Jackson Stung by Friendly Fire : Billboard, the usually upbeat music trade, astonishes the industry with a vitriolic review blasting his new double album.

Has the bible of the music industry committed blasphemy?

Billboard magazine, dramatically breaking from its tradition of accentuating the positive in covering new releases, published a savage review of Michael Jackson’s album “HIStory: Past, Present and Future Book 1” in its July 1 issue.

Calling Jackson a “gifted musical careerist of negligible emotional maturity . . . [who] struggles to contrive dubious monuments to himself,” the review trashes much of the new material that makes up half of the two-disc package:

“Jackson serves up an often-dated stylistic muddle tinged with petulance over the child-abuse case he opted to settle, his reluctance to acknowledge personal flaws or accept adult responsibilities and his attacks on the same shrill mass-media mechanisms he’s currently exploiting.”

For the most part, the music world is astonished.

“Whoa! That’s seismic!” says Bryn Bridenthal, head of publicity for Geffen Records. “That’s more than a negative review. That’s a position paper.”

In most publications, this wouldn’t be such a big a deal. But Billboard’s unsigned reviews generally take a fairly neutral stance, focusing primarily on a new release’s appeal to radio programmers and retailers. Such personal criticism of an artist is virtually unheard of.

And now people at Billboard are waiting for retribution from Sony, which releases Jackson’s albums--especially in light of Sony’s having just paid Billboard to wrap its previous issue in a “newspaper” touting “HIStory.”

No one at Billboard will talk about the review on the record, and the magazine won’t even say who wrote it.

One person who works with the publication says that Sony has a history of “flexing its muscles” by withholding advertising when trade magazines cross it.

Sony had no comment.

Even if Sony withholds advertising, some feel the magazine’s financial loss will be made up for with a gain in credibility.

“Billboard is often seen as being tied in to advertising, so this is a healthy thing for them to break out of that,” says Reprise Records President Howie Klein. “I’m just glad they chose someone else’s label to do it with.”