Homeless Japanese Hold Blackface Michael Jackson Dance Party

The September issue of MADMAX Magazine contained a short article on, as the title suggests, a group of homeless men who dress up in Michael Jackson costumes and hold dance parties in Shinjuku's Chuo Park.

Thrilling! Say Beat It to your Bad Life!Japan's ongoing recession has left Shinjuku's Chuo park flooded with homeless. Our reporters happened to be interviewing three such homeless men in their fifties when word of Michael Jacksons's death came in.

When Michael fever was taking the world by storm twenty years ago, these men still had a respectable job and roof over their heads, rocking with the King of Pop every step of the way. They, too, once glittered like a rhinestone glove.

However, as if in response to the sudden drop in Michael's popularity, Japan's economic bubble, along with these men's lives, went POP! When the smoke cleared, they found themselves living on the streets.

"Michael's gone..." The stunned mourners decided then and there to fill the void MJ left behind. After they scrubbed the filth from their bodies and traded in their ragged clothes for flashy costumes, all it took was a little face paint to transform them into the Jackson Three. They just needed a dance floor to return to the days when they shimmered brighter than any disco ball!

The vigor of youth soon returned to their sweat-drenched faces as they cut a rug to all the Michael classics. "Now that we've come this far, there isn't anything we can't achieve!" The three have sworn to carry out Michael's comeback for him, dancing on as the King of Pop watches from his throne in heaven.

My first reaction to this was "Oh no! Blackface!" The story is actually kind of touching, though. 90% of me suspects that these dudes were just put up to this by MADMAX's staff, but 10% of me really wants to believe that they are legit.

If you go out to buy a copy of this for yourself, be forewarned that MADMAX's normal content involves yakuza killing reports, motorcycle gang interviews, hyper-violent manga and a ton of porn, not to mention 1000s of perverse advertisements that blow the porn out of the water. I may have to post some of them in the near future...