here's a piece on michael jackson, prince, and madonna from say 2005.

and here's an assessment of the career of michael jackson.
ok most of this will be obvious, more or less. jackson was an excellent singer and a great dancer. he was not an independent artist, in the sense that everything depended on the writing and production of others. the jackson five were delightful; he was good in the disco era; he was good circa thriller, with a great stage act; but in no case was he original or innovative. his talent was quite the opposite of that: he combined existing elements and crafted the product extremely well: the first j5 album (a sweet synthesis of motown and bubblegum which completely dominated my mostly-black junior high circa 1971) and thriller were the only moments he really sounded extremely fresh, but surely the motown folk and quincy jones get a lot of the credit. thriller was important in establishing a new basic pop: post-disco/funk, and an alternative to "new wave." partly it was a return to pop-soul; partly it was an incorporation of the mainstream rock of the time.

the overwhelming moment came because you couldn't sell enough funk or hip hop to white people; thriller embodied a racial synthesis, even a kind of reconciliation. (eventually he became some kind of racial monster, an argument for the wholesomeness of existing racial identities.) michael jackson made good or at least elaborate and memorable videos (they're unwatchable now), which right at that moment became the key.

it was paradigm pop because it didn't instantiate any other particular genre: it was syncretic, masterfully so. and it was the occasion of a great coalescing of audiences or stampede of lemmings, depending on your mood. one reason to mourn jackson's passing is that thriller was a moment of cultural solidarity: one of the last times the whole culture was listening to the same thing, more or less. if jackson had not made thriller, his death would have been merely a lead obit, like bo diddley's, say. but i have to say that the decentralization or balkanization of pop music is a good thing, overall, and that mass art necessarily is fundamentally uninteresting.

the visuals were...idiotic: plastic sequined militariana and processed hair, race change surgery, a crust or bark of make-up, masks, etc. his tastelessness in every dimension was extreme. extraordinary. pitiful. cf. "neverland." it would be surprising if someone whose taste was that appalling could make really good music; on what principles is he going to select repertoire etc? and he made a lot of extremely boring or ridiculous music: essentially a lot of thriller and everything thereafter, more or less. but also before: play "ben." now play it again. now frisbee the thing into the ether. there wasn't a single really good moment after the early 80s, and there was a lot of incredibly cliched or self-indulgent horseshit.

he was a study in human misery for decades: continuously disintegrating into mental illness, addiction,  sexual strangeness, conspicuous continual tastelessness, extreme embarrassing stupidity, a world of delusion: the worst case of celebrity implosion since elvis. or, really, the worst of all times. it seemed to last forever. you kept waiting for some kind of redemptive moment or a moment of perspective or self-reflection, waiting for him to talk to the man in the mirror. or at any rate to make a decent album. even if he had, i wouldn't have bought it (well i never bought any of his albums; no need to; the question was how to avoid his music). to be honest, i don't think it was about to happen, as everyone seems to be asserting; i don't think it was going to ever happen. but i guess we don't know. it's not hard to predict the toxicology: opiates, anti-depressants, ambien, and three things you didn't know existed.

the king of pop, artist of the century, etc.: in my view he compares unfavorably to dozens of actually important musicians: louis armstrong, or jimi hendrix, or janis joplin, or muddy waters, or sonny boy williamson, or john coltrane, or miles davis, or bessie smith, or blind lemon jefferson, or blind willie mctell, or robert johnson, or hank williams, or tammy wynette, or merle haggard, or johnny cash, or patsy cline, or george jones, or the rolling stones, or professor longhair, or john prine, or the pretenders, or blondie, or bob marley, or lee perry, or king tubby, or augustus pablo, or toots and the maytals, or fats domino, or prince, or smokey robinson, or martha reeves and the vandellas, or aretha franklin, or otis redding, or wilson pickett, or al green, or the dixie hummingbirds, or james cleveland, or james brown, or thomas dorsey, or parliament-funkadelic, or the allman brothers, or the louvin brothers, or lotte lenya, or sarah vaughn, or bonnie raitt, or the bar-kays, or dave brubek, or the grateful dead, or led zep, or ac/dc, or jerry lee lewis, or the temptations, or the four tops, or jimmie rogers, or bob wills and the texas playboys, or sam cooke, or billie holiday, or howlin wolf, or little richard, or chuck berry, or bo diddley, or mahalia jackson, or shirley ceasar, or snoop dogg, or grandmaster flash, or public enemy, or dre, or wu-tang clan, or biggie, or eminem, or buck owens, or bill monroe, or ella fitzgerald, or benny goodman, or duke ellington, or b.b. king, or albert king, or freddy king, or otis rush, or magic sam, or loretta lynn, or waylon jennings, or the skatalites, or fela kuti, or creedence, or van morrison, or elvis costello, or count basie, or ornette coleman, or django reinhardt, or charlie christian, or charlie parker, or ma rainey, or elmore james, or lucinda williams, or bobby bland, or little walter, or brian wilson, or the ramones, or the dead kennedys, or minor threat, or nirvana, or the white stripes, or chet atkins, or dwight yoakam, or the seldom scene, or flatt and scruggs, or the stanley brothers, or les paul, or the clash, or jelly roll morton, or immortal technique, or woody guthrie, etc. leaving aside composition, production, or instrumental vituosity, all of these are, like mj,  recording artists, and even on that basis, with regard to many of them (such as hendrix, armstrong, hank williams, marley, coltrane, monroe, ellington, waters) mentioning jackson in the same breath would be madness. i think of him more like...aly and aj. nothing wrong with that - aly and aj are excellent pop artists - but the 48 hours of continuous programming is just a misunderstanding.

hoothe bad?