This is why I like you.

And boo boo, it was practically sucide the way he took those pills anyway.

I always lol a little when people call him untalented.

Just because he didn't write his own songs (omg wait, HE DID) and because he lip synched during concerts.

And of course any dumbass could sing Billie Jean while dancing like every part of their body is being manipulated by strings.

My roommate is obsessed with this song. Whenever we go out and it's played he goes nuts and dances all MJ-like. Quite funny. Is a great song, though.

I gave into temptation and briefly reviewed the discography. I was never a huge fan and always thought he was over rated because he took five years in between what I always thought was cookie cutter pop music.

I was always mesmerized by the dance moves, though I'd rarely admit to it, but overall the persona was never my style. Ultimately, in my original opinion and after review I have to admit "Off the Wall", "Thriller" and "Bad" are three pretty exceptional albums, especially for the genre. I love "Off the Wall" most for the unforgettable opener "Don't Stop..."

The real story in his death is that of his tyrant of a father and what he did to his most talented son and all the rest. He destroyed their lives and all the money, fame and success could not repair what he had broken and could not save Micheal's life.

I just read this Newsweek article about Michael Jackson called "He Never Made Me Moonwalk" and I'd be interested in hearing what some of you think about it. One of the central points of the article is that Nirvana was a "musical regime that dethroned" Michael Jackson. Honestly, I think that's a pretty absurd claim to make. Nevermind may have been the next album to hold Billboard's number one slot after Dangerous but that hardly means Nirvana dethroned him. I mean Nirvana sold a lot of albums but they certainly didn't sell nearly as many as Michael Jackson and they were much more of a niche band whose popularity did not cross racial, ethnic and national borders the way Michael Jackson's did. Beyond that, the most ridiculous claim implied by the author is that, while Michael Jackson was "a man consumed by the incendiary mega-ness of his stardom" and whose "stardom doomed him to a tragic adulthood", Nirvana were somehow the antithesis of this.

That's the stupidest sh*t I've ever heard.

Music didn't need saving from Michael Jackson, if anything, Jackson (along with Talking Heads, Prince and a few others) was the real bright spot in the murky 80s pop scene, and of course, providing a much needed alternative on MTV at a time when it was dominated by awful hair metal. Jackson really did build the bridge for more black artists to gain crossover success.

And Nirvana didn't undo any of that, because at the same time Nirvana was on MTV, so was Public Enemy and Dr. Dre, who had just as much impact as Nirvana did if not more.

Nirvana got us out of hair metal, and that was it, but even that they didn't do alone. Metallica and RHCP deserve some of that credit too.

I love Nirvana, but really. Cobain's talent can be very overstated at times, he was a solid songwriter for sure. But I'd even argue that Jackson was not only way more talented, he was a better songwriter too.

I mean c'mon. Don't Stop Til' You Get Enough, Billie Jean, Beat It, Bad and Smooth Criminal were strokes of pure genius.

I found myself agreeing with a lot of that article.

As for this, I got the impression he was talking personally the effect it had on him, not culturally.

lol, booboo, i never cease to be amazed at just how many rubbish bands you like and unduly credit! it borders on the comical!

Exactly. And grunge, like hair metal, was merely a niche within popular music. In the 80s as well as in the 90s the biggest of the big stuff was pretty consistently just straight up pop music a la Michael Jackson. Nirvana didn't do anything to change that. They weren't even competing in the same arena as Michael Jackson.

Says a fan of Animal Collective and Deerhoof, the two most unfathomably awful bands in modern music.

Now stop trolling me.