Michael Jackson

100 Best Albums

Essential Albums

  • Bad
    Bad
    Bad

    Bad may not have all the timeless prestige of its predecessor, Thriller, but it’s just as full of heart and purpose. Over rockier rhythms, Jackson sounds gleeful and impassioned, whether he’s making a profound humanitarian plea (“Man in the Mirror”), raging with lust (“Dirty Diana”), or narrating a suave play-by-play (“Smooth Criminal”). And when he’s slaying the dance floor, his voice is spine-tingling—his nuanced falsetto goes from subtle to ferocious in the space of a single line—once again proving that Jackson is pop's one true master of ceremony.

  • Thriller
    Thriller
    Thriller

    100 Best Albums There are few pop albums, or even works of art, that denote a wholesale shift in time and space the way Michael Jackson’s Thriller did in 1982. Noting its impact on the career trajectory of a child star turned R&B hitmaker feels reductive; talking about its record-smashing commercial success diminishes its creative leaps. It did nothing less than define the modern pop blockbuster and redefine the scope and reach of music. Stripping the weight of history from Thriller is a big job, but hearing the record as a statement in itself remains hugely rewarding. Seven of its nine original cuts were Top 10 singles, and it became one of the best-selling albums ever made, but more important is the way Jackson and producer Quincy Jones turned the singer’s obsessions into intricate, stunningly sung pop-funk. The album’s opening throwdown, “Wanna Be Startin’ Somethin’,” is Jackson at his fiercest and funkiest, picking up right where 1979’s Off the Wall left off—and shoring up his R&B bona fides. But from the Paul McCartney-blessed pop of the first hit single “The Girl Is Mine” to the Eddie Van Halen-revved pyrotechnics of “Beat It,” Jackson’s crossover moves opened up the eyes and ears of the industry—and audiences around the world—to what music could sound, look, and feel like if we blurred those old color lines. “Billie Jean” is a gripping psycho-study of the paranoia and persecution that he was already feeling—yet it still maintains the mysterious allure of an artist who became the avatar for the omnipresent global pop superstar.

  • Off the Wall
    Off the Wall
    Off the Wall

    No longer a precocious child star but not yet the King of Pop, Michael Jackson hooked up with producer Quincy Jones for this 1979 solo breakthrough—a disco-era masterpiece propelled by gleaming melodies, compulsive grooves, and some of Jackson’s most spectacular performances. While it contains a handful of his signature, heart-tugging ballads, Off the Wall is also incredibly funky: From the sinuous sway of “Rock with You” to the glittering rush of “Don’t Stop ’Til You Get Enough,” these tracks will never cease to fill dance floors.

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About Michael Jackson

Michael Jackson was one of the 20th century's defining artists, a singer, songwriter, producer, and dancer of exceptional high-quality versatility. He emerged as the prodigious star of the Jackson 5 and soon scored his first solo chart-topper with "Ben" (1972). A starring role in The Wiz sparked a partnership with producer Quincy Jones, resulting first in Off the Wall (1979), a dazzling disco-era album that announced Jackson as a mature talent with "Don't Stop 'til You Get Enough" and "Rock with You." Featuring early MTV staples "Billie Jean" and "Thriller," Thriller (1982) became the biggest-selling album of all time. Kept in the stratosphere with the high-tech Bad (1987), he was dubbed "the King of Pop," then teamed with new jack swing originator Teddy Riley for Dangerous (1991), trailed by the half-retrospective/half-new HIStory (1995) and the slick R&B of Invincible (2001), his final album before his death in 2009.

HOMETOWN
United States of America
BORN
August 29, 1958
GENRE
Pop

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