Michael Jackson

Keith Harris nails what made the Michael Jackson trial so depressing: how Jackson's recorded output portended the megalomania and juvenile insularity which led to the trial in the first place. He also does a brilliant job describing what makes "Billie Jean" such a fantastic and endlessly listenable pop masterpiece more than 20 years later:

On "Billie Jean," a sole voice struggles to pass safely through a treacherous rhythm machine: drums stamp downward, a bass line rises and falls like a piston, and beneath the wide gaps in the keyboards a bottomless echo threatens to engulf the singer. The song's a brilliant illustration of the warring emotions of terror and exhilaration that combine in the sex drive of a teenage boy, just one moment where Jackson has reveled in commingling seemingly opposite impulses. He didn't just strike a balance between naïveté and sexuality, nervousness and grace, effeminacy and aggression—he demonstrated their interdependence.

All this, and a defense of Invincible that strikes me as reasonable.