angel345 said:

amit1234 said:

THIS is the song that carried Invincible to over 2 million in sales in the USA.

Make no mistake.

I still remember how the album consistently sold over 100k week after week while this song was killing it at urban radio.

Kind of fitting that MJ's last big hit of his career was because of Black America.

Black America has always had his back until death

depends on who you talk to... i could point to some folks who laughed at me due to my support of him. and a lot of folks felt he fell off when 'bad' came out, because he 'wasn't black' to them. they took one look at the cover, and rolled their eyes. they said he was betraying his race. i remember when this happened. when he did 'dangerous' some people began to support him again, but not totally. but yeah, when he was accused of all that stuff, a lot of people in the black communities supported him, due to the treatment black people consistently get in the (in)justice system.

i love that dave chapelle skit, when he was like, "he didn't do anything, HE MADE THRILLER!"

MJJstudent said:

amit1234 said:

THIS is the song that carried Invincible to over 2 million in sales in the USA.

Make no mistake.

I still remember how the album consistently sold over 100k week after week while this song was killing it at urban radio.

Kind of fitting that MJ's last big hit of his career was because of Black America.

oh MAN! that is such a great point! things definitely come full circle. i saw on this british program once, this one guy interviewed was discussing how 'invincible' didn't do as well because it was declared 'too black' by the majority. who knows if this was the case; ultimately it was sony's lack of promotion that prevented things from happening. but thanks to people who leaked the song, yeah, the album did better than i guess they wanted it to. because they certainly printed some copies of the single. then ceased its release. so all you had was promos, more or less.

It's silly to say that, the same people are endorsing r&b and hip hop from black artists, the ones from europe probably got used to pop/rock mj and the american ones can relate to r&b/soul mj the most even though he did really well too with pop/rock singles in the US

And that Wendy Williams or Toure was calling it crap too and saying something about "their community" not relating to him or some shit like that in 2002. They knew nothing about mj's politics at Sony and his whole speech, they were just looking at what the media fed the public about Sony and Tommy Motolla and going by that. They should have felt lucky to have him.

MJJstudent said:

angel345 said:

Black America has always had his back until death

depends on who you talk to... i could point to some folks who laughed at me due to my support of him. and a lot of folks felt he fell off when 'bad' came out, because he 'wasn't black' to them. they took one look at the cover, and rolled their eyes. they said he was betraying his race. i remember when this happened. when he did 'dangerous' some people began to support him again, but not totally. but yeah, when he was accused of all that stuff, a lot of people in the black communities supported him, due to the treatment black people consistently get in the (in)justice system.

i love that dave chapelle skit, when he was like, "he didn't do anything, HE MADE THRILLER!"

I wonder if black or white and having big black superstars in videos had anything to do with it.

MJJstudent said:

angel345 said:

Black America has always had his back until death

depends on who you talk to... i could point to some folks who laughed at me due to my support of him. and a lot of folks felt he fell off when 'bad' came out, because he 'wasn't black' to them. they took one look at the cover, and rolled their eyes. they said he was betraying his race. i remember when this happened. when he did 'dangerous' some people began to support him again, but not totally. but yeah, when he was accused of all that stuff, a lot of people in the black communities supported him, due to the treatment black people consistently get in the (in)justice system.

i love that dave chapelle skit, when he was like, "he didn't do anything, HE MADE THRILLER!"

I was about three when this started occurring and I heard that a lot too. It got real bad during the initial Dangerous era. It changed somewhat after 1992 and especially after the allegations, black folks were like "see, always trying to put a successful black man down!" Then he was at the NAACP Image Awards accepting an award and made a great speech. That had black folks standing up like they were at a Black Panther rally. Touching stuff. But I think all communities were kinda polarized against him until his death but good music definitely will have people on your good graces. The response "Butterflies" got in the R&B community was beautiful. Had it not been for that price tag on Fat Joe's song, "Butterflies" would've been number-one instead of number-two. I felt it personally got robbed.

[Edited 2/7/11 11:45am]

Timmy84 said:

MJJstudent said:

depends on who you talk to... i could point to some folks who laughed at me due to my support of him. and a lot of folks felt he fell off when 'bad' came out, because he 'wasn't black' to them. they took one look at the cover, and rolled their eyes. they said he was betraying his race. i remember when this happened. when he did 'dangerous' some people began to support him again, but not totally. but yeah, when he was accused of all that stuff, a lot of people in the black communities supported him, due to the treatment black people consistently get in the (in)justice system.

i love that dave chapelle skit, when he was like, "he didn't do anything, HE MADE THRILLER!"

I was about three when this started occurring and I heard that a lot too. It got real bad during the initial Dangerous era. It changed somewhat after 1992 and especially after the allegations, black folks were like "see, always trying to put a successful black man down!" Then he was at the NAACP Image Awards accepting an award and made a great speech. That had black folks standing up like they were at a Black Panther rally. Touching stuff. But I think all communities were kinda polarized against him until his death but good music definitely will have people on your good graces. The response "Butterflies" got in the R&B community was beautiful. Had it not been for that price tag on Fat Joe's song, "Butterflies" would've been number-one instead of number-two. I felt it personally got robbed.

[Edited 2/7/11 11:45am]

He was also robbed of a grammy, he deserved it for Butterflies. I was confused about his changes during those eras, but thought I was too young to understand and will get it later....lol but I was confused about whether he was black or white, cause the very first time I saw him he looked black, like OTW, Thriller, Bad clips.

alphastreet said:

Timmy84 said:

I was about three when this started occurring and I heard that a lot too. It got real bad during the initial Dangerous era. It changed somewhat after 1992 and especially after the allegations, black folks were like "see, always trying to put a successful black man down!" Then he was at the NAACP Image Awards accepting an award and made a great speech. That had black folks standing up like they were at a Black Panther rally. Touching stuff. But I think all communities were kinda polarized against him until his death but good music definitely will have people on your good graces. The response "Butterflies" got in the R&B community was beautiful. Had it not been for that price tag on Fat Joe's song, "Butterflies" would've been number-one instead of number-two. I felt it personally got robbed.

[Edited 2/7/11 11:45am]

He was also robbed of a grammy, he deserved it for Butterflies. I was confused about his changes during those eras, but thought I was too young to understand and will get it later....lol but I was confused about whether he was black or white, cause the very first time I saw him he looked black, like OTW, Thriller, Bad clips.

Actually it was "You Rock My World" and I agree, that was HIS Grammy but they gave it to a 30-year James Taylor song that he did live. Don't get me wrong, I love me some James Taylor but come on. As for me I wasn't confused. Once he said he had vitiligo I believed him. When I got online I got a better understanding of what he had and why his look changed so much.

Timmy84 said:

alphastreet said:

He was also robbed of a grammy, he deserved it for Butterflies. I was confused about his changes during those eras, but thought I was too young to understand and will get it later....lol but I was confused about whether he was black or white, cause the very first time I saw him he looked black, like OTW, Thriller, Bad clips.

Actually it was "You Rock My World" and I agree, that was HIS Grammy but they gave it to a 30-year James Taylor song that he did live. Don't get me wrong, I love me some James Taylor but come on. As for me I wasn't confused. Once he said he had vitiligo I believed him. When I got online I got a better understanding of what he had and why his look changed so much.

I meant to say robbed of a grammy nomination for Butterflies, I know about YRMW and wish he won that Aint nobody singing that James Taylor song that got nominated anyways the year before!

When I got the internet and found out it was a disease and someone told me around the same time, I totally got it. I was confused about whether it's makeup or what for years, but like I said, felt too young to get it.

alphastreet said:

Timmy84 said:

Actually it was "You Rock My World" and I agree, that was HIS Grammy but they gave it to a 30-year James Taylor song that he did live. Don't get me wrong, I love me some James Taylor but come on. As for me I wasn't confused. Once he said he had vitiligo I believed him. When I got online I got a better understanding of what he had and why his look changed so much.

I meant to say robbed of a grammy nomination for Butterflies, I know about YRMW and wish he won that Aint nobody singing that James Taylor song that got nominated anyways the year before!

When I got the internet and found out it was a disease and someone told me around the same time, I totally got it. I was confused about whether it's makeup or what for years, but like I said, felt too young to get it.

But see he had been using makeup to cover up any blotches, the blotches were still visible. That's why I wasn't so surprised he looked that light. Stress played a part in why he lost it so soon.

Anyway putting this thread back on topic again...

Marsha mentioned how when Michael first heard the song he felt he couldn't reach that high when it got to the "I caress you" part but Marsha confidently told him "you can do it". Andre encouraged him too and I think he actually got it on the first take.

I also think he was actually singing with his head voice (as opposed to the chest voice) rather than going falsetto. Someone mentioned that a while ago that when he went to sing that part, it was NOT in falsetto. I was impressed.

[Edited 2/7/11 12:02pm]

LOL mj being worried about not getting high? WTF! that man was a trip!

And yeah you have to sing with your head voice to get the high voice effect

[Edited 2/7/11 12:08pm]

Timmy84 said:

Anyway putting this thread back on topic again...

Marsha mentioned how when Michael first heard the song he felt he couldn't reach that high when it got to the "I caress you" part but Marsha confidently told him "you can do it". Andre encouraged him too and I think he actually got it on the first take.

I also think he was actually singing with his head voice (as opposed to the chest voice) rather than going falsetto. Someone mentioned that a while ago that when he went to sing that part, it was NOT in falsetto. I was impressed.

[Edited 2/7/11 12:02pm]

The "high voice" effect here are all notes Michael could hit in "head voice" (the end of will you be there...enjoy yourself...and dirty diana and the way you make me feel which is one note below...high D) however those are his highest notes as far as head voice...he could do it in the past and does similar notes in his grunting voice on Earth Song....but those notees on Butterflies.. the i caress you etc is definitely falsetto not head voice...

[Edited 2/7/11 12:25pm]

doesn't take away from his vocal performance though....i think falsetto was more fititng for that part anyway.

NMuzakNSoul said:

doesn't take away from his vocal performance though....i think falsetto was more fititng for that part anyway.

I don't know, some parts don't sound as if it's falsetto. I could be wrong lol but I did see Marsha say something to that effect. If anyone can bring up what she said again...lol

I'd be interestind in this quote Tim...cause that is definitely falsetto. lol

I mean like I said he could hit them in head voice...and has done so prior to 2001 on record...but I think they went with falsetto to keep that smooth tone that fits the song.

NMuzakNSoul said:

I'd be interestind in this quote Tim...cause that is definitely falsetto. lol

Yeah I remember seeing it on one of the Michael stickies.

Timmy84 said:

MJJstudent said:

depends on who you talk to... i could point to some folks who laughed at me due to my support of him. and a lot of folks felt he fell off when 'bad' came out, because he 'wasn't black' to them. they took one look at the cover, and rolled their eyes. they said he was betraying his race. i remember when this happened. when he did 'dangerous' some people began to support him again, but not totally. but yeah, when he was accused of all that stuff, a lot of people in the black communities supported him, due to the treatment black people consistently get in the (in)justice system.

i love that dave chapelle skit, when he was like, "he didn't do anything, HE MADE THRILLER!"

I was about three when this started occurring and I heard that a lot too. It got real bad during the initial Dangerous era. It changed somewhat after 1992 and especially after the allegations, black folks were like "see, always trying to put a successful black man down!" Then he was at the NAACP Image Awards accepting an award and made a great speech. That had black folks standing up like they were at a Black Panther rally. Touching stuff. But I think all communities were kinda polarized against him until his death but good music definitely will have people on your good graces. The response "Butterflies" got in the R&B community was beautiful. Had it not been for that price tag on Fat Joe's song, "Butterflies" would've been number-one instead of number-two. I felt it personally got robbed.

[Edited 2/7/11 11:45am]

WORD! beautiful words, timmy.

I really wish 2002 continued to promote Invincible, I was imagining songs like 2000 Watts, Whatever Happens, Unbreakable being promoted. It's cool Heaven Can Wait charted without a release.

MJJstudent said:

Timmy84 said:

I was about three when this started occurring and I heard that a lot too. It got real bad during the initial Dangerous era. It changed somewhat after 1992 and especially after the allegations, black folks were like "see, always trying to put a successful black man down!" Then he was at the NAACP Image Awards accepting an award and made a great speech. That had black folks standing up like they were at a Black Panther rally. Touching stuff. But I think all communities were kinda polarized against him until his death but good music definitely will have people on your good graces. The response "Butterflies" got in the R&B community was beautiful. Had it not been for that price tag on Fat Joe's song, "Butterflies" would've been number-one instead of number-two. I felt it personally got robbed.

[Edited 2/7/11 11:45am]

WORD! beautiful words, timmy.

Tim has a way with words as always.

^ I wish he were a writer

alphastreet said:

I really wish 2002 continued to promote Invincible, I was imagining songs like 2000 Watts, Whatever Happens, Unbreakable being promoted. It's cool Heaven Can Wait charted without a release.

Break of Dawn...Unbreakable....Butterflies...Heaven Can Wait Whatever Happens...all couldve had a cool video.

alphastreet said:

MJJstudent said:

oh MAN! that is such a great point! things definitely come full circle. i saw on this british program once, this one guy interviewed was discussing how 'invincible' didn't do as well because it was declared 'too black' by the majority. who knows if this was the case; ultimately it was sony's lack of promotion that prevented things from happening. but thanks to people who leaked the song, yeah, the album did better than i guess they wanted it to. because they certainly printed some copies of the single. then ceased its release. so all you had was promos, more or less.

It's silly to say that, the same people are endorsing r&b and hip hop from black artists, the ones from europe probably got used to pop/rock mj and the american ones can relate to r&b/soul mj the most even though he did really well too with pop/rock singles in the US

And that Wendy Williams or Toure was calling it crap too and saying something about "their community" not relating to him or some shit like that in 2002. They knew nothing about mj's politics at Sony and his whole speech, they were just looking at what the media fed the public about Sony and Tommy Motolla and going by that. They should have felt lucky to have him.

the thing is, rock n' roll as we know it began in the u.s., arguably by people of african descent. black people weren't too accepting of that either, in many ways. a lot of artists ended up moving to europe due to the lack of acceptance of what they could do here... everyone from nina simone to grace jones to james baldwin... there are so many limitations here. a lot of it due to industry; a lot of it due to our refusal to expand our minds.

black people are limited in their perception of music in a lot of ways. i was consistently told i wanted to be white because i was into the punk rock, so... NOW we see a lot of black musicians up on that, but when i was coming up it was NOT accepted. i totally saw that with michael too. i think this is beyond what happened between michael and sony- this is more about how limited we can be as black people a lot of the time, when it comes to the art we create. we are just as influenced by major media as anyone else; so when someone goes outside the perception of what black people can do, it's an issue.

alphastreet said:

MJJstudent said:

depends on who you talk to... i could point to some folks who laughed at me due to my support of him. and a lot of folks felt he fell off when 'bad' came out, because he 'wasn't black' to them. they took one look at the cover, and rolled their eyes. they said he was betraying his race. i remember when this happened. when he did 'dangerous' some people began to support him again, but not totally. but yeah, when he was accused of all that stuff, a lot of people in the black communities supported him, due to the treatment black people consistently get in the (in)justice system.

i love that dave chapelle skit, when he was like, "he didn't do anything, HE MADE THRILLER!"

I wonder if black or white and having big black superstars in videos had anything to do with it.

i'm not sure what you mean... i do know that michael could not get white directors to do 'remember the time' because it was an all black cast, featuring a non-white perspective of egypt. jaime foxx had the same issue i believe... he was asked why there were no white people on some special he had some years ago.

my thing is, i saw no black people in john hughes movies really, and the asian and black people i saw were usually silly or stereotypical. or 'cheers'. that had no black people either. i mean, wow. people can't have their voices heard on their own terms, if they are not white. this is how it reads to many folks, including myself.

alphastreet said:

Timmy84 said:

I was about three when this started occurring and I heard that a lot too. It got real bad during the initial Dangerous era. It changed somewhat after 1992 and especially after the allegations, black folks were like "see, always trying to put a successful black man down!" Then he was at the NAACP Image Awards accepting an award and made a great speech. That had black folks standing up like they were at a Black Panther rally. Touching stuff. But I think all communities were kinda polarized against him until his death but good music definitely will have people on your good graces. The response "Butterflies" got in the R&B community was beautiful. Had it not been for that price tag on Fat Joe's song, "Butterflies" would've been number-one instead of number-two. I felt it personally got robbed.

[Edited 2/7/11 11:45am]

He was also robbed of a grammy, he deserved it for Butterflies. I was confused about his changes during those eras, but thought I was too young to understand and will get it later....lol but I was confused about whether he was black or white, cause the very first time I saw him he looked black, like OTW, Thriller, Bad clips.

the thing is, if you check for it, the man never lost his distinct jackson features... that family has some of the strongest genes i have ever seen in my life. they have the most beautiful genes... and joe had to go and tell his kids they were ugly... man, lemme stop before i go off...

and the tapes on his fingers were most likely due to renaud's phenomenon. the man also had arthritis.

Timmy84 said:

alphastreet said:

I meant to say robbed of a grammy nomination for Butterflies, I know about YRMW and wish he won that Aint nobody singing that James Taylor song that got nominated anyways the year before!

When I got the internet and found out it was a disease and someone told me around the same time, I totally got it. I was confused about whether it's makeup or what for years, but like I said, felt too young to get it.

But see he had been using makeup to cover up any blotches, the blotches were still visible. That's why I wasn't so surprised he looked that light. Stress played a part in why he lost it so soon.

yup. you also saw the 'butterfly rash' on his face for the lupus. it probably didn't help him that he got the plastic surgeries. you are not supposed to do that when you've got discoid lupus.

and the tape on his fingers were most likely due to renaud's phenomenon. he also was arthritic, probably by the time he was at least 32- he began wearing the wrist brace during 'dangerous'. he was in a bad way. his feet were also in really bad shape. he gave and gave and gave, in terms of his art, and more. so yeah, i'd say he was deserving of another award, even if he's already gotten about 20 million of them. you rock my world is a brilliant song, as is butterflies.

NMuzakNSoul said:

Timmy84 said:

Anyway putting this thread back on topic again...

Marsha mentioned how when Michael first heard the song he felt he couldn't reach that high when it got to the "I caress you" part but Marsha confidently told him "you can do it". Andre encouraged him too and I think he actually got it on the first take.

I also think he was actually singing with his head voice (as opposed to the chest voice) rather than going falsetto. Someone mentioned that a while ago that when he went to sing that part, it was NOT in falsetto. I was impressed.

[Edited 2/7/11 12:02pm]

The "high voice" effect here are all notes Michael could hit in "head voice" (the end of will you be there...enjoy yourself...and dirty diana and the way you make me feel which is one note below...high D) however those are his highest notes as far as head voice...he could do it in the past and does similar notes in his grunting voice on Earth Song....but those notees on Butterflies.. the i caress you etc is definitely falsetto not head voice...

[Edited 2/7/11 12:25pm]

yes, the head voice, for sure...

MJJstudent said:

alphastreet said:

He was also robbed of a grammy, he deserved it for Butterflies. I was confused about his changes during those eras, but thought I was too young to understand and will get it later....lol but I was confused about whether he was black or white, cause the very first time I saw him he looked black, like OTW, Thriller, Bad clips.

the thing is, if you check for it, the man never lost his distinct jackson features... that family has some of the strongest genes i have ever seen in my life. they have the most beautiful genes... and joe had to go and tell his kids they were ugly... man, lemme stop before i go off...

I didn't mean to word it like that, he still looked similar to me in a lot of ways even with the changes, and beautiful. Those Jackson eyes and cheekbones are THE TRUTH!

MJJstudent said:

alphastreet said:

It's silly to say that, the same people are endorsing r&b and hip hop from black artists, the ones from europe probably got used to pop/rock mj and the american ones can relate to r&b/soul mj the most even though he did really well too with pop/rock singles in the US

And that Wendy Williams or Toure was calling it crap too and saying something about "their community" not relating to him or some shit like that in 2002. They knew nothing about mj's politics at Sony and his whole speech, they were just looking at what the media fed the public about Sony and Tommy Motolla and going by that. They should have felt lucky to have him.

the thing is, rock n' roll as we know it began in the u.s., arguably by people of african descent. black people weren't too accepting of that either, in many ways. a lot of artists ended up moving to europe due to the lack of acceptance of what they could do here... everyone from nina simone to grace jones to james baldwin... there are so many limitations here. a lot of it due to industry; a lot of it due to our refusal to expand our minds.

black people are limited in their perception of music in a lot of ways. i was consistently told i wanted to be white because i was into the punk rock, so... NOW we see a lot of black musicians up on that, but when i was coming up it was NOT accepted. i totally saw that with michael too. i think this is beyond what happened between michael and sony- this is more about how limited we can be as black people a lot of the time, when it comes to the art we create. we are just as influenced by major media as anyone else; so when someone goes outside the perception of what black people can do, it's an issue.

yeah it's sad what limitations there are out there and what the public expects and it's so deeply ingrained into us, and it's weird how some people don't realize it was blacks that did rock and roll first and think it's weird if black people do rock...I think they do it great, and michael did it great, as do prince, lenny kravitz, little richard etc.

Timmy84 said:

Anyway putting this thread back on topic again...

Marsha mentioned how when Michael first heard the song he felt he couldn't reach that high when it got to the "I caress you" part but Marsha confidently told him "you can do it". Andre encouraged him too and I think he actually got it on the first take.

I also think he was actually singing with his head voice (as opposed to the chest voice) rather than going falsetto. Someone mentioned that a while ago that when he went to sing that part, it was NOT in falsetto. I was impressed.

[Edited 2/7/11 12:02pm]

Nice story but the part you mentioned, MJ could easily sing in head voice and falsetto but I actually think the point you're talking about (or she lol) is "Oh baby you give me butterflies.." (End of the 2nd verse just going into the chorus)

I've always noticed that you can hear his voice at that point really at the very top of his range, it's almost such a special moment just because of that. Makes sense now, thanks

Japha11 said:

Timmy84 said:

Anyway putting this thread back on topic again...

Marsha mentioned how when Michael first heard the song he felt he couldn't reach that high when it got to the "I caress you" part but Marsha confidently told him "you can do it". Andre encouraged him too and I think he actually got it on the first take.

I also think he was actually singing with his head voice (as opposed to the chest voice) rather than going falsetto. Someone mentioned that a while ago that when he went to sing that part, it was NOT in falsetto. I was impressed.

[Edited 2/7/11 12:02pm]

Nice story but the part you mentioned, MJ could easily sing in head voice and falsetto but I actually think the point you're talking about (or she lol) is "Oh baby you give me butterflies.." (End of the 2nd verse just going into the chorus)

I've always noticed that you can hear his voice at that point really at the very top of his range, it's almost such a special moment just because of that. Makes sense now, thanks

Yeah that could've been it.