Decoding The New Michael Jackson Album Cover Art, of the first new posthumous album of unreleased material by Michael Jackson, a collage of images taken from his old songs and albums. Found 16 Michaels and images from Moonwalk to Captain EO. Trying to figure out what every little thing on the cover. We need your help to source the rest.

1. The 16 Michaels
We saw this cover and we almost couldn't help ourselves. At first it seemed weird that
the cover of the first new posthumous album of unreleased material by Michael Jackson
would be a collage of images taken from his old songs and albums. But then we got
caught up in trying to figure out what every little thing on the cover was. Why are there
policemen over there? Is that Bob Dylan? What's the deal with the UFO?
As Kanye West might say, it's not an album cover, it's a painting. And it actually is. The
image on the cover of Michael is by an artist named Kadir Nelson, and it manages to
incorporate an astonishing number of highlights from the golden age of Jackson's career,
starting with 1979's Off the Wall and running through Dangerous in 1991.
Take a close look at the cover and join us after the jump for a guided tour of Michael's
hall of mysteries.

2. The 16 Michaels
1. Off the Wall Michael
2. "Thriller" Michael with zombies
3. Dancing "Thriller" Zombie Michael
4. "Billie Jean" Michael
5. "Beat It" Michael
6. "Whole New Generation" Pepsi Commercial Michael (image 1)
7. "We Are The World" Michael
8. Robot Michael from the end of Moonwalker
9. Captain Eo Michael (credit for this catch belongs to NPR Music's Amy Schriefer)
(image 2)
10.Dangerous Michael
11.Rocket roller coaster-driving "Leave Me Alone" Michael
12."Leave Me Alone" Sideshow Dancing Michael with Elephant Man's bones
(image 3)
13.Bad Michael (image 3)
14."Smooth Criminal" Michael (image 3)
15.Silhouetted "The Way You Make Me Feel" Michael (image 3)
16."Michael" Michael

3. Images from Videos or Songs
From "We Are The World"
• Cyndi Lauper
• Bob Dylan
• Bruce Springsteen (image 1)
From "Leave Me Alone"
• Weekly World Something Or Other tabloid cover (image 1)
From Moonwalker
• Claymation rabbit on a motorcycle, possibly the single strangest image on the
cover. (hold on, we'll get to the naked interracial coronation cherubs in a minute.)
(image 3)
From "Remember The Time"
• Explosion of light/sand near upper right corner (at least, we think that's where this
is from).
From "Man In The Mirror"
• Behind "Smooth Criminal" Michael, a mirror with a reflection of "Smooth
Criminal" Michael (images 3 and 4)

4. Metaphors or Expressionistic Images Signifying Important Moments Or Events In
the Life of Michael
• The central image of Jackson is being crowned by two cherubs, one black, one
white. A particular song comes to mind. (images 5 and 6)
• The crown being placed on the central Michael figure suggests Jackson's "King of
Pop" nickname.
• Bubbles fill the bottom left of the image. This seems like a nod to Jackson's pet
chimp, but confusingly, some of them the bubbles seem to be filled with other
significant items of Jacksoniana, such as these sunglasses, fingertips of a white
glove, and a "Smooth Criminal" hat.
• In the upper left quadrant, an MTV Moon Man crowns "Michael" Michael's right
temple. Probably a reference to Jackson's groundbreaking videos rather than his
mistaken belief, in 2002, that MTV had decided to present him with an award for
"Artist of the Millennium." (image 5)
A Few Items We Identified But Whose Importance We Could Not Place
• In the upper left corner, a UFO. Definitely not the sleek space ship from the "Scream"
video, but we're not sure of its provenance. (image 5)
• What looks like candy at the bottom of the "Leave Me Alone" roller coaster.
• Tiger, Elephant, Lion, Bear and Butterfly — perhaps these are animals kept at Jackson's
Neverland Ranch? If so, the connection is rather opaque. (image 4)
• Above Bad Michael, a pair of dogs. We thought these might be the "Just stop doggin' me
around" dogs from the "Leave Me Alone" video, but they're not wearing suits. (image 2)
• A couple of police officers, above the image from the cover of Dangerous.
• The bank of cameras in the upper right quadrant. Presumably signifying Jackson's rocky
relationship with the press, but we couldn't come up with anything specific here. (image
6)
• A goldfish in a bubble. (image 3)

5. Two Items Which We Could Not Identify At All
• In the upper left corner, behind Off The Wall Michael, you'll see half of a ghostly
face. No idea who this is, unless it's a character from Jackson's grotesquely
overblown longform video for Ghosts, from 1996. Mysteriously, the figure
appears in one — but not both — of the cover images on this page.
• In the lower right quadrant, hidden inside one of the bubbles, is a small golden
object that's just too small to identify, but we're sure it's vitally important. (images
3 and 4)
We're sure there's more. What did we miss? What's not on the cover that should be?