I'm going to blow the lid on what I believe to be one of the greatest cover-ups in the history of American popular music. I'm going to do it right here, right now, in this very review. I'm putting my life at risk by writing this. No doubt one of the most powerful men in show business will be out to silence me after I publish this, and I'm sure he'll stop at nothing to do it. So, to all of my friends on this site, if you don't hear from me after this, I'm either dead or in deep, deep hiding. Well, that or I may just be drunk in my garage.
Here it is:
Michael Jackson ripped off Scott Baio's album cover.
Shocking, isn't it?
Not only do I believe Jackson ripped off the cover from this album for his blockbuster album Thriller, I believe he's led a covert campaign to cover up his tracks. Don't believe me? Try to buy this record. It's hard to find. When you do find it, it's expensive. I found one on ebay selling for $50. Why is it so rare? It can't be because it's such a great record that people can't bear to part with it. Trust me, if you heard it you'd be ready to part with it. I've never heard a singer approach a note from so many different angles without ever actually hitting it, and the songs are mind-boggingly awful. No, I believe it's tough to find because for years Michael Jackson has secretly been buying and destroying every copy of Scott Baio that he can get his hands on. It's probably cost him millions of dollars and driven him to the brink of bankruptcy, but he's been fairly successful at it. There is no proof of this, of course, but if you talk about this album with record dealers they will invariably tell you stories of mysterious masked men buying up every copy they've had in stock.
Both albums were released in 1982. Thriller was released in December and Scott Baio came out in . . . well . . . we don't actually know. It's all part of the cover up. I believe we don't know exactly when Scott Baio was released because Jackson has been secretly obscuring the facts surrounding the album for years. There was probably some Watergate-style break-in at RCA Records and all records of the album's existence were destroyed.
That's right, all evidence points to Michael Jackson having his own plumbers.
Now, for any crime to be committed, two things are required: motive and opportunity.
Motive:
Scott Baio was a child/teen star. No more needs to be said about that point, I imagine. He was very popular not only with the preteen girls of the era, but he's always been something of a ladies man. He's dated Pamela Anderson, Erika Eleniak, Nicole Eggert, Brooke Shields, and Heather Locklear, among others. Michael Jackson wasn't yet the coolest man on the planet. He was looking to Baio for guidance regarding chick appeal, obviously. If Baio made an album cover laying on one elbow, then Michael should do that too. I'm guessing Jackson was planning on stealing more than just the cover, but once he got a whiff of "Wanted for Love" he must have realized he was better off just taking the cover concept.
Opportunity:
Scott Baio was recorded at Motown/Hitsville USA in Los Angeles. Of course, Jackson began his career as a Motown artist. No doubt he had friends in that studio, and it's likely that they slipped him a pre-release copy of the record. It may have been an innocent thing. "Hey Michael, you've got to hear this crap Baio's been recording. He sings like a dying albatross." Or, it may not have been so innocent. Who knows, but clearly there was opportunity.
Well, there I've done it. I'm sure Michael Jackson will be sending his henchmen after me to both silence me and acquire my copy of Scott Baio by whatever means necessary. They'll have to pry it out of my cold, dead hands.
http://rateyourmusic.com/release/album/scott_baio/scott_baio/