There I was, lying in the dentist's chair, the Darth Vader mask on my
nose, sucking up the aptly nicknamed laughing gas. The hygienist, Amy,
was asking me about my job. Giggling, I told her that I had to listen to
the new Michael Jackson album earlier that afternoon. She screwed up her
face in disgust, which made me laugh harder. Then we both tried to
determine which was worse: getting teeth drilled or listening to the new
Michael Jackson album.

Oh, the drilling was certainly worse, but Jackson's (third? fourth?)
triumphant "comeback" CD is no less anesthetizing.

First, let me assert: Michael Jackson is not the King of Pop. He gave
himself that title years ago, and the little Napoleon even had the
audacity to demand that media refer to him thusly. We've been along for
the ride ever since.

King of pap, maybe. To wear the crown of King of Pop, though, an artist
would be expected to be omnipresent in all the fifedoms of popular
music. The force of his rule should be felt in provinces as far away as
jazz and indie-rock. Aspiring young musicians should be chanting the
same mantra as young basketball trainees, wanting to "be like Mike."

But they aren't. Musicians don't cite Jackson's indomitable influence
when discussing their own albums in interviews. They're not covering his
songs. Well, sometimes they do, but it's almost always from the
perspective of cheeky irony, from "Weird Al" Yankovic to Alien Ant Farm.
They do it for a laugh, not because they think the music is
awe-inspiring and better than something they themselves could have
created. They're making fun of him.

Part of the reason we know Bob Dylan is an important artist is that
countless other musicians -- the prisms of our culture -- have performed
and recorded his songs. The first riff most aspiring rockers learn on
guitar is Led Zeppelin's "Stairway to Heaven." Every cover band in
America plays a U2 song. But where's the material from the allegedly
all-powerful Michael Jackson? It's in never-never land.

Where's the beef?

In a desperate flurry of research last week, I attempted to find record
of such influence or esteem. I came up sadly lacking. Some journalists
have mentioned a possible Jackson influence on 'N SYNC, but this is
primarily an influence of the Jackson 5, not Michael himself . Many
folks, in fact, cite the Jackson 5 -- a remarkably different entity,
creatively -- as an inspiration, but never Michael himself.

No one denies his commercial success. In fact, that's the only thing
speakers, journalists, even fans seem able to discuss about Jackson. Was
"Thriller" a good album? "Yes!" sayeth all with conviction. Why was it a
good album? "Because it sold more than 40 million copies."

Welcome to capitalist culture, where the masses assume that commercial
success automatically implies great art. Of course, Jackson himself is
partly responsible for conditioning us to believe this. He may be a
mediocre musician, but he's "The Wiz" at marketing -- a despot, really.
He crowned himself king, and when no one had yet built a monument to his
glory he digitally created one for the cover of his greatest-hits
package, "HIStory."

When we talk about Wacko Jacko around the water cooler, we talk about
his monkey, his lawsuits, his oxygen tent, his sequined glove, his
moonwalk, his videos, his humanitarian efforts, his mutilated face. But,
to borrow a "Thriller"-era commercial tag, where's the beef? Why aren't
we talking about his music? Because it's incidental to the enthralling
freak show that is Jackson's life and because -- with the possible
exception of the "Thriller" follow-up, "Bad" -- it's not worth talking
about.

Prince Albert of Monaco, in presenting Jackson the Male Artist of the
Year award at the World Music Awards last year, said, "A thousand years
from now, when the history of popular music is examined, no single
performer will be as remembered and as celebrated as Michael Jackson."
I'd be willing to leave a sizeable wager in my estate that this does not
occur, that he might be remembered but not widely celebrated --
remembered as an imposing, self-aggrandizing, blustery oaf who bored
everyone at the party with his boasts and never recognized that he was
being humored until he finally took the hint and went home.

Man or machine

"Invincible," despite its optimistic (obnoxious?) title, is certainly
not an album that will assure Jackson's canonization. It's 77 minutes of
retreaded grooves, mack daddy role playing and ballads so saccharine
they'd put every member of 101 Strings into a diabetic coma. Nothing
here breaks new ground. The "grooves," if we can call them that, are
just turning over spent soil, barely beefing up the basics of modern
R&B.

Of course, an album doesn't have to obliterate the status quo to be
judged a worthy creative step. "Invincible," though, belies its title
with a distinct lack of confidence. Jackson's administration for this
album was a choking bureaucracy of producers, writers and other stars.
The majority of songs are credited to an average of six writers, and the
album is crowded with every collaborator from Jackson's little black
book (or did he bleach that, too?) -- Brandy, Rodney Jerkins, Teddy
Riley, Babyface, Andre Crouch, Carlos Santana, even the Notorious B.I.G.
back from the dead. Jackson's singing -- i.e., his hiccups and toilet
grunts -- struggles to rise above the cloying music, tired beats and
general hubub of too many cooks in the kitchen.

The two songs with a single Jackson writing credit are flat echoes of
his once-interesting past. "Speechless" opens with an a capella stanza
quickly (but not quickly enough) rescued by strings; "The Lost Children"
is less a song than a score for future public service announcements
decrying child neglect. Both songs employ choirs -- tricks he's used
before -- and the arrangements are so lifeless they slide off the ear
like a cold tongue.

The art on the CD cover is very indicative of the music inside, too. On
the front, Michael's face -- ever resembling the forensic sketches of
alien abductors -- stares at us calmly, featureless except for his right
eye, which has been pixelated as if the image were beginning to slip out
of resolution on a digital screen. Inside, a single rose suffers the
same predicament: half the petals have lost their detail in digital
pixels. Jackson's music is slipping down the same silicon drain. The
beats throughout "Invincible" are so digitally produced -- so cold, so
crisp, so sharp -- that they thump harshly in the headphones. The songs
become mere sound effects with beats. They're hard to dance to, there is
no groove. It's chilly, uninviting, inorganic.

The unfathomable gall

I'm not the first critic to unload on Jackson upon the occasion of this
CD release, and listening to the opener, "Unbreakable," perhaps it's
easy to see why. He practically dares critics to diss him, claiming that
he is absolutely impervious to all sticks, stones and hurtful words.
"You can't touch me because I'm untouchable," he boasts. "There's no way
you'll ever get to me . . . You'll never break me 'cause I'm
unbreakable."

Almost a quarter century into his solo career, and he still suffers
from the raging persecution complex of the child star. Who does he think
is after him? Is he addressing the tabloids, and if so must we all be
punished for their overindulgence? We're not after you, Michael. On the
contrary, we'd like you to be after us. We'd like you to chase us down
with the sauna-smooth grooves you pioneered on "Off the Wall," the
infectious exuberance that permeated every track on "Bad," the genuine,
gleaming smiles that graced both. Come after us, for a change.

But instead, "Invincible" justifies its title in another way: it keeps
Michael's public persona impenetrable. In "Privacy," Jackson once again
lectures us on his personal need for seclusion (which he did much better
on "Bad" in "Leave Me Alone"). "I need my privacy," he begs, "so
paparazzi, get away from me." He even evokes Princess Diana ("one of my
friends") in an effort to make his anti-tabloids crusade a cause for the
people. How self-important he must feel when making the decision to put
this kind of song on an album for general consumption. A song about his
unique struggles with fame is supposed to mean something in our every
day lives? Get over yourself, Jacko.

Commercially, no doubt, he is unbreakable. "Invincible" debuted at the
top of the charts, fueled by hype and hoopla, not by the music itself.
All this sound and fury signifies absolutely nothing, and next time I'm
in the dentist's chair, I expect to hear something from "Invincible"
being piped into the office along with the rest of the Muzak that's
engineered to be ignored.

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Thomas Conner, World entertainment writer, can be reached at 581-8473 or via e-mail at thomas.conner@tulsaworld.com.