MJ and Madonna

[Bruno]

I wonder what are the reasons for these artists to be underrated in the rankings of the site. For example, the Jackson's album "Bad"is absurdly low. Weird, since I always see him among the greatest albums of the 80s and placed among the top 200 of all time. He is currently taking # 1564. These "errors" are repeated in some other albums and songs of both artists.

The links of the artists below:

http://www.acclaimedmusic.net/Current/M ... ackson.htm

http://www.acclaimedmusic.net/Current/Madonna.htm

However, the creator of the site deserves congratulations and the site is a great search tool for anyone who is a lover of music.

[Jirin]

I see Bad as more of an uneven album with great singles than a great album. I mark it as the start of his period where he was getting defensive and trying too hard with his image. "Nobody's business but mine and my baby's!" "LEEAAAVE ME ALOOOOOONNNE!" Both these songs work well individually, but taken together, start to paint an uncomfortable picture.

You can also contrast the big singles from his previous album and this one. "Beat It": "You don't want to be in a gang, you could really get hurt." "Bad": "I am in a gang, I am so freaking AWESOME!"

I love the singles from Bad, but never listen to the full album. I think some of the singles from Bad like The Way You Make Me Feel and Smooth Criminal should be on the chart.

With Madonna I personally feel a lot of her albums have great singles, but too much filler to be considered fully a strong album. And the two that do rank highly on AM, Like A Prayer and Ray Of Light, are IMO the two biggest exceptions. But there's nothing on either of those albums I like better than Borderline.

[VanillaFire1000]

I tend to think the Bad singles are also underrated in Henrik's list. But they also sound, somehow, more dated than his Thriller material. I think you can trace the development of Bad to the Terry Riley/Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis stuff of the late 80s/early 90s. All of New Jack Swing can be directly traced to the influence of Bad on pop. And none of that stuff is high on lists here, even the best stuff (Guy, Bell Biv Devoe, Boyz II Men) is really low.

[JR]

I think their overall placements, when stacked against the most acclaimed acts, is pretty fair. These lists for the most part take into account only the musical acclaim, not anything in terms of most important artists (though some lists do take a "most important" slant for albums or tracks). So, while there is a ranked artist list, it's dependent on the showings of individual albums and songs, and not opinions on the artists and their general greatness.

And, yes- we can never give Henrik enough congrats and pats on the back.

[John]

Bad is my favorite MJ album by a wide margin. Thriller has the best songs, but I think Bad is his most consistent album. I think it gets underrated because of the title song, which does sound dated and even at the time seemed ludicrous with Michael Jackson singing about being "bad" and the video made the Sharks and the Jets look like Crips and Bloods.

I think Madonna's 89-94 "naughty era" is really underrated. Not only is it good music, but her public image during that time could be seen as groundbreaking. It opened the door for a lot of things, some good, some bad.

[JR]

I don't know- perhaps the 1992-1994 is underrated for Madonna. But, the 1983-1989 studio albums have garnered decent acclaim on best-of features.

My favorite Bad tracks are "Man in the Mirror" and "The Way You Make Me Feel." They haven't gotten as much critical love as they may deserve- but that happens at times with non-lead singles from an album (especially if they were third and later singles).

[Bruno]

I think their overall placements, when stacked against the most acclaimed acts, is pretty fair. These lists for the most part take into account only the musical acclaim, not anything in terms of most important artists

Yes, that's right I'm talking about. In terms of acclamation only.

The position of the Bad album on the list is ridiculously low. I researched several lists, all the criticism of the album, and it is highly recommended. I do not remember which was his place before the last update. But it seems to me, he dropped a lot. And if we speak only of acclaim, Jackson has two songs that are clearly underrated, not only here: Man In The Mirror and Stranger In Moscow. Not to mention the album Dangerous and other songs after "Bad".

Perhaps because it is based on many lists that give priority to alternative music and indie rock, these artists r&b and pop/rock does not have the positions they deserve on the site.

[JR]

Indie and alt. rock are two of the more popular genres for a lot of the lists out there these days, that is true.

[Bruno]

Indie and alt. rock are two of the more popular genres for a lot of the lists out there these days, that is true.

Yeah. Particularly I like a lot of Indie Rock and Alt. But I think there is a very large amount of lists that focus much more on these styles, instead of pop/rock and r&b most "recent" (80/90/00).

[Bruno]

Still on "Bad", below are some lists which show that the album deserves a much better position in the ranking of Acclaimed Music:

Slant Magazine - Best Albums of the 1980s: No. 48
http://www.slantmagazine.com/music/feat ... 308/page_6

Ranked number 202 on Rolling Stone magazine's list of "The 500 Greatest Albums of All Time".

The album is included in the book entitled 1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die

FNAC (France) - The 1000 Best Albums of All Time (2008): No.463
http://www.listology.com/list/les-1000- ... de-la-fnac

VH1 listed the album at number 43 on their list of "100 Greatest Albums of All Time of the MTV Generation", in 2009
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Current position in Acclaimed Music:

Bad (1987)
Year Rank: 32
Decade Rank: 302
All Time Rank: 1564

[Greg]

Spike Lee is currently working on a documentary of the album "Bad"

[Moonbeam]

Bad is easily my favorite MJ album and Madonna is one of my top 10 artists. I agree that their work is worth a lot of acclaim! However, I don't find any fault with Henrik's work here - he is simply aggregating the lists of critics.

The larger problem that I see is in the clear hierarchy of genres exhibited by music critics. Genres like funk, pop, disco, country and jazz are at a disadvantage because a majority of critics seem to favor white males who play guitar.