BLACK OR WHITE

"Black or
White" is a single by American singer-songwriter Michael Jackson.
The song was released by Epic Records on
November 11, 1991 as the firstsingle from Jackson's eighth studio album, Dangerous. It was
written, composed and produced by Michael Jackson and Bill Bottrell.

"Black or
White" was written, composed and produced by Michael Jackson and Bill
Bottrell,^[2] and
was picked as the first single from the album Dangerous. An
alternate version was first heard by Sony executives on a trip to Neverland, as
the third track of the Promo (Flight Only) CD
Acetate. It began to be promoted on radio stations the first week of November
1991 in New York and Los Angeles.^[2][3] "Black
or White" was officially released one week later, on November 5, 1991.^[3] The
song has elements of dance, rap and hard rock music
such as Bill Bottrell's guitars and Jackson's vocal style.^{[4][5][6][7][8][9]} The song's main riff is often falsely attributed to Guns N' Roses guitarist Slash.
His guitar work is featured in the opening skit for the song's track on the
album.^[10]

"Black or
White" entered Billboard's Hot
100 at number thirty five.^[11] A
week later it shot up to number three and on its third week, December 7, 1991,
it ascended to number one, making it the fastest chart topper since the Beatles'
"Get Back"
also won the Hot 100 in just three weeks in 1969.^[11][12] It
achieved the year at number one, and remained at the top of the singles chart
into 1992, for a total of seven weeks, making Michael Jackson the first artist
to get number one popular hits in the 1970s, 1980s and 1990s.^[12] In
the UK, the single became the first single by an American to go into the singles
chart at number one since 1960, when "It's Now Or Never" by Elvis Presley did
in the same manner.^[11] Around
the world, "Black or White" hit number one in the US, UK, Canada,
Mexico, Cuba, Zimbabwe, Australia, New Zealand, Austria, Belgium, Denmark,
Finland, France, Israel, Italy, Norway, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and
the Euro Chart Hot 100, number two in Germany and
number three in Holland.^[11][12] The
single was certified platinum in
the US, selling over one million copies.^[12]

Reviews of the song
varied. Rolling Stone's Allan Light in
his Dangerous review,
compares the song unfavourably to "Beat It":
"Neither this slow-burn solo nor the Stones-derived riff on 'Black or
White' offers the catharsis of Eddie Van Halen's blazing break on 'Beat
It'".^[10]

The music video for
"Black or White" was first broadcast on MTV, BET, VH1, and Fox (giving them their highest Nielsen ratings ever)^[14] on
November 14, 1991.^[15] Along
with Jackson, it featured Macaulay Culkin, Tess Harper,
and George Wendt. It helped usher in morphing as
a new technology in music videos. The sequence begins with extra, Let Mon Lee,
and features supermodel Tyra Banks and actress Cree Summer.^[16] The
video was directed by John Landis, who previously directed Thriller. It premiered simultaneously
in 27 countries, with an audience of 500 million viewers, the most to ever
watch a music video.^[17]

The first few
minutes of the video featured an extended version of the song's intro, during
which a 10 year old kid (Macaulay Culkin) is dancing to rock music in
his bedroom at night. This attracts the attention of his father (George Wendt),
who furiously orders him to stop playing the music and go to bed. Culkin
complies by setting up large speaker cabinets behind his father's reclining
chair, donning leather gloves and sunglasses, and playing a power chord,
setting on an electric guitar.^[14] The
sound then shatters and destroys the house windows and sends his father (seated
in the chair) halfway around the world, where the actual song begins.^[14] The
kid's mother (Tess Harper), comments that his father will be very unhappy
when he gets back. The album version of the song does not feature Culkin's nor
Wendt's voice; they are replaced by voice actors performing a similar intro.
Wendt crashes in Africa, and Jackson sings "Black or White",
surrounded by various cultures scene-by-scene.^[15]

The video shows
scenes in which African hunters begin dancing using moves from West
African dance, Jackson follows their moves and then they mirror his; as do, in
sequence, traditional Thai dancers, Plains Native Americans, a
woman from India and a group of Russians.^[14] Jackson
walks through visual collages of fire (defiantly declaring "I ain't scared
of no sheets; I ain't scared of nobody"), referring to KKK torch
ceremonies before a mock rap scene shared with Culkin and other children.^[15] The
group collectively states, "I'm not gonna spend my life being a
color." The final verse is performed by Jackson on a large sculpted torch,
which the camera pans out to reveal as the Statue of
Liberty. Jackson is seen singing on Lady Liberty's torch surrounded
by other famous world edifices including The Giza Sphinx, Hagia Sophia, The Parthenon, Taj Mahal, St. Basil's Cathedral, Pyramids of Giza, Golden Gate Bridge, Big Ben and
the Eiffel Tower. At the end of the song, different
people dance as they morph into one another (shown as "talking
heads"). This technique, previously executed without digital assistance in
the Godley & Creme video for "Cry", known as morphing, had been
previously used only in films such as Willow and Terminator 2. The morphing visual
effects were created by Pacific Data Images. Jackson's niece, Brandi Jackson,
daughter of Jackie Jacksonmakes a cameo appearance in the
video.^[11] Wade Robson also
makes an appearance in this music video as well as Another Bad Creation's, Mark and Dave.

The music video of
the song appear on the video albums: Dangerous - The Short Films (long
version), Video Greatest Hits - HIStory (long
version), Number Ones (short version), and Michael Jackson's Vision (long
version).

Controversy was
generated concerning the last four minutes of the original music video. Jackson
walks out of the studio as a black panther and
then morphs into himself.^[15] Then
he walks outside to perform some of his most physically complicated dance
techniques, in a similar way to "Billie Jean".
This part contained sexually suggestive scenes when Jackson starts to grab his
crotch,^[14] and
then zips his pants up. In the original version, Jackson is seen smashing
windows,^[14] destroying
a car and causing an inn (called the "Royal Arms") to explode.
Jackson later apologized saying that the violent and suggestive behavior was an
interpretation of the animal instinct of a black panther, and MTV and other
music video networks removed the last four minutes from subsequent broadcasts.^[15] To
make the vandalism and violence more understandable to viewers, racial messages
were digitally added using CGI graffiti to the windows that
Jackson smashes. They are, "Hitler Lives" on
the passenger window with a swastika on the driver's window, "Nigger Go
Home" (the 3 G's form the 666) on the car's back window, "No
More Wetbacks" on the windshield,
and "KKK Rules" on the store door.
The version included in the boxset "Michael Jackson's Vision" is the
original uncut, uncensored version without the digital
graffiti, and does not include the "prejudice is ignorance" title
card.

To date, the uncut
version has generally been seen in the United States on MTV2 only between the
hours of 01:00 and 04:00, as part of their special uncensored airing of the
"Most Controversial Music Videos" of all time. The extended version
is also available on Jackson's DVDs. The original version (without graffiti) is
available on the VHS and Laserdisc releases of Video Greatest Hits – HIStory with
the DVD release containing the "racist graffiti version", and online
at MTVMusic.com. On Sunday, November 29, 2009, the FUSE cable
channel aired the original version of "Black or White" (without
graffiti) on its two-hourRemember His Time tribute wherein most of
Jackson's music videos were played.

It was still shown
in its entirety for some years in Europe.
Indeed, UK channel MTV Classic aired
the full video at 14:00 in the afternoon on April 11, 2010, including the brief
cameo by Bart and Homer Simpson before
the "prejudice is ignorance" image. The version available in
the iTunes Music Store contains neither the
panther scene nor the Simpsons cameo, and is cut after the
morphing sequence.

Starting in 1992,
Nocturne Video Productions began playing the "Panther Segment" of the
video as an interlude during Michael's Dangerous World tour. The clip is 20
seconds shorter than the original with all the violence and the sexually
suggestive scenes removed.^[15] However,
the part where he re-zipped his pants was kept in. On March 28, 2009, the Australian Broadcasting Corporation's
music video program Rage aired
the uncensored, non-graffiti original version in its entirety in a 720p digital
broadcast. In January 2011, FUSE on Demand has the full video (without
graffiti) for Comcast On Demand until February 28, 2011. Even though the short,
censored version continues to air periodically to this day, some television
channels still air the complete version but with the racist graffiti in it.