‘Thriller 25th Anniversary Edition’ has dropped to #10 on the German Album Chart this week.

Source: musiknews.de

‘Thriller 25th Anniversary Edition’ has dropped 1 place to #3 on the Swedish Album Charts this week.

‘Wanna Be Startin’ Somethin’ 2008′ has dropped 7 places to #20 on the Swedish Singles Chart this week.

Source: Sveriges Radio P3

‘Thriller’ has dropped 1 place in the Irish Album Chart at #3.

Meanwhile, ‘Live In Bucharest - The Dangerous Tour’ has also dropped 1 place in the Irish Music DVD Chart at #5.

Source: IRMA

Quincy Jones’ daughter Rashida (32) was attacked by Michael Jackson’s famous pet chimpanzee Bubbles when she was a child.

The actress spent lots of time at the superstar’s Neverland Valley Ranch while her father worked on Jackson’s hits - and she still has the scar that reminds her of one time when Bubbles attacked her.

“I have the pleasure of being bit by a monkey - namely Bubbles, Michael Jackson’s chimpanzee - when I was 10.

I have a scar. I was standing next to his cage and he grabbed something out of my hand. I opened the cage and the monkey started throwing things at me. Books and video tapes.

I tried to punish him by lightly hitting him on the head, and he grabbed my hand and bit down on it like a sandwich.”

Source: WENN, MJFC-USA

According to Global Track Chart, the official global hitlist compiled and provided by Media Traffic, ‘Thriller 25th Anniversary Edition’ remains at the top of the Global Album Chart this week with sales of more than 250,000.

The album has now sold more than 631,000 copies.

Source: Global Track Chart

Paul Grein, of Yahoo Muisc`s Chart Watch, wrote an interesting article on the situation on the US Billboard Chart. Some relevant quotes from that article follow below:

For the second week in a row, Jack Johnson’s Sleep Through The Static and Michael Jackson’s Thriller 25 are the top two albums in the U.S. Or are they?

They are, if you look at the Top Comprehensive Albums chart compiled by Nielsen/SoundScan. Johnson is #1 for the week with sales of 105,000 copies, trailed by Jackson with 63,000 copies.[…]

But Jackson is nowhere to be found on the list of Top Current Albums that is published each week (as The Billboard 200) in Billboard magazine. The top 10 from that chart is reprinted in countless newspapers and websites around the world, including this one. The reason for the omission, as I explained last week, is that Nielsen/SoundScan and Billboard exclude catalog titles-defined as albums that are 18 months old or older-from the main chart. (Continuously running “current” hits are exempted.)

The idea is to make more room on the chart for new albums, which need every break they can get. This week, the rule resulted in 31 older albums being removed from Top Current Albums and shifted over to Top Catalog Albums. Just four of these 31 titles would have ranked in the top 100: Thriller 25, which would have ranked #2; Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers’ Greatest Hits, #63; Guns N’ Roses’ Greatest Hits, #64, and Bob Marley & the Wailers’ Legend, #84.

The idea of clearing catalog product out to give new titles a break makes a certain amount of sense. But having a top 10 that forever has to carry an asterisk is a high price to pay. Billboard and Nielsen/SoundScan should consider revising their policy so that the top 10, at least, is presented without any modification. They could even present the top 100 exactly as is. This week, as noted, they’re opening up only four spots in the top 100 by having this policy. Most of the catalog titles–including such perennial best-sellers as Pink Floyd’s The Dark Side Of The Moon, AC/DC’s Back In Black and Metallica’s Metallica–rank in the second hundred.

In his Over The Counter column, Billboard’s Geoff Mayfield reports that Thriller 25 is only the second album to be denied a top 10 spot on Top Current Albums by the catalog-exclusion rule since the Comprehensive chart bowed in late 2003. Il Divo’s The Christmas Collection would have placed #10 on the main chart in December 2006 if it had been allowed to compete. Even so, two albums denied a hard-earned spot in the top 10 is two too many.

I know that Michael Jackson, a proud and highly competitive man, is never content to finish second. But he should bear in mind that his album, which won the Grammy for Album of the Year 24 years ago, sold more copies in each of the last two weeks than this year’s freshly-minted Album of the Year champ, Herbie Hancock’s River: The Joni Letters. River ranked #5 last week and this week dives to #16. […]

To read the entire article, click here.

Source: Yahoo! Music, MJFC-USA

Michael Jackson will avoid foreclosure on his Neverland Ranch property with a new loan, a Jackson insider told CNN Wednesday.

Documents show that Neverland Ranch in Los Olivos, California, is scheduled for a public auction on March 19 at Santa Barbara’s downtown courthouse.

But the Jackson source said that won’t happen.

“Michael Jackson’s ranch is not going to be auctioned off at the courthouse,” the Jackson insider said. “The financing is all being worked out.”

“There are plenty of lenders willing to work with him. The real estate market is very bad right now and Jackson is being affected just like many other Americans,” the source said.

The Santa Barbara County Recorder’s Web site lists a “notice of trustees sale” by Jackson and his property lenders, Financial Title Company, filed Monday.

In California, title companies typically represent lenders in foreclosure cases.

A notice of trustees sale cannot be posted earlier than 90 days after a notice of default is filed. That notice is not filed unless a loan is in substantial default, sometimes six months or more past due.

A real estate source inside Santa Barbara County said the trustees filing is only the first step in a long process that could drag on for months.

The real estate source said other options are available to Jackson, including selling the ranch directly to another party or making a payment on his $24.5 million Neverland debt that would satisfy the trustee.

The recorder’s Web site also reveals there was a release of lien on Jackson on February 4, showing he paid off all or part of delinquent taxes to the state of California.

“It seems unlikely that someone would pay off back taxes, only to let the ranch go up for auction a few weeks later,” said the real estate source.

Jackson has not lived at Neverland since June 2005.

Source: CNN

For the second straight week, Michael Jackson and Jack Johnson have the best-selling albums in the USA and held down the top spots on their respective charts.

For the week ended Sunday, Johnson’s ‘Sleep Through the Static’ topped the Billboard 200, selling 105,000 copies, according to the latest SoundScan numbers, while Michael Jackson’s ‘Thriller: 25th Anniversary Edition’ ruled the Top Pop Catalogue chart, selling 63,000 copies.

As a reissue, the silver-anniversary Thriller was ineligible for the Billboard 200 despite selling more copies than that chart’s current number two artist, Alicia Keys, who sold 53,000 copies of ‘As I Am’.

Source: Billboard

‘Thriller 25th Anniversary Edition’ has dropped 2 places to #4 on the Official Swiss Album Charts this week.

‘The Girl Is Mine 2008′ has dropped 27 places to #88.

Source: The Official Swiss Charts

Michael Jackson’s Neverland Ranch will be put up for sale at a public auction next month unless the pop star pays the more than $24 million he still owes on the property, according to a Tuesday court filing.

Financial Title Co. filed the notice of trustee’s sale with Santa Barbara County Superior Court, setting the auction date for March 19. A spokeswoman for Jackson did not immediately return a call for comment.

Julie Wagner, a manager at the San Francisco-based title company, confirmed that Jackson’s property was set for auction.

Court documents obtained by Fox News warn Jackson that he has until the date of the auction to take action to keep his lavish estate.

If the property does go to auction, the initial asking price could be higher than the $24.5 million Jackson owes because of interest due and other costs, according to the filing. Everything from the estate’s merry-go-round and other carnival rides, locomotives, sculptures to the curtains and bath tubs in the estate would be up for sale should the auction take place, according to the filing.

Source: Associated Press