#56-60 Janet Jackson

Her name ain't baby; It's Janet... Ms. Jackson, if you're nasty.

I like Janet Jackson's music fine, especially the Control through Rhythm Nation 1814 era, with those hit singles being all over the radio and MTV when I was young.

She's got 8 MusiCards total: the 5 consecutive here in Series 1, plus one in the UK edition, one "alternate design" promo, and one regular design promo. We'll hit most of those in this "speed round" post, trying to get the blog back in the swing of things after it sank into a hiatus the latter half of 2022.

Good variety of photos in the group.

1991 Pro Set MusiCards #56 Janet Jackson

This one features a lot of hair.

 

1990 sure was a big year for her.

1991 Pro Set MusiCards #57 Janet Jackson

She could almost pass for LaToya from this angle. Heck, squint your eyes and it could be her brother Michael.

It's tough for me to pick a favorite Janet Jackson song, but "Pleasure Principle" would be up there.

Janet Jackson - "Pleasure Principle"

1991 Pro Set MusiCards #58 Janet Jackson

This one's all business. A rare time the awkward MusiCards design actually works well with a photo.

Back picture here, featuring Janet as a blonde with her hair up, is similar to that on card #57, likely from the same photoshoot. Almost look like they could be stills from a video. Actually, yeah, looks like that might be from the "Love Will Never Do (Without You)" video.

Janet Jackson - Love Will Never Do (Without You)

1991 Pro Set MusiCards #59 Janet Jackson

This horse cameo might be the first animal sighting in the set so far unless I'm forgetting something. Wikipedia mentions Janet wanted to be a horse racing jockey when she was little.

I remember getting a little sick of the "Rhythm Nation" video getting played so much on MTV at the time, but it's a good song.

Janet Jackson - "Rhythm Nation"

1991 Pro Set MusiCards #60 Janet Jackson

Looks like this image is from the "Love Will Never Do (Without You)" video shoot, as with the back of cards #57 and #58. A bit grainy, but cute pic.

I watched the big Janet documentary on Hulu (think it was originally on Lifetime) last year and enjoyed it. Learned a lot about her and the Jackson Five. That also inspired me to find and watch Poetic Justice, the 1993 film she starred in with Tupac. That was a decent flick. Talented lady, no doubt.

Now here's the unnumbered promo card-- note the different font in the logo. These "cello pack promos" as TCDB currently lists them, are often early versions of cards that went on to appear in the final 1991 MusiCards set-- that is to say they use the same photograph-- but there's no non-promo doppelganger sharing this straightjacket-pose shot. Promo exclusive, baby! Ms. Jackson!

The back photo didn't get reused either. Probably the earliest photo of the bunch, from the looks of it.

Janet Jackson - "Miss You Much"

The write-up says "Miss You Much" was the most played single of 1989, though fact-checking that claim, looks like the Billboard Year-End Hot 100 singles of 1989 (Wikipedia entry) has it ranked at #5. But I guess they're talking about radio and/or MTV play, which is likely a somewhat different list.

Notice the colors are flipped on the back of the promo.

Finally, here's Janet's alternate design promo card from 1990. This photo was also not used on any of her retail MusiCards. It looks very close to the back photo of card #56, but nope, different photo.

Seems like the same picture at first glance, but it's like one of those "spot the differences" exercises when you take a closer look.

BTW, I'm not covering her card in the UK edition in this post, but that one features the same "a lot of hair" photo we saw earlier at card #56.

Most of the bio information here is mentioned on her other MusiCards, though this one does share the tidbits that she loves eating Mexican food (me too! so relatable!) and visiting Paris in spring. I dig the "sexy mummy" photo, too.

"Escapade" is another favorite song of mine. Listened to it a lot on a special playlist made for Friday afternoons when I got off work, with its whole vibe of "whew, I'm done working for a while, time to have some fun" helping ring in the weekend.

And so there's a bunch of Janet Jackson cards. Any thoughts or memories coming to mind when you think of her? Favorite song(s)? Feel free to share in the comments.

#26 Paula Abdul

We've finally made it passed the Legends and into the main set. The main set is actually split up into three genres (Pop, R&B/Rap, and Rock) sorted alphabetically, with the occasional outlier making things weird... but we'll get to all that later.

1991 ProSet Super Stars MusiCards #26

Kicking off the pop section is the lovely Paula Abdul. Looks like the photographer had her dance around a bit to get an "action" shot with her hair bouncing around. I can picture the guy, "Ok Paula, now let's jog in place. Lift those knees! Beautiful!"

Paula has 6 total MusiCards: two more on deck right after this one, plus two more once we get to Series 2, and then one in the UK edition. Also worth noting that her cartoon collaborator MC Skat Kat has a couple cards himself in Series 2.

The back write-up covers her background as a successful choreographer. I remember that she was part of the Laker Girls before her singing career, but forgot she did all that other stuff too. Pretty impressive. Younger folks who weren't around for her time on top of the charts probably know her best these days as a judge on American Idol back when that show was a cultural phenomenon, and she's since gone on to judge on other singing/dancing TV shows.

It's not great quality, but this video taken at a live performance features Paula telling the story of how she became a Laker Girl. (It wouldn't let me embed it here.)

Pre-stardom Paula got some screen time in the "Nasty" video.

The Jacksons discovered her through her work on the court and her career quickly took off from there. The music videos she choreographed for Janet Jackson are "What Have You Done for Me Lately", "Nasty" (which netted her the MTV Video Music Award for Best Choreography), "When I Think of You", and "Control". Those were all from 1986, as was the one video she did with ZZ Top, "Velcro Fly". She was also behind the big keyboard scene in Big (1988). Even after she became a pop star, she stuck with it, such as choreographing Val Kilmer's moves when he played Jim Morrison performing in The Doors (1991).

In putting this set together, I've come across a lot of MusiCards, and I try to keep an eye out among the dupes for any undiscovered variations or interesting printing flaws. I haven't found much, but one that was almost notable was a #26 that was slightly miscut. Notice how the "P" is all the way at the edge of the card. Again, not all that interesting unless you're really going through the set with a fine-tooth comb like I am.

As for Paula Abdul's music, I'll admit I was a fan as a kid back in the day. I owned 1988's Forever Your Girl on cassette and loved it. Even today, I consider her a "guilty pleasure" of mine and will give that album a play every so often. 

MC Skat Kat shows off his best card.

We've still got 5 more Paula Abdul cards in the pipeline, so we can poke into her musical career more later. I'm going to keep this post short (no "Custom Corner" bonus artist today), but wanted to make sure I published something before September was over. One post per month is my bare minimum goal for this blog. Hopefully going forward I start getting through the set at a brisker pace. 

My life was floating along pretty nicely back when this blog debuted a year ago (10/1/2019), but things took a turn for the worse shortly thereafter. My dog Annie got sick that month and had to be put down in early November, which really gutted me and my wife. Then just when things were getting back to normal for us, the whole covid-19 pandemic took hold of the planet and made things shitty for everyone. Figuring out how to do my job mostly from home took some work. Add to that US government bullshit, unrest over police racism, and Oregon wildfires uncomfortably close to my neighborhood, and it's been a stressful and depressing 2020. Plus we got a new puppy (Ruby) in July who's a mischievous stinker who needs a lot of attention. And we're in the process of buying our first house, with the big move on the horizon. So recreational projects like this MusiCards Blog get bumped to the backburner thanks to stuff like that, even if cranking out one of these posts isn't exactly a ton of work or super time-consuming, but I still gotta carve out some time and get in the right headspace for it.

Not that I think you few kind folks reading this care too much about the frequency of posts here, but as we hit the one-year mark at the blog, just wanted to defend the slow progress so far. 

Big thanks for sticking with me! Hopefully year 2 of the blog covers more than 26 cards!