Prince wins Highest Hairdo at the UK Music Hall of Fame. Photograph: Johnny Gree/AP
Twenty years ago, it would have been every discerning metropolitan pop fan's dream to have Michael Jackson and Prince appearing in London the same week. Two decades too late, it's finally happening; Prince was inducted into the UK Music Hall Of Fame last night, while tonight sees Michael Jackson re-enact the Thriller video at the World Music Awards at Earls Court.
Jackson's mutilated visage, way scarier than the zombie makeup he originally wore in the Thriller clip, speaks volumes about how epically awry his life and career have gone. Prince has fared better, named by Rolling Stone as music's top earner of 2004 thanks to a US tour which netted him $56.5m, but you'd have to be a truly rabid fan not to believe that his muse flew off sometime shortly after 1987's classic album Sign O The Times, before making a kamikaze landing around the time he changed his name to a symbol.
This week, both icons still top the bill, but the bill itself is lower - both award shows are B-brands compared to the Brits and MTV Awards dog and pony shows. There's also something rather unseemly about the way both Prince and Jacko still appear to need the approbation of any old random committee.
(Kanye West's inherited this character trait too, with his ludicrous rushing of the stage at the MTV Awards last week in protest at not winning Best Video).
And yet, and yet... it's hard to remain entirely unmoved by the appearance of these two pop colossi. At their peak, their talents seemed to outstrip everyone, and we're still hearing the echoes of their music today everywhere from the Gossip's gender-bending disco funk to Timbaland's techno-soul - even electro-geeks Hot Chip had an early song called Down With Prince.
But should Prince and Jacko just leave us alone to remember them at their peak, here and here, or do they still have something left to give us in 2006?
