Seventeen years is a long time to wait for your own family.
That’s how long it had been since the Jackson brothers last shared a stage. The Victory tour wrapped in 1984, and after that they scattered. They made solo records and built separate lives. Michael became the biggest star on the planet, and the other four kept to their own paths.
Then, in September 2001, they all came back.
It happened at Madison Square Garden, over two nights built around Michael’s thirty years as a solo artist. The room was stuffed with famous faces. But the moment people still bring up wasn’t a celebrity guest or a flashy duet. It was five grown men walking out to stand beside their little brother, slipping into a formation they’d known since they were kids in Gary, Indiana.
Jackie, Tito, Jermaine, Marlon, Randy and Michael in the middle.
For a few minutes the years fell away and they were the Jackson 5 again, trading lines like no time had passed.
You have to see how easy it looked.
Michael Jackson – Medley (with The Jacksons) [30th Anniversary Celebration 2001]
Watch how fast they drop back into the old steps, like those seventeen years never happened.
They rolled through the old hits and gave each brother his moment. Then the tempo eased for the one that always gets to people.
Jackson 5 – I’ll be There (Final Concert 2001)
If you click only one, make it this. The harmony on “I’ll Be There” is the brothers at their softest, and you can hear every year of their history in it.
Here’s the part that still sits heavy. The second show was September 10, 2001. The next morning the towers came down a few miles away, and the city changed forever. Nobody in that building knew what was coming. They were just happy to be together.
Michael passed in 2009. Rolling Stone later called this his final performance with his brothers, and it was Randy’s last concert with them too. The whole night aired on CBS that November, though the magic really lives in these clips.
Go watch them find each other again.