Michael Jackson's corporeal form turns 51

Spike Lee threw a helluva little birthday party for the recently deceased frontman of the Jackson 5 on Saturday.

If you'd suspected, as perhaps nearly everyone in the country had, that the appetite for Michael Jackson news was at least in part manufactured by the sloven newsgathering sensibilities of news networks, well, that may be true. But let me vouch: People love them some MJ.

A Michael Jackson tribute: on the streets of Port-au-Prince, Haiti.

Originally Lee's tribute to Jackson was slated for somewhere in Fort Greene, but somebody did the math and realized tens of thousands of people would be better accommodated on a large lawn in Prospect Park. As my friend Jena and I approached from the rather stunning north end of the park we joined a trickle of pedestrians that grew as we neared a thudding bass rolling through the damp woods. "I'm going there now," a man behind us said into his cell phone. "I'm just following the peoples. The little white peoples." But it wasn't just little white peoples: It was hipsters and black mothers with children and dudes on bikes and elegant girls in tight dresses and just about anyone you'd expect to see rocking out to Michael Jackson. And when we arrived on the green, there was a full-blown party breaking out.

Remixes of old-school MJ were blaring from speakers at the front of the green while people dance-swayed. The good Rev. Al Sharpton appeared on stage and reminded us that Jackson rose from a lower-class family in world-class shithole Gary, Ind. to become one of the great entertainment forces of the 20th century -- a tale that resonated with the overwhelmingly black crowd. As the DJ spun the likes of "Rock With You" and "Thriller" while kids in dinosaur-emblazoned raincoats bounced, and grandmothers popped-and-locked, and some dude tried to sell me burned copies of all eight of Jackson's albums for $25 (I came thisclose), the best moments were a spontaneous group dance among a maaaaaassive swath of the crowd during "Billie Jean" and a Tracy Morgan-led karaoke rendition of "The Way You Make Me Feel". Check out the audio below. (And click that Tracy Morgan link, if you know what's hilarious for you.)

The Way You Make Me Feel

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Park Slope sings "The Way You Make Me Feel" (Download)