Ranking George Michael albums

Approaching two years, I haven’t hardened against the reality of his death — the worst of 2016’s superstar crop. Uet his standing continues to rise.

1. Listen Without Prejudice, Vol. 1 (1990)

“For those of us too young for the plague years—who can imagine, at least, a life lived instead of convulsing in agony on a hospital bed—chastising Michael for leaning on elegies and ballads in 1990 strikes me as glib,” I wrote for Pitchfork in 2017 on the release of a multi-disc edition of George Michael’s second solo album — an edition that turned an excellent, much overlooked album into an essential one. At the moment when the talons of the boomer generation held fast to conceptions about authenticity, here was an acoustic album whose quiet sprung rhythms depended on its maker’s immersion in dance pop and dance culture. Even Michael’s Stevie Wonder cover has evolved from gesture of affection to fulfillment, a proof of his connection to an R&B language that plumbed an already too febrile imagination and assuaged desires he could no longer suppress.

2. Faith (1987)

The Anglo-Greek Sign o’ the Times, out six months later and surpassing it in pop appeal, black and white. Chris Molanphy, Morgan Rhoes, and Oliver Wang’s recent podcast adds crucial context, Brad Nelson an aural explication.

3. Make It Big! (1987)

Pure pop for now people, Wham!’s second album courted frivolity, daring its audience to dismiss the duo as another pair of limey whiteheads whose fascinating fashion acted like Samson’s hair or Hercules’ belt when it came time to cavort before the camera. To say that “Freedom” overpowers their Isleys cover in 2018 is less trolling than an acknowledgment of the speed at which Michael’s talent matched his ambitions.

4. Older (1996)

A late nineties smash in Europe, Older was a lesser realized Listen Without Prejudice, a haunted release on which ghosts distract him from doing dudes in his BMW because, as he noted more than a decade earlier, guilty feet have got no rhythm. “Fastlove” and the title track rank among his most elegant compositions, and in general he absorbed Brazilian melodic overtones better than the competition.