Some stories are too sweet to stay buried, and this one just came back into the light this week.
The producer Swizz Beatz sat down on a show called “The Real Report With Tony Yayo and Uncle Murda” and told a story about his wife and Michael Jackson. If you know Swizz, you know his wife is one of the most beloved singers of her generation.
“I found out that Michael had a crush on my wife,” Swizz said.
Now, plenty of husbands might bristle at a line like that. Not Swizz. His reaction is the warm twist that makes the whole thing worth hearing.
First, how did the crush even come out? Swizz believes it was Michael’s sister Janet who spilled it. As he tells it, Janet went to his wife and said, “You know, my brother always had a crush on you.”
Instead of feeling jealous, Swizz thought it was lovely. He saw a chance to give two artists who admired each other a real moment together. “I thought it was cool to set up for her to meet him,” he said. “Just for both of them to just have that moment as fans of each other.”
So he made it happen.
Shortly before Michael’s planned London shows, the couple went to visit him at his home. Michael had his kids there, and the guests brought along gifts for the little ones. Michael was bubbling with excitement about going back on tour. At one point he even started showing off a few of his moves.
You can hear Swizz tell the whole thing in his own words.
Swizz Beatz sharing the Michael Jackson story
The singer at the heart of it is Alicia Keys. Picture her and Michael in the same room, two musicians from different worlds, grinning at each other like a couple of fans. That’s the image Swizz paints.
It’s a gentle memory from the last stretch of Michael’s life, before he passed away in 2009. There was no drama to it, only a proud artist happy to meet someone who loved his work as much as he loved hers.
Swizz could have kept the whole thing private. Instead he shared it, and all these years later it still makes him smile. For Michael fans, it’s one more reminder of the kind, playful man his friends kept seeing long after the rest of the world had made up its mind about him.