Sheryl Crow has spoken for the first time about the sexual abuse allegations surrounding her former tourmate Michael Jackson.
The All I Wanna Do star was a back-up singer for Jackson during his Bad tour, which ran from 1987 to 1989. The tour also saw James Safechuck, who makes numerous abuse allegations about Jackson in HBO documentary Leaving Neverland, join Jackson on the road, and Crow admitted she always wondered why the young man's parents allowed him to tag along on the tour.
"I happened to turn on CNN the morning after the first half (of Leaving Neverland) aired, and they showed clips of the young man who was on the Jackson tour with us and it made me… I mean, I still feel really…," Crow said, before trailing off.
She then picked up: "It’s like a death in the family, you know? It’s sad. (Safechuck) was a great kid and the whole time he was with us – which was the better half of an 18-month tour – I always wondered, ‘What in the world are his parents doing?’, you know?"
Suggesting she believes the allegations against Jackson are true, Crow added in the interview with Britain's The Guardian newspaper that the entourage surrounding the Thriller star may have made the abuse possible.
"I think that there were a lot of exceptions made because of the damage that (Michael Jackson).... I mean, he didn’t intentionally project it, but it was part of his aura – this almost being untouchable and almost alien-like (figure)," she mused. "And, yeah, I mean, I’m sad, and I’m mad at a lot of people. I feel like there was just a huge network of people that allowed all that to go on. It’s just tragic."
