TS: Billie Jean vs. Little Red Corvette

^^ QED

BJ. I feel the better comparison would have been between BJ and When Doves Cry tho.

Or between LRC and Rock with You or Don't Stop til You Get Enough

everybody comparing parts of LRC or judging it as a dance track are on the wrong track entirely. that song does it's own thing and it's breathtaking

you must be a limousine

I voted BJ and imo the only Prince that is on par with it is When Doves Cry. Maybe I've a preference for sparse and funky.

― DISMISSED AS CHANCE (NotEnough), Thursday, September 18, 2014 12:08 PM (6 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

...then surely you should also acknowledge Kiss (which I prefer to either, though it was an acquired taste, and it's possible I've largely missed what makes WDC great, which I don't think it is)? I don't regard BJ as the best on Thriller (nor LRC the best in 1999, necessarily), and admit to generally favoring Prince as the less creepy of the two weirdoes (and perhaps the more "rock" of the two "r&b"ers), and to having slightly disliked BJ since hating 2nd grade or whenever it was circa my first exposure to both megapop and its corporate (fast) food cognate, but I was ready to vote either way, and a re-listen confirmed that my vote is still for LRC.

I think I dislike now the same things I did then about BJ, even if I didn't know it, starting with the synthesized (?) strings that are just one sign of a taste-challenged overproduction that at times includes MJ's voice itself (though he does have some fine moments as well - I isolated the "People always told me" passage even before I saw JBR's post), and from which the relatively dinky-sounding guitar solo actually comes as something of a relief. I mean, I recognize that it's a different kind of song, but imagine if you hadn't put all that extra stuff on top of the great beat, the way (t)he(y) hadn't on Off the Wall (or Destiny) or even Thriller's better tunes - still-disco WBSS of course, Beat It (which I have taste problems with as well, extending from the guitar pyrotechnics to the vocal ones - the semi-unintelligible "no one wants to be defeated" part of the chorus tastes in my memory exactly like terrible soda), and above all the title track that absolutely flattens any such quibbles. Instead, a potentially great dance tune was subsumed within the weirdo's encroaching cinematic fantasies/paranoid delusions. LRC, otoh, seems to be very much the product of a recognizable human being, and that's my bottom line.

Incidentally, who thinks "Stan" was (un?)consciously modeled on BJ?

If you take all of the extras, including paranoia, off Beat It, you might end up with a dance tune like the B-52's' Mesopotamia. I'm not going to claim that it's a more socially useful song, but I definitely like it better.

Also, can someone explain why, on WBSS, MJ keeps calling me a vegetable? That doesn't seem very nice.

This is the only time I intend to vote for MJ over Prince

i dunno why but somehow it's mildly startling to see someone say 'i hate MJ,' seems like there's more agreement on his at-least-occasional-classicness than any other artist i can think of -- whereas i wouldn't blink an eye if someone said they hated the beatles, stones, elvis, etc.

there's a deny thy father thing going on with the boomer hate. sort of looking forward to a day when 80's music is less revered.

my loathing of pop music's most overrated egomaniac is p well documented around here but I'd be happy to go into it further if you like.

I am not a baby boomer.

I meant hating stones/beatles/etc typically has "screw you grandma you don't know me" undertones aimed at boomers

oh, i've got no problem with anyone hating MJ but it's interesting to me that he's become something of a sacred cow post-death -- i can remember a time when he was seen with a lot more ambivalence. i recall a lot of ppl expressing extreme disgust at the idea of him owning the lennon-mccartney catalog, way more intensely revulsed than i think they would have been if some random faceless corporation had owned the rights.

lots of people have always hated michael jackson

it's pretty easy to hate any omnipresent pop star. just look at their smug mugs.

I don't think anything changed post-death (great term, post-death). He was a joke for years, decades practically.

MJ is kind of like the Star Wars franchise - something I loved as a small child that has since become grotesque and unenjoyable after decades of overexposure, hysterical adulation, and the bloated weight of self-importance. I can't really locate anything to enjoy in the music itself. I've heard it all so many times and its subtexts - abuse, narcissism, Peter Pan syndrome, paranoia, delusions of grandeur - are all singularly unattractive, not sentiments I enjoy reveling in. As dance music there's a million things I would prefer, primarily from the eras immediately prior to his peak (funk/disco) and immediately afterward (hip hop). As 80s synth-funk/R&B goes MJ's weirdo obsessions (circa Thriller we have horror movies, pedophilia, illegitimate children, and an ode to either masturbation or gang warfare who can be sure) just gross me out and lack any sense of fun. In light of the arc of his life enjoying this stuff seems morbid and depressing in the extreme, sort of like how I feel listening to Nirvana. As an "innovator" eh what the fuck ever - he leaned on a lot of people sonically and stayed with the times for the most part. He owes a lot to the Motown machine and to Quincy Jones. I don't hear a lot of crazy formal innovation in his stuff that wasn't already happening in the late 70s and early 80s (Moroder, Prince, copping basslines from Rick James etc.). And I'm not really convinced that his vocal schtick of screeches and grunts accompanied by crotch-grabbing are any improvement over James Brown (or, since we're on this thread, again, Prince). Where he was unique was in the level of his stardom. But I don't give a shit about that.

xp

the way this clip morphs over 14 minutes is kind of mindblowing:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r5qm8Nu_JjI

i have watched the motown 25 billie jean clip a million times but for some reason i'd never seen bit just before that, the jackson 5 reunion thing. why were they wearing baseball uniforms/stirrups?

He owes a lot to the Motown machine and to Quincy Jones.

If Jackson's home demos are anything to go by, he doesn't owe Jones anything. The vocal and instrumental arrangements are complete, absent only a few horn stabs or string swirls (which, I'm told, Jones wasn't even responsible for anyway).

pop stars being egomaniacs, heaven to betsy, leave me with some illusions

also why do you guys insist on putting two great things in competition all the fucking time

If Jackson's home demos are anything to go by, he doesn't owe Jones anything.

Jackson only has four individual writing credits and co-producer credits on Thriller. Other people wrote and produced PYT, Thriller and Human Nature (and no one gives a shit about the other songs on the album). Similarly Jones produced all Off the Wall, and most of that is written by other people too. Jackson knew how to craft some of his biggest singles, but he constantly relied on other people, he was not some singular genius doing it all himself a la Todd Rundgren or Prince, despite the way he's often depicted. Not that this is necessary to be a great artist (see also James Brown or David Bowie or Dr. Dre or any number of huge figures), but I think it's bullshit when people make him out to be some kind of all-powerful creative force.

A truly great songwriter would have more to his resume than a half-dozen (however giant) singles. and that's all MJ has.

also why do you guys insist on putting two great things in competition all the fucking time

Because putting mediocre movies into countdowns got old.

A truly great songwriter would have more to his resume than a half-dozen (however giant) singles. and that's all MJ has.

― Οὖτις,

wait seriously? He wrote everything on Bad and from that point forward wrote or co-wrote everything.

Shakey, I don't mind your not liking MJ so much as you're using the rockist songwriter argument when in MJ's case it is flat-out wrong, especially when so many demos exist.

PYT is the most bewitchingly perfect pop song I've ever heard, it makes me think of being in school and watching people rehearse musicals, and all this effort and slog and graft and then it suddenly hits a point where it takes flight and looks effortless. MJ just seems totally in control all the way through the song in this really compelling way

Of course MJ relied on others; I'm not disputing that. I'm disputing the idea of Quincy Jones as the (or even a) main architect of Jackson's successes.

He wrote everything on Bad and from that point forward wrote or co-wrote everything.

yes all of which is terrible

I only brought up the rockist songwriter/producer angle as part of it because people claim he was a genius at both. being a songwriter/producer is not necessary to being a great artist and it never has been. but if we're going to compare his songwriting/production work to others, I wouldn't even put him in the top 10 on that count. Of the stuff he wrote/co-produced "Rock With You" is probably the best. Even allowing that the other two big hits he wrote/co-produced from "Thriller" are up there as well, that's THREE FUCKING SONGS. which is paltry.

yes all of which is terrible

pfffft

I dunno how anyone can listen to "Bad" (the song) and not hear it as a totally desperate, almost comically inept manifestation of masculine insecurity. Everything from that point onward became by turns hamfisted and/or disturbing, whether he was singing about skin color not mattering (hmm gee wonder what's going on there) or fantasizing about fucking Diana Ross. Delivered by a manchild in a military uniform that builds giant statues of himself. Even typing this out makes me lol at the baldly ridiculous (and ultimately very sad and tragic) insanity of this guy's output. He was not a happy guy working through his problems; his catalog is a funhouse mirror of denial, delusion and solipsism. I don't really get how people relate to it.

I can't relate to Michael Jackson lyrically on any level. It doesn't stop me from thinking he's responsible for some solid jamz.

Good to great self-written MJ songs:

Workin' Day and Night
Don't Stop Til You Get Enough
Wanna Be Startin' Something
Billie Jean
Beat It
Leave Me Alone
Smooth Criminal
Who Is It
Remember the Time
Jam
Can't Let Her Get Away
In the Closet
Stranger in Moscow
Morphine

I had to stop cuz there's so many.

*and co-written I should have said.

Also, it helps that because I didn't have MTV until the late nineties he (and Madonna) came to me as a radio artist.

Other people wrote and produced PYT, Thriller and Human Nature (and no one gives a shit about the other songs on the album)

tbf the other two songs no one gives a shit about are Temperton's

i thought Thriller was known for people giving a shit about every song

(i give a shit about every non-ballad track)

have literally never heard anyone praise Baby Be Mine of Lady in My Life but sure let's hear it

xp

'baby be mine' is a fucking jam, i thought that was uncontroversial. like with many of his tunes, i've got even more appreciation for it after working on an instrumental (new orleans brass band) version of it recently. the melodies are pretty crazy (modal?).

"Baby Be Mine" is always played on adult R&B and quiet storm.

"The Lady in My Life" is a quiet storm staple and I've long used it as a litmus test for whose opinions I can take seriously about r&b

itt Shakey does a great Mr Snrub impersonation

'baby be mine' is a fucking jam

― festival culture (Jordan), Thursday, September 18, 2014 3:45 PM (28 minutes ago)

i love "baby be mine" and "lady in my life"

hey Shakes, Marlon Brando didn't write any of his films

ohh, didn't realize Οὖτις is Shakey.