Reels & Riddims

Thriller Turns 40: Michael Jackson's Timeless Legacy & Impact on Pop Culture

Kerry-Ann & Mikelah Season 2 Episode 20

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Ever wondered how Michael Jackson's "Thriller" album managed to stay relevant across generations? Get ready to uncover the secrets behind its universal appeal as we celebrate its 40th anniversary! From our childhood memories of eagerly watching the groundbreaking "Thriller" music video to the way it continues to captivate our own children today, this episode is a heartfelt tribute to the King of Pop. Listen as we reminisce about the cultural impact of Michael Jackson’s music in Jamaica and explore how his extraordinary work transcends time and generations.

Through the documentary get a glimpse of Michael Jackson's business genius and his revolutionary contributions to the music industry. Discover how his strategic moves, like the iconic Pepsi endorsement during the Jackson Brothers tour, set the stage for modern artists such as Beyoncé. We'll highlight the mind-blowing ways Jackson transformed music videos and performances, leaving a lasting legacy that continues to inspire pop stars today. We’ll draw intriguing parallels between Jackson’s visionary efforts and the massive, high-budget productions that define contemporary music entertainment.

Explore with us the cinematic brilliance of Michael Jackson’s music videos, particularly the awe-inspiring choreography that set new standards and continues to inspire platforms like TikTok today. We'll share our favorite tracks from the "Thriller" album and reflect on the meticulous artistry behind Michael and Janet Jackson's performances. Finally, join us as we compare the monumental impacts of Michael Jackson and Bob Marley, celebrating their unique contributions to music and culture while sharing personal anecdotes that highlight their lasting legacies. This is one nostalgic journey you won't want to miss!

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Speaker 1:

Hey, reels and Rhythms family. This episode discussing the documentary celebrating the 40th anniversary of Michael Jackson's iconic album Thriller was originally released on the Style and Vibes podcast.

Speaker 2:

Hello everyone and welcome to another edition of the Style and Vibes podcast with yours truly Mikaela.

Speaker 1:

And the one and only Keri, and.

Speaker 2:

Keri-Ann Rebron as Miss A. So Keri and I again are watching documentaries because it's our thing and Michael Jackson's thriller is celebrating its 40th anniversary. So Keri watched it first and she recommended that I watch it. And you guys know how much we love music and documentaries and you know all Jamaica people stay about them, michael Jackson. So I'm gonna say yes, make a run with it. Ponce Island vibes I'll see where it goes, because I know you and I both have unique experiences coming up with Michael Jackson.

Speaker 2:

But this in particular, I think is important because you know we hear the term GOAT greatest of all time, as coined by LL Cool J thrown around a lot. When I think of GOAT, I think of the best that you've ever heard. Stands the test of time within history and I think Michael Jackson really does that Particularly. This album, thriller, solidified his place in doing that Cause he had such an amazing catalog as part of the Jackson five Um. Thriller is his second solo album, which they talked about um and how it really progressed. I I knew some of the stories in in the um documentary, but not all of them. So I think that this was a really good compilation of all the thoughts and ideas of people who were present in making this project, um. So what were your initial thoughts on? On the um, the documentary, and let's not go too deep because we got a bunch of different things to kind of talk about, but give me your overall sense of the documentary.

Speaker 1:

Macaulay, I'll tell you about it. I don't know what else to say. You said not to go too much into it, so I mean, I guess this is a good example of how good the documentary was. My boys 11 and 5, particularly the 11-year-old, sat through it and watched it with me twice. That's it.

Speaker 2:

Dancer yes, I'm a dancer, that's what I like. But I think to your point. People are so enamored and it doesn't matter what age you are when you discover Michael Jackson. I remember my oldest and I, when she discovered Michael Jackson, like we had to buy her the Wii game. We were walking in the airport and she heard the song and she just started singing and she wanted to stop and she's like, I got videos of her dancing, you know, and now you know my youngest. She's watching the show called Motown Magic and even the theme song is like ABC from the Jackson 5. It features some of their Motown songs. Yeah, she says AB. Yes, she called the whole show Amy. So I think, like the quality of the music that he has, it transcends generations. It's going to continue to play. When did you like really realize, like coming up, that Michael Jackson was this superstar? What was your first encounter, experience with him?

Speaker 1:

I mean, I mean, I grew up in Jamaica and so everything is Michael Jackson. And the thing about what I feel like growing up as a Jamaican and Michael Jackson work is, for instance, everyone laughs when we sing Eterna Alfa de Jamaica, boom, right. Michael Jackson's music is something that Jamaicans can rhythmically imitate with the sound of their mouth, their beat, like everything Jamaican can do. We can replicate his music without instruments and that attracts Jamaicans. Because you know, at the time, growing up in the 80s, you know 90, you know you don't have much, so you make do with what you have. And so I do remember Thriller. When it came out.

Speaker 1:

Obviously I was very young but I still remembered it and you know, as you are watching the documentary, my brother was talking about it like, growing up in Jamaica we didn't get it in 84 because we got it a little bit after that, but I was at my aunt's house watching it on her satellite dish and all my cousins and stuff were there and it's crazy to me that that's just like a seven, five, seven minute video to me. I was like you know what, watching Michael Jackson movies, a dopey movie. I'm going to be afraid of it. And I was so afraid, because then you have to left the yard and go back to your yard. And but then you know, street light in Jamaica is one every three block. From an American perspective, right, it's not a lot. So it's dark. And you know the older kids they want to wait till you get to a dark spot to go, you know. So I remembered it and I remembered because of obviously the same aunt. They, you know, they have money.

Speaker 1:

You know my cousin Marky and David. They one had the black um jacket and the other one had the red jacket, kind of knockoff or similar to the thriller jacket. So it was a huge thing, um, for those reasons, you just remember it. And I mean Michael Jackson itself has been a theme. So it may have way more Michael Jackson stories outside of Thriller, but since we're talking about Thriller, it was just like that, was it? You know? And my brother even said, like you know, the worst part of it At the movie when he turned around and ha, ha, ha, ha, ha ha ha.

Speaker 2:

That was his first part and that's the end. That was one of the scariest parts to that video, to me too. And what's interesting is so I I'm dating myself. I was born when the album came out, so but for me I think I grew up with it, it was, it was still super popular as probably like a four or five-year-old range and he hadn't quite yet come out with Bad as an album.

Speaker 2:

But I remember my dad had this record player, you know that old school record player that have the cassette, the vinyl player, and then have to look a speaker underneath to slide in your vinyls underneath and then you have to look a clean and then underneath you can't, um, slide in your vinyls underneath and then you have to look a clean off and clean the mind.

Speaker 2:

I'm totally dating myself and he had a collection and that was part of the collection.

Speaker 2:

Prince was in there, I think lionel richie, some other stuff was in there, and that's really kind of where I initially, um, just I was enamored with the album art cover and then my uncles they were at that time, you know now those videos were definitely playing on television. So I didn't even realize that the material that I was watching was that old when I was watching it. It felt like I was watching it. It felt like I was watching it. It was still pretty like gossip wasn't and superstardom wasn't what it is today like very fast paced. I think that you know the length of which an album could live and even they talked about it in the documentary about the span of time that he promoted the album, worked on the album. From the time that he worked on the album and promoted the album, um, and where thriller came in, I didn't even realize that thriller, the, the video, was the last thing he did to give it that extra push after it was almost out for a year and a half.

Speaker 1:

That was one of the what because that was one of the shocking or the new things that I found out in this video that the album was out, they did all the videos. He wasn't. He wasn't happy, he still wanted to push, push, push and he was able to do this video a year and a half after the album was released and that made the album even bigger, almost two years after it was released.

Speaker 2:

It was wild like moments that you know, you kind of discovered through the documentary that was. Also I didn't realize it was last. I think the other thing was I didn't realize the inspiration that he had going into it. Um, so, coming off of off the wall, he was not awarded the Grammy, the awards that he thought that he should have gotten out now. Now you gotta remember Michael Jackson is young, he's come in the game very early, he has paid his dues. So he thought that Off the Wall was that album and he had been met with so much resistance in terms of being able to be played on MTV, being able to cross over from soul, r&b, pop chart to the pop charts, and really felt snubbed and went into the studio with that manifestation of I'm going to make the greatest album.

Speaker 2:

I was just like MJ was already manifesting before. It was a thing on social media that everybody started talking about and I think that that is like. It's just like history just repeats itself and changes in different forms, because now, like those are things that people openly talk about doing when they're trying to manifest something in their life. It's like putting a post-it there and talking to yourself and really like amping yourself up like he was his own biggest critic, his biggest champion, and I would have loved to hear it from his voice like. I got so much um, I gained so much more respect for his process in watching this documentary that I would have loved to hear it from his perspective.

Speaker 1:

And he went into that album making process with a chip on his shoulder, like you said, and he had a determination that was I'm good, this is going to be the greatest selling album of all time you can do. On how he was going to do this, he was so strategic, like they said, he did a sneak attack, and so that was interesting. But the biggest thing that I learned from that was how he got his masters from Walter Walter Yitnikoff and it was the whole thing around him being pulled from working on the ET album and there was this whole litigation and they were being sued and Walter Yitnikoff was like is he mad at me? And Michael Jackson's lawyer is like what do you think? And then Walter asked the lawyer so what can I do? And the lawyer ah, that's why you need a good luck lawyer on retainer was like give him his master's.

Speaker 2:

And that's how he had his master's.

Speaker 1:

I was just like yes, so um, michael wasn't even worried about it at that point, but he probably should have been worried about it at that point, but he probably should have been and that was a good thing that he did. I mean, that lawyer worked. That lawyer was always like thinking about different ways. I loved everything about that documentary Just so many things the breakdown, the level of nerding into the documentary that I, as a music lover and someone who loves to dance, would appreciate, loved it.

Speaker 2:

And they really broke it down by song. I think it was so interesting to. I think I really learned how strategic Michael really was, like Paul McCartney was on there and he kind of felt out of place when it. When I listened to it, it felt out of place, you know. But then, like when, when they talked about why he wanted you know um Paul McCartney on there, why that song came second, it was like super strategic on the album, starting with um want to be starting something like how that drum pattern came to about, like he wanted you to put on this album and, from the beginning, be excited about it, and that was like the first um. That was the intro to the rest of the album, um, so also many things, yeah, go ahead.

Speaker 1:

I think I want to be starting something is, um, where what I loved about it was really how they talked about Michael Jackson the term they use is percussive how he used the same thing. I said, like you can use your mouth, your, your, your things that are, you know our bodies to to mimic the sound of Michael Jackson music. And when he did the demo he had no instrument. He was doing all of this like it's ad lib and you know all the things that we come to know as Michael Jackson.

Speaker 1:

But he really really put that on display in Thriller, the album, but particularly on Wanna Be Starting Something. And as William broke down the track, you hear him yawning on the track, doing all sorts of stuff on there to kind of give the, to kind of give this fullness to all the sounds that are coming at you in the track. So I loved how they broke it down. I loved, I mean, the part of the documentary and the guy was just like bringing in different pieces of music and I was like okay this song is not sounding familiar, he's adding this, and that Still's not sounding familiar.

Speaker 1:

And it was only at the end where he was like, yeah, we kind of added this little conga drum thing. And that's how I was like, oh, so this is how Thriller really came about. All these different pieces. I was just like from beginning had no idea that these are all the layers of instruments, beats, pace, syncs, you know all the things that they did to get Thriller it was.

Speaker 2:

It was amazing to see yeah, I definitely echo that because the and a lot of those ad-libs became his signature sounds that you remember Michael for and it's just like it's hard to think about Michael Jackson past that and like the Jackson 5 catalog is super extensive. The other thing was towards the end it really talked about how he performed this in front of people on tour. It wasn't even a thriller tour, it was a Jackson Brothers tour that he promoted this album on, so essentially it was the biggest selling. They said it was the biggest selling album that never had a tour.

Speaker 1:

As you mentioned the tour, I remember there was something else I learned from that whole thing that I didn't know before where Michael didn't really want to do the tour, or he didn't want to be associated with Pepsi, because he said he didn't drink Pepsi, he didn't drink soda, and so he made his lawyer put it in the contract that he wouldn't be on camera for no more than six seconds or something crazy like that, and at no point would he have a Pepsi buckle in his hand. I was just like Michael was on it from the beginning. He's like no more than six seconds on camera. I ain't no one knowing you're no Pepsi. I thought that showed his business savvy very early.

Speaker 2:

Well, I think he knew what he wanted and visually, you saw that in the videos that he did create and even in thinking about the tour, and I mentioned this to you as well. I recently saw Beyonce's documentary for her latest tour and the first thought that I came to my mind in the first 15 to 20 minutes, where she spent the initial time really talking about the production of the stage show, the lighting and Beyonce really does it different every single time and to be able to transform the scenery for the same songs I wonder what Michael would have commented and said about Beyonce's visionary of, like the stage presence. You and I went to a Beyonce concert before and we said the same thing like visually it was almost overstimulating because you don't know what to pay attention to, but the documentary really gave you the opportunity to see it in its fullness because you got to get up close and personal with the set design, all of the lighting that she really did, how she built the stage and why it had to be in that space. And I just immediately thought about Michael Jackson and what he probably like this is probably what he was envisioning for himself back then and to see someone of a younger talent being able to execute at that excellent level. I really started to think about the correlation between this album and his impact, because in the documentary they said it, there's only pop stars pre michael jackson and post michael jackson.

Speaker 2:

So if everyone post michael jackson uses michael jackson as the inspiration, the blueprint for doing something different, changing, wanting to change the game, but essentially it's never it's. We always think, oh, that's Michael Jackson, that's my, that's a Michael Jackson inspiration, or that was like to me. Beyonce is probably the closest to being completely outside of that realm, but even her, like I, immediately thought of Michael Jackson when I saw that stage show. So what are your thoughts when it comes to impact of Michael Jackson, particularly maybe with this album and beyond, on today's pop stars?

Speaker 1:

I mean he did set the trend for big budget Like he ushered, you know um, for big budget like he ushered, you know um. What's his name is it steve ivory kind of said it. It was like he went from mtv not wanting him on, or black artists on mtv, to mtv financing the making of thriller and michael jackson ushering in this new age of video that dominated for the 80s and through the early 2000s. And so when you think of videos, you think back to how Michael approached it in a cinematic way and he talks about that, right, and that's how I think of music videos. What's the story they're telling? Right, a music video, you know like nowadays music videos don't carry the same value, but Michael Jackson and I see a lot of good artists, like you mentioned Beyonce when your music video tells a story, they capture the audience right, and he was always keen on telling a story. So every video that he did tell a story, the more memorable music videos that you could think of, they tell a story. So not only big budget videos, but the storytelling behind the videos. You think of dancing right behind the videos. You think of dancing right In the documentary. They said it when they first started shooting Billie Jean, the camera was just a waist up focus. They weren't catching his footworks because at the time, videos weren't even focused on a dancer, they were focused on just the talent, and from waist up. And so what Michael Jackson did also was create a space for the dancer, for the whole body of the artist, especially if the artist is a dancer. So that's an impact. You're going to have people doing big dance scenes, whether it is a line dance or whatever. It is now a big part of any video period.

Speaker 1:

And then I mean this album itself. If Thriller don't do nothing else in a Halloween, it go have a purpose, right, it just does. But the song that I love most off that album is human nature. I absolutely love that song. Harris is like I love why? Why? So I love human nature. I think the album and we talk about this, right how albums are sequenced is an art that is out the window nowadays. Right, we used to study liner notes and you know, even when I used to make my own mix CDs, which is not really mix, it's just song with a lineup Like I thought about the progression of how I want the CD, the mix cassette, the cassette to start and how to end and that impacts how you experience an album, right? So there's just so many things that are iconic and will forever be iconic about that album. And Even the stats with TikTok and how BTS and that lineup of every move of Michael Jackson that BTS basically memorized and just copied that side-by-side was wild.

Speaker 2:

It was just wild the movements kind of become ingrained in you and there are signature movements. Again, he has signature sounds on this album, signature movements, which he was inspired a lot by street dance and and modern dance, and he really took to that extremely well and really was still able to put his own spin on it. I think was completely genius. The impact from a TikTok perspective the head of TikTok was on the documentary as well and really talked about some of the stats 10 million videos to the Thriller album songs, 10 million videos made and this is just on the platform 17 billion views of those videos and then 2 billion likes of all of those videos that are made and they really opened it up and it's just like it's a completely different generation that is experiencing.

Speaker 2:

In our day we would just watch the music videos and just learn the dances and we would do them together at parties or family gatherings or talent shows or who could dance the best? And as a dancer myself, you didn't really understand how intricate Michael's moves are, like down to the fingertip, like where he placed every hair, like you don't really understand it until you try to emulate it and that's why it looks so poignant when everyone else does it, because it takes so much practice to really get it right and even if you're wrong, you still have, like the flick of the hand, the hat on the head, the mood, the moonwalk and how you kind of twist where you go. I think that all of that continues to thrive movements. It's the videos that it was like this perfect storm culmination that happened, that really, really, truly stands the test of time.

Speaker 1:

It's the dancing. For me, man, it's the way he opens the jacket, licks the jacket back, slides his hand in, you know. So in Jamaica we have this running joke that say, you know, if your pants short, you know, like when a little boy outgrows his pants, or anybody outgrows their pants, it's like, yeah, michael Jackson, I expect flood, right. But that's very tactical because you, you, you are now forced to pay attention to his feet, like cause. Now it is so obvious, like these, why is his pants so short, you know? And then he adds the little bedazzled socks. But everything was intentional to draw your eye to where he wants you to see. I mean, everything was just so meticulously thought of.

Speaker 1:

So the clip from Motown 25 and Motown 25 is near and dear to me and my brother because I had an uncle that passed away but he recorded Motown 25 on HBO and brought it to Jamaica and that's how we watched it and my brother and I we knew a lot of.

Speaker 1:

We could tell you that whole ceremony back and front, to the part when the Jackson 5 came out, when they pointed and brought Randy on the stage, to the point where we knew that performance and down to the way that he holds the mic, we're geeking out over it, but it's so intentional, every single twirl. We knew Michael Jackson is shy, but even when he chooses to speak is a thing right, because you know that he doesn't speak a lot. So that is also, I feel, intentional performance, art when he chooses to speak to the audience and bring the audience into the performance. So I think that documentary we haven't shared too much of it, but I think it is worth watching if you're a music lover, if you appreciate the contribution of Michael Jackson and even how Janet you can see how Janet again obviously influenced by her older brother just really visually, just pays attention to every fine detail in order to create the shows and the entertainment that they do on stage. It's pretty incredible.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, we can't even get into Janet, because that's going to be his own podcast.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, yeah yeah, yeah, but I think you know, as Jamaicans, we always we see this meme a lot and we probably have this conversation. I know I have with family who's more popular Michael Jackson or Bob. I have with family who's more popular michael jackson above marley, or who's more impactful, and it's just like it's right. I mean jimmy, kate and me is biased. However, this it's like they're just different. They're just different like what are your? I just I can't really choose. They're. They're impactful in different ways in my opinion, but would love to hear your thoughts.

Speaker 1:

They are different. They're not the same at all. But if I looked back on my childhood and what the little kids were doing, they were all dancing Michael Jackson. And what the little kids were doing, they were all dancing Michael Jackson. That's just the reality. We entertained our entire community after Hurricane Gilbert dancing to Michael Jackson. Bad album.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, no, I definitely agree. I think, because you're exposed to Michael from very young, because the music is For us, bob Marley, we're exposed to very young, because the music is for us, bob Marley, we're exposed to very young as well. But I also think that that's a cultural thing and while I do recognize the impact, the global impact, I do think that they're just impactful in different ways. So I can't, I really can't choose. But if you ask a lot of you know, like you said, if the litmus is is young kids, they're going to know Michael Jackson. They may or may not know Bob Marley and I think that's a that's a good, that's a good analogy. You mentioned what's your favorite song on Thriller. So Human Nature is your favorite song. All right, I think when we start, something is my favorite song, because that that's a second for me, but human nature.

Speaker 1:

I just love it. I feel like it's a sexy song.

Speaker 2:

It's just like, yeah, you know, like it's breath and then beat it, and then beat it yeah, no, every you know there's something and oh my god.

Speaker 1:

And who wrote human nature? And so I had to play it. I said that's why that song sounded so familiar who wrote it?

Speaker 2:

I forgot toto who's toto? The group toto oh, okay, okay, okay and the song um um there's, there's elements of africa, the song that toto, I think.

Speaker 1:

Daritya and Toto. There's Elements of Africa, the song that Toto sings that I feel are in. It feels part of human nature, but I just love that song and then human nature is also what I love about it. You can sample it in so many different ways. Right, it's been sampled so many different ways. You know Taros Riley did a sample. You know, of course, swb, so it's just, I just love it. Yeah, that's it.

Speaker 2:

I think a lot of there's like a central instrument in every song and that synthesizer at the beginning, that's the signature, whereas for wannabe, starting is like it just gets me excited and I think but that's a running theme throughout the entire album is each song sonically has its own dna that you can kind of string together. Um, favorite, favorite video.

Speaker 1:

Since they talked about videos, my favorite video is not a video from the thriller album per se. It is his performance on motown 25 of billy g. I take that.

Speaker 2:

I take that. I take that. I think Thriller is my favorite video of the album because it was just so. I love scary movies, so I loved the cinematography of it and how I really liked how they transitioned from him being in the movie to being a movie attendee on a date and then becoming a monster all over again. I just thought it was such a clever way to. I don't know Even the song. If we think about it. It's supposed to be like a scary fun song but it ends up being fun because of the rhythmic baseline of it. It's just so like you don't like. There's some songs that are like gimmicky and cringe when you hear them.

Speaker 1:

Thriller isn't one of them when you hear them, thriller isn't one of them. That's because with Thriller you didn't really focus on the song lyrics anymore. You're just focused on the movie and the video. I don't think most people pay attention to the actual lyrics of Thriller as much as they, because at this point they've had 40 years of this video and what the video means. That you're like it's close to midnight, something's like, and they you know everything, just kind of.

Speaker 2:

That's why it was like that silent song because it wasn't until the video that really brought it to life and gave the entire like. I see why it gave the video, gave it such a huge push because it probably it was in the middle of the album. The songs in the middle potentially could get skipped, like, depending on how good it is. So that's a question I would ask him if he was here today Did he envision having the video once the song was made? Because the video came, like you said, like almost two years later.

Speaker 1:

Um, in terms of executing the video, the making of it and doing the whole entire documentary around it well, the the documentary said that he wasn't satisfied with just having three number ones, he wanted all of them. He said he wanted, you know, six, seven, eight, nine, ten number ones. But what really inspired him to really do that treatment to Thriller was one of his brothers showed him American Werewolf in London and so that's kind of where the idea came for thriller. He he was like, oh wow, maybe I could do it for this. So that's kind of what the inspiration was. I don't think he really had. He knew he wanted to do more, but what that more was didn't come until he was inspired by his brother showing him the movie and the brothers thought they were scaring him. And he was inspired by his brothers showing him the movie and the brothers thought they were scaring him and he was oh my god, I love this. And he loved it so much. He was like, why can't?

Speaker 2:

I could do this with this type thing and I mean it's just crazy that he created that song independent of really thinking about the, because now, like that's a thought, like you think about, you create the song and then you almost immediately have a visual in your head because I guess in his mind too, he wasn't even sure if his videos were going to be played anywhere, because mtv wasn't really playing him or or filling the music that he was, that they were the only video channel at the time. So I thought that that was that culmination of the video, the documentary, and making of Last words, like I mean, if you guys have not watched it or you haven't heard of it, you didn't know that the 40th anniversary of Thriller, now you know. So please go watch the documentaryth anniversary of Thriller, now you know. So please go and watch the documentary. I believe it's on Paramount Plus.

Speaker 1:

Or Showtime.

Speaker 2:

Or Showtime, so you can watch it. That's how I watched it. That's how Carrie watched it as well. But any last thoughts.

Speaker 1:

Watch it, fall in love with it, like, like, listen, like, just geek out on how they broke down every.

Speaker 2:

When the dancers broke down every move and silhouette, oh I was just like yes, yes, yes, dance off, we dance, type thing and, believe us, as much as we've talked about in this episode, we didn't really cover everything that is in it in its holistic totality, and I just saw that they're going to do a biopic and his nephew is going to play him, so that should be very, very interesting, especially with this background, and he does kind of look like he sounds like him too. I think it's, I think it might be jermaine's son, um, so I'm I'm looking forward to it. I hope they do justice and and and do a good job, but this was a moment that we had to share, so thank you guys so much. Thank you, carrie ann, for joining me on this episode. My semi-permanent co-host.

Speaker 1:

You know I love to talk the things music, so I'm glad to be here.

Speaker 2:

Thanks again and until next time later. My peeps Bye.

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