had double their normal traffic. flowers, stuffed animals and scrawled papers got stuffed in fences from his childhood home in gary, IN, to the american embassy in moscow.

i dare you not to tap your foot to "abc", or "that girl is mine".

laughter, sex and music. they speak to all the world.