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[Popchartfreak]

554. THE MAN IN THE MIRROR - Michael Jackson (1988) 1,164,150



I've not attached the posthumous video as it has nothing to do with my memories of this record, which came out just after the christmas after the Bad album debuted in 1987. This finger-clicking gospel track was written and gifted to Michael by Siedah Garrett, who'd already duetted with Michael on the lead single I Just Can't Stop Loving You, which also had no video and which didn't make this list. Maybe she didn't want the publicity! This was probably my fave track on the album, and the 4th single, so it came as something of a shock when it didn't even make the UK top 20, despite topping the US and my charts. Quite a few ballads that would have been expected to have been big hits (George Michael for one) flopped in early 1988, I can only put it down to an unusually large number of ballads in the chart over that Xmas, and everyone getting sick of it and getting ready to dance along to the new oncoming Second Summer Of Love in the new year instead. Cos when Michael suddenly died in 2009, this was the big posthumous hit that was the centrepiece of attention, and it seemed sort of appropriate, and finally had been re-appraised in the UK. The 6th Jacko track of many on the list.