--- description: Like a Tupac hologram before him, the King of Pop returned to the stage at Sunday's Billboard Music Awards thanks to the latest technology title: Watch a Michael Jackson Hologram Perform at the Billboard Music Awards image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt882d06c1b54515c0/69869012169ab0f0e9279602/michael-jackson-moonwalk.png?branch=production&width=3840&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  * [Entertainment](/section/entertainment/) ## Entertainment Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close # Watch a Michael Jackson Hologram Moonwalk at the Billboard Music Awards  by [Nolan Feeney](/author/nolan-feeney/)  ## Nolan Feeney Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close May 19, 2014 3:05 PM CUT   by [Nolan Feeney](/author/nolan-feeney/)  ## Nolan Feeney Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close May 19, 2014 3:05 PM CUT An artist’s legacy is no longer measured by album sales, posthumous releases or fan pilgrimages to childhood homes — it’s whether or not the deceased performer is resurrected in hologram form. Two years after the Coachella music festival featured a three-dimensional light display of Tupac Shakur, a ghostly hologram of Michael Jackson took the stage at Sunday night’s Billboard Music Awards to perform “Slave to the Rhythm,” a track off his recent posthumous release, [_Xscape_](http://time.com/88527/michael-jackson-xscape-album-review/ "undefined"). Though producer Timbaland’s fingerprints are all over the song’s contemporary remix, the Michael Jackson hologram was clearly programmed to be a classic crowd-pleaser — just watch him moonwalk like it’s 1983 all over again. ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/104725/michael-jackson-hologram-billboard/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/104725/michael-jackson-hologram-billboard/"},"headline":"Watch a Michael Jackson Hologram Moonwalk at the Billboard Music Awards","datePublished":"2014-05-19T15:05:38.000Z","dateModified":"2026-02-21T07:55:14.869Z","description":"Like Tupac Shakur before him, the King of Pop returned to the stage at Sunday's Billboard Music Awards thanks to the latest hologram technology","url":"https://time.com/104725/michael-jackson-hologram-billboard/","keywords":["Music","michael jackson","Billboard Music Awards"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt882d06c1b54515c0/69869012169ab0f0e9279602/michael-jackson-moonwalk.png?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Nolan Feeney","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/nolan-feeney/"}],"articleSection":"Entertainment","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt882d06c1b54515c0/69869012169ab0f0e9279602/michael-jackson-moonwalk.png?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"michael jackson moonwalk","caption":"","creditText":"","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/entertainment/","name":"Entertainment"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/104725/michael-jackson-hologram-billboard/","name":"Watch a Michael Jackson Hologram Moonwalk at the Billboard Music Awards"}}]}] ```