Phew, scream, what a week for boy bands. Around the time that One Direction announced that they were splitting up, the remaining members of the Jackson 5 revealed that they are saddling up — and coming to London.
The British band may have managed a scant five years together, but the American-born Jacksons have been a force in pop music for nearly 50.
Can you feel it?, as they used to ask back then.
The group were little more than children when they had their first hit, I Want You Back, in 1969.
Since then their lives have been a switchback of triumph and tragedy, of notoriety and rumour. The greatest heartbreak was the death of their brother Michael, in controversial circumstances in 2009.
Two years later, Michael’s doctor Conrad Murray was found guilty of involuntary manslaughter, after lethal amounts of prescription drugs were found in the singer’s body.
Today, however, the Jackson family still believe that questions remain unanswered about Michael’s death.
‘We do know a bit more about what happened but we can’t say what that is,’ Jermaine Jackson told me.
‘We don’t know 100 per cent what happened that night, but we have an idea in the back of our heads. In time, the truth will unfold.’
