Black or White: Inside the 1991 Global Video Premiere

Black or White was written by Michael Jackson, with the rap section written by Bill Bottrell, who co-produced the track. Bottrell also performed the rap, credited under the name L.T.B. The song's opening guitar riff has a rock edge, and the rap and the lyric make a direct statement about race and unity.

Musically it is simpler than much of Dangerous. The riff, a steady rock groove and a sing-along chorus make it one of Jackson's most immediate singles. That simplicity is probably why it became a hit so quickly.

The video premiered on Thursday, November 14, 1991, broadcast in the United States on Fox (in the slot after The Simpsons), MTV and BET, and on television in many other countries. The label reported a worldwide audience of around 500 million people. Independent verification of that figure is not possible, but it was clearly one of the most widely broadcast music video premieres up to that time.

The simultaneous premiere was itself a marketing innovation. Instead of letting a video drip out on music channels, the release was staged as a single global television event, which guaranteed attention for the Dangerous album released two weeks later.

The most famous part of the video is near the end of the main song, when a series of people of different ethnicities and genders sing and their faces morph smoothly into one another. The effect was created by Pacific Data Images. Digital morphing had been used in films before, but this sequence brought it to a mass audience and was widely copied in advertising and other music videos over the next few years.

The sequence also carries the song's message. Instead of telling the audience that differences do not matter, it shows faces blending into each other so seamlessly that the boundaries seem to disappear.

After the song ends, the original version continues with a section in which a black panther walks off the set and turns into Jackson, who dances alone on a street, smashes car and shop windows, and makes sexually suggestive movements. The section has no music, only sound effects. Many viewers and broadcasters objected, particularly to the violence and the grabbing.

Jackson issued a statement apologising and saying the section was meant to interpret the animal instincts of a black panther. The coda was removed from many later broadcasts, and a version with racist graffiti added to the smashed windows was later released to give the destruction a clearer meaning. The episode is a reminder that Jackson's biggest creative risks did not always land as he intended.

Black or White reached number one on the Billboard Hot 100 in December 1991 and stayed there for seven weeks. It was also a number one in the UK and many other countries.

The single shows a shift in Jackson's approach. Where Thriller-era videos were about the performer, Black or White is about a message. That shift runs through the Dangerous and HIStory eras, from Heal the World to Earth Song. For fans who match the Dangerous era in our quiz, this is the key video: ambitious, technically new, and willing to provoke.