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AFP
Published: Tue, February 12, 2008 - 10:33 am
Last Updated: Tue, February 12, 2008 - 10:40 am
Last Updated: Tue, February 12, 2008 - 10:40 am
The best-selling album of all time, Michael Jackson's Thriller, is to be re-released this week, 25 years after first appearing with its success and popularity still unchallenged.
The album made Michael Jackson the undisputed pop artist of the modern age and the Thriller video introduced the world to break-dancing back-from-the-dead monsters whose moves inspired a generation.
Having already sold an estimated 55 million copies according to the latest Guinness Book of Records, anniversary copies of the album and videos are to hit shelves worldwide on Monday and Tuesday.
With the music industry in crisis and sales of albums declining due to Internet downloads, the records set by Thriller in the 1980s appear safe from competition.
It spent eighty weeks in the US top ten album chart, was certified 27 times platinum (27 million sales) in the country and was and still is the only album to have been a best-seller in the United States for two consecutive years (1983 and 1984).
It went platinum or diamond in 27 other countries, including Britain, France and Japan; out of nine tracks, seven were released as singles; and it won eight Grammys at the US music awards in 1984.
The music, a mix of soul, disco and funk, also inspired one of Michael Jackson's most famous dance moves, a backwards sliding motion that stands among the greatest of his many contributions to the world of pop.
The "Moonwalk" was born during a performance of Billy Jean, one of the hit singles on Thriller, during a televised celebration for the 25th birthday of the record label Motown in May 1983.
The re-released album and DVD, which appear Tuesday in the United States and Monday everywhere else, features seven bonus tracks with contributions from US R&B and rap stars Kanye West, Akon and Fergie.
There is also another unreleased track dating back to when the album was first recorded.
Thriller first appeared a little over 25 years ago in December 1982. It was the sixth solo album from Jackson, who earned the "King of Pop" sobriquet thanks to its phenomenal success.
Perhaps the ultimate tribute to the album's enduring popularity is to witness a dance floor when the first notes of Thriller or Billy Jean register at a party, sparking the amateur moonwalkers and zombie impersonators into life.
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