While Michael Jackson stands out as the brightest star in the annals of pop music history, behind the glittering facade of his stardom stood a King of Pop that few ever saw. Just at the time when the world was preparing for his much-anticipated “This Is It” tour in 2009, a new revelation now emerges: he was at the time wracked with anxiety about the tour, more so a “lost boy” than the invincible performer the world knew.
The sources close to Jackson revealed that while he stood as an unrivalled superstar, a legend during his time, he was extremely apprehensive about the tour. It is the showbiz world where he is going to make a grand comeback after a decade of relative silence, and pressure simply didn’t let him breathe. They add that Jackson felt overwhelmed by the expectations and the physical demands entailed by the tour. Extensive rehearsals and the enormous scale of production only fueled his fears.
“He was like a lost boy,” one source remembers of Jackson’s attitude at the time. “He was like there’s this feeling of anxiety. He was always on edge about how he could live up to his legacy and all those millions of fans across the world.”
This emotional maelstrom was further complicated by the rigorous schedule and the high stakes involved. For Jackson, it wasn’t just a comeback tour; it was an event of epic proportions by which he had to test his physical and mental limits. Sadly, Jackson’s life came to an end before he could fully actualize the artistic vision that he had in mind for the tour, and the world was left wondering how it would have been.
The “This Is It” concert series by Michael Jackson was to be a comeback effort, but offstage it was an intense struggle for the pop icon. His legacy cannot be underrated, but having this view of his final days does add poignancy to the story of his extraordinary life.