Michael Jackson – “Invincible” (2001)

Rating: 4

Best Song: “Butterflies”

            If Dangerous and HIStory signaled the beginning of the end of Jackson’s reign as the King of Pop, then Invincible is where he was finally deposed. For all the problems I had with HIStory, and even if it was no longer particularly innovative, it at least still had several songs where Jackson was still working at a level far beyond his contemporaries. Invincible is quite lacking in this regard, and for the first time, Michael Jackson could be any random pop artist.

            It follows the same basic template that he started with Dangerous in order to stay modern, which in hindsight, was more and more of a bad idea. It runs the entire length of the CD, employs a new, hip producer, features guest rappers for no discernible reason, and leans heavily on sentimental balladry. Yet where in the 90s he still had enough songwriting ability to make the formula work, it doesn’t here. The ballads are more numerous than on previous albums, and provide predictable low points, as there are several awful ones scattered through the second half of the album. Yet even the dance songs, normally where Jackson would be able to prop up the album, are fairly mediocre.

            The opening trio of “Unbreakable,” “Heartbreaker,” and “Invincible” should have been the section where Jackson could have established some goodwill with me before the inevitable onslaught of ballads I was destined to despise. Yet although these three songs aren’t terrible, and feature at least decently memorable melodies, I am struck by how stiff and non-danceable they feel. In new producer Rodney Jerkins’ attempt to create a modern sound, he somehow lost the funk and rhythmic drive that was always so crucial to making these types of songs operate. It also doesn’t help that Jackson’s vocals were severely diminished by this point. In the verses of all these songs, his voice is low and grumbly and his range lessened. Then when the choruses come, the harmonized Jackson background vocals, always present on his earlier albums, are here the focus instead of the counterpoint, indicating to me that either he or his team of producers were uncertain that he had the ability any more to have his voice as the main focus of the song. Although I rank Michael’s peak vocal abilities well below some of my R&B favorites like Stevie Wonder and Prince, his unique timbre and ultra-high range were part of what separated his music from the rest. When that’s missing and the beats and rhythms are just OK, there’s not a lot that makes this music feel like Michael Jackson, apart from the recognizable chord changes leading into the raps that are probably identical chord progressions to previous work (I could probably look this up, but I prefer to rely on my ears for this one). This all also applies to the more retro lead single “You Rock My World,” which for the first 30 seconds (ignoring the pointless spoken-word intro with Chris Tucker a la “Black or White”) of its thick bass and strings arrangement does sound like classic Jackson, but never quite gets there due to the weak vocals and the fact that it’s so desperately trying to capture his old vibe (witness the bridge that is a near identical replica of the bridge from “Remember the Time” melodically).

            Weirdly, the first few ballads on the album are actually not bad perhaps because they aim for a similar feel to songs like “Human Nature” or “The Lady in My Life” rather than “Heal the World.” They’re not great either, but I like both “Break of Dawn” and “Heaven Can Wait” just fine. On “Heaven Can Wait,” Jackson actually opens up in the last minute of the song with his singing and it’s clear that he was straining to sing at this time of his life, as his increasingly harsh delivery has now become almost a bark. Yet I actually prefer this to the smooth, processed vocals of most of the album. At least there’s a clear passion and energy here, and that was probably the one factor left that could still make him stand above his peers. The smooth “Butterflies” is one of two songs on the album that I rank as near-excellent, and although it’s strained, I love the fact that he goes into full falsetto for the second verse, adding some rare appeal to a Jackson ballad.

           So if I could take the first seven songs and add in a few others from later in the album (specifically “Privacy,” “Whatever Happens” and “Threatened,” particularly “Whatever Happens” with another one of the few examples where Jackson actually tries to sing on the album), I probably wouldn’t give it that bad of a rating. Unfortunately, tracks 8-14, excluding “Privacy,” a passable anti-tabloid rant that would have fit well on HIStory, are the worst stretch of songs of Jackson’s career and ultimately drag down the rating significantly. In fact, this section is so bad that it’s taken me a lot of listens to realize that the surrounding material was at least decent enough that this album should get a 4 instead of a 3 or even lower. The worst offenders are the self-penned “Speechless,” a ballad that starts out a capella but with a totally unmemorable melody, then gets progressively worse by adding in all sorts of gushy strings and of course, the Andrae Crouch choir, and “The Lost Children,” which I could probably have guessed I would totally abhor just by the title but once the inevitable choir of children comes in to sing the chorus, it really is sublimely awful, and if he really molested children, it probably goes well beyond being artistically repellent to actually being offensive. The ballads contributed by outside songwriters are not much better and much as I usually love R. Kelly’s megalomaniacal ballads, his contribution this time (“Cry”) falls short as well. The one dance song that breaks up this terrifying section of ballads (“2000 Watts”) is a bust as well, clearly trying to sound futuristic but really going nowhere.

            Ultimately, I have to say that Invincible deserves its bad reputation and rightfully marked the end of Michael’s commercial relevance. There are occasional glimpses of his previous talent, but rarely even for an entire song. Although plenty of artists besides Michael Jackson have found it difficult to keep up their quality 22 years after their first great album, given the evident weakness in his voice and increasing reliance on outside producers and songwriters, it’s hard not to think that his various health problems, both mental and physical, hadn’t contributed to the decline. Had he been more stable and less concerned about trying to make a big commercial comeback, I think he might have still had the potential to release some solid, if not great albums by revisiting the sounds of Thriller and Bad. Alas, that was never to be as Invincible was his final release before his death in 2009.