Michael Jackson Graces Cover Of Vibe Magazine

You want to see something scary. Check out Michael Jackson in his first fashion spread since he was little baby Jackson prancing around in teen magazines in bell-bottoms and colorful polyester shirts. The spread is in the new issue of Vibe, the hiphop magazine controlled by music producer Quincy Jones.

Vibe is known for cover interviews and profiles of the leading lights of rap and rhythm & blues. So when a visitor in my office noticed the latest cover, his reaction was: “What’s a white person doing on the cover of Vibe?”

But that was no white person. It was Michael Jackson, and let me tell you, skin disease or no skin disease, this man is the freak of the week.

In the spread, Jackson’s hair has been straightened and curled at the ends. His skin is so light it’s luminous. His surgically enhanced eyes are bright and doelike. He looks for all the world like he is an embalmed man from ancient Egypt suddenly come to life.

Now let’s talk about the duds. Mr. Thriller did set some trends in his day. Remember when a kazillion kids rushed out to buy the red-and-black leather coat from the video of his 1983 hit, “Thriller”?

But let’s face it, there are not many people who think much of Jackson’s looks in recent years. This is a man who kept a well-oiled Jheri curl long, long after even the most stylebackwards people dropped it. And this is also a man who wore tight black pants so often one wondered if he moonlighted (or moonwalked) as a bullfighter.

Still, for Quincy, Jackson’s longtime friend and collaborator, the gloved one consented to strike a few poses in the oversized youthful looks of Tommy Hilfiger, Phat Farm and Diesel. It’s a sad spread because Jackson is, at 36, too old to be wearing the hip-hop wardrobe, too fey to be adopting the posture of rap artists and just too out of his own skin to relate to the clothes, let alone the viewer.

There is one arresting photo. The first page features a head-andshoulders shot of Jackson wearing a brown leather coat with the collar pulled up on his chin. Jackson looks like a high fashion model, say Claudia Schiffer.

Jackson wasn’t interviewed for the story, but his wife and assorted friends and collaborators had plenty of good things to say about him.