Destin remembers its Michael moments: There were always guys ‘butchering' the moonwalk, Nightown manager says

If pop star Michael Jackson rocked your world, you are not alone. In the past week, the superstar’s local fan base has been snatching up his music and memorabilia.

The world said good-bye to the “King of Pop” last week when he died abruptly on June 25 at the age of 50.

Jackson was pronounced dead at UCLA Medical Center after paramedics tried to resuscitate the singer in his rented Holmby Hills home. The cause of death is reported to be cardiac arrest, unless toxicology reports from his autopsy reveal anything more.

“I had some special edition releases of the Jackson 5 on vinyl and we’ve sold out,” said Tom King, manager of Central Square Records in Seaside. The music store carries Jackson’s music on CD and vinyl, but they may be out for a while.

King said that all of the record label distributors are out of Jackson’s music as well. Stores were likely preparing for the increased sales, though not all of them are moving his merchandise.

The Log spoke with a Best Buy sales associate on the phone to see if there had been any hysteria for the star’s music.
“We’ve been allocated more Michael Jackson CD’s, but they haven’t been flying off the shelves,” he said. “But we’ve had a lot of people playing “Beat It” on Guitar Hero.”

Walmart is experiencing the opposite. The low price retailer in Destin can’t keep enough Michael around now that “his CDs are hot.”
“We always had overstock of Michael Jackson,” said Dory Fleming, 48, a sales associate in the electronics department. “People have been asking and we have sold out of his CDs, we can’t keep them in the shop.”

Fleming said she is asked at least 20 times a day now about the albums of the 13 Grammy winning, Rock and Roll Hall of Famer. She’s even heard “Thriller” blaring from Hooters when she walks out of the store.

“I think he’s hotter now,” she said.

She also said Michael’s music has been selling even more back in her home country, the Philippines.

“You see more news about Michael in the Philippines than in the United States,” she said.
“I really like him,” she gushed. “I liked him when he was young.”

She said the 70s was her favorite era for Jackson’s music, a time when “Don’t Stop ‘Til You Get Enough” and “Rock with You” were at the top of the charts.

But nobody in Destin has seen more people shaking their booty to Michael than Nightown manager J.J. Johnson.

Johnson was a bartender at Nightown during Jackson’s heyday.

“I remember when the song “Billie Jean” hit the charts,” he said. “When that song would start at midnight, you could hear the crowd say “alright!”

Nightown did a tribute to Jackson last Friday night, playing all of the songs and videos they had.

Over the decades, clubbers took dance cues from Jackson’s music videos on MTV in the ’80s. Johnson said he didn’t see too many people doing the cult classic “Thriller” dance in his 22 years at the night club, but people were not afraid to try Michael’s signature moonwalk.

“There was always guys trying that — butchering it — and there were some who were really good at it,” he said.

“Even today, DJ Doc Roc spins “Billie Jean,” you can still play it and get away with it,” he said. “People still love it.”

‘But wait, there’s more …’
Infomercial and “As seen on TV” pitchman Billy Mays was found dead on Sunday in his Tampa home, just a few days after the death of pop star Michael Jackson.

Mays also died at 50-years-old from heart complications.

Mays’s demise has had a lot of customers asking about the bold, bearded salesman in the Santa Rosa Mall store named for the products Mays marketed at all hours of the day and night on cable.

“People assume that since we are an “As Seen On TV” store that we know all about him,” said store employee Austin Bradley, 20.

“People come in here just to ask about him.”