Okay, so we all know about the lame album 'Victory' that was released in '84 by The Jacksons [as well as the 'Victory' tour that followed]. But imagine in '85 that MJ dropped an album that actually fits right in between both 'Thriller' & 'BAD'. What would it have sound like? Would it have been too soon? Could it have stood next to 'Thriller'? Or could it have possibly messed with his legacy? Please give your opinions........

It would have probably screwed with Thriller's sales. I know that much.

That's an impossible question and prediction because Thriller gave him a sizable run financially and success-wise for nearly four years (1982 to 1985). If Michael would've striked it out on his own and toured solo, instead of dealing with the Victory debacle, there's no telling just how much more big he would've blown up. But if he would've dropped an album after Thriller and before Bad, it would've definitely messed up Thriller in terms of sells. It would've been confusing, very confusing!

I ask this question simply because I think MJ should have avoided 'Victory' at all cost. He could have saved "State Of Shock" for himself, toured by himself. Wouldn't have been burnt making that commercial [potentially] which could have changed some things that DID happen later on.....

Then he would have been more like Prince. Which would be a good thing. Look at it this way - between the release of "Bad" and "Thriller" (including the years those albums were released in) , Prince released "1999", "Purple Rain", "Around The World In A Day", "Parade" and "Sign O' The Times". And made two movies.

Ultimately once you move past hype, sales, etc (which are finite concepts).... what you are left with is the body of work. Which is infinite.

Michael shouldn't have been so concerned with trying to "beat" or even match Thriller and simply focused on making great music, like Prince did.

They are my two favorite artists of all time - and I think both of them could have learned something from the way the other went about things.

Militant said:

Then he would have been more like Prince. Which would be a good thing. Look at it this way - between the release of "Bad" and "Thriller" (including the years those albums were released in) , Prince released "1999", "Purple Rain", "Around The World In A Day", "Parade" and "Sign O' The Times". And made two movies.

Ultimately once you move past hype, sales, etc (which are finite concepts).... what you are left with is the body of work. Which is infinite.

Michael shouldn't have been so concerned with trying to "beat" or even match Thriller and simply focused on making great music, like Prince did.

They are my two favorite artists of all time - and I think both of them could have learned something from the way the other went about things.

Now here's a response I'm loving! You hit nail on the head with the Prince/MJ comparison of body of work during this whole era! I've always felt that MJ should have had more albums then he ultimately left us with....'Thriller' could have have comp...btw I LOVE that Parade Doc you posted. I DL'ed it & listened to it earlier today...SUPERB!!!

He would have had more output (in his adult years) but even going back to his solo albums on Motown he still has a good amount of material.

gunner82 said:

Militant said:

Then he would have been more like Prince. Which would be a good thing. Look at it this way - between the release of "Bad" and "Thriller" (including the years those albums were released in) , Prince released "1999", "Purple Rain", "Around The World In A Day", "Parade" and "Sign O' The Times". And made two movies.

Ultimately once you move past hype, sales, etc (which are finite concepts).... what you are left with is the body of work. Which is infinite.

Michael shouldn't have been so concerned with trying to "beat" or even match Thriller and simply focused on making great music, like Prince did.

They are my two favorite artists of all time - and I think both of them could have learned something from the way the other went about things.

Now here's a response I'm loving! You hit nail on the head with the Prince/MJ comparison of body of work during this whole era! I've always felt that MJ should have had more albums then he ultimately left us with....'Thriller' could have have comp...btw I LOVE that Parade Doc you posted. I DL'ed it & listened to it earlier today...SUPERB!!!

I love that response as well. But I also think that Michael at that point in his career was very prolific, from the Motown solo/J5 days and Jacksons period to his breakthrough solo career at Epic. I mean by the time Michael released Thriller, he had thirteen plus years in the game and was breaking barriers left and right. He had sixteen albums under his belt (solo and with his brothers). When the talk about record sales, gimmicks, and hype are taken out of the equator, you are left with a very rich body of work that MJ had done before and after Thriller came into the picture and single-handedly changed the musical landscape. But one must understand that the MJ and Prince comparisons are absurd because their music ambitions were very distant from each other.

[Edited 4/23/11 21:11pm]

^^^I remember an article in some magazine in the mid 1980's that said Mike was planning to release an album of all Beatles songs.

I wonder how Bad was gonna be perceived as a triple-disc/LP set?

gunner82 said:

I ask this question simply because I think MJ should have avoided 'Victory' at all cost. He could have saved "State Of Shock" for himself, toured by himself. Wouldn't have been burnt making that commercial [potentially] which could have changed some things that DID happen later on.....

Instead of a new full-length album, Michael could have released an EP in December 1984, just in time for the holiday season.

Think about it. An EP release entitled Behind The Mask with only 6 tracks:

1. Behind The Mask

2. State Of Shock (featuring Freddie Mercury)

3. Be Not Always

4. Starlight

5. Come Together

6. Leave Me Alone

TonyVanDam said:

gunner82 said:

I ask this question simply because I think MJ should have avoided 'Victory' at all cost. He could have saved "State Of Shock" for himself, toured by himself. Wouldn't have been burnt making that commercial [potentially] which could have changed some things that DID happen later on.....

Instead of a new full-length album, Michael could have released an EP in December 1984, just in time for the holiday season.

Think about it. An EP release entitled Behind The Mask with only 6 tracks:

1. Behind The Mask

2. State Of Shock (featuring Freddie Mercury)

3. Be Not Always

4. Starlight

5. Come Together

6. Leave Me Alone

I get the point about an EP, But Starlight was 'Thriller', so why would he release that again?

gunner82 said:

TonyVanDam said:

Instead of a new full-length album, Michael could have released an EP in December 1984, just in time for the holiday season.

Think about it. An EP release entitled Behind The Mask with only 6 tracks:

1. Behind The Mask

2. State Of Shock (featuring Freddie Mercury)

3. Be Not Always

4. Starlight

5. Come Together

6. Leave Me Alone

I get the point about an EP, But Starlight was 'Thriller', so why would he release that again?

Starlight was an original, NOT Thriller. And you're right, Michael would have never released Starlight to the public unless he had a remix version to prevent from sounding too much like Thriller.

hmmmmmmmm... i like the fact that nothing was released between the two actually... similar to STEVIE. i like that michael did captain eo in between thriller and bad, and was quite successful with that. if anything, there could have been a series of songs michael produced for the film, as opposed to the two (one of the songs ended up on 'bad' anyways). there was a score released for captain eo, but perhaps michael could have put a few songs on that album, similar to what happened with the E.T. storybook.

michael also did we are the world, produced and wrote 'centipede', worked with artists like jennifer holiday, etc. so he was in no shortage of material which got released. i'm one of those folks who's not a fan of constant releases. from a listener's perspective, i like that the infrequent releases don't wear out any welcomes; and from a marketing perspective (especially with someone like michael), you wanna keep the mystery. and perhaps doing frequent releases may pull from the perfectionist mode of an artist like michael.

and yeah... victory was TERRIBLE! the only song i liked was 'be not always'. i see footage from that tour and i just see anger/frustration coming from michael the whole time. disaster all around... michael announcing the breakup with his brothers (without their knowledge), jackie getting his leg broken, don king... pepsi...

TonyVanDam said:

gunner82 said:

I get the point about an EP, But Starlight was 'Thriller', so why would he release that again?

Starlight was an original, NOT Thriller. And you're right, Michael would have never released Starlight to the public unless he had a remix version to prevent from sounding too much like Thriller.

It's the same exact song beyond slight lyrical changes. "Thriller" is better, imo!

One of the main reasons why he held off on releasing an album after Thriller was overexposure. Thriller had 3 videos, 7 singles (the eighth was supposed to be The Lady In My Life but got cancelled) and had a couple of collaborations. He was everywhere so and then when Victory hit, there was a bit of backlash. He did We Are The World and Telethon '85 in Australia and then he decided to disappear for awhile, plus Bad was taking a lot longer to make than he and Quincy had thought AND Captain EO was in production

If you look at articles from back then, there's alot saying "Enough already". He didn't even do Live Aid, so he knew he was overexposed by '85

Wasn't needed.

Where's luv4u?

Wasn't Michael planning to focus on film if he didn't get dragged into the Victory project?

Militant said:

Then he would have been more like Prince. Which would be a good thing. Look at it this way - between the release of "Bad" and "Thriller" (including the years those albums were released in) , Prince released "1999", "Purple Rain", "Around The World In A Day", "Parade" and "Sign O' The Times". And made two movies.

Ultimately once you move past hype, sales, etc (which are finite concepts).... what you are left with is the body of work. Which is infinite.

Michael shouldn't have been so concerned with trying to "beat" or even match Thriller and simply focused on making great music, like Prince did.

They are my two favorite artists of all time - and I think both of them could have learned something from the way the other went about things.

This sums it up perfectly. No need 2 add anything else.

isn't there a sticky for stuff related to this dead guy?

gunner82 said:

I ask this question simply because I think MJ should have avoided 'Victory' at all cost. He could have saved "State Of Shock" for himself, toured by himself. Wouldn't have been burnt making that commercial [potentially] which could have changed some things that DID happen later on.....

'State of Shock' was not worth saving for anything.

There's no way MJ would have kept that for himself.

MJJstudent said:

hmmmmmmmm... i like the fact that nothing was released between the two actually... similar to STEVIE. i like that michael did captain eo in between thriller and bad, and was quite successful with that. if anything, there could have been a series of songs michael produced for the film, as opposed to the two (one of the songs ended up on 'bad' anyways). there was a score released for captain eo, but perhaps michael could have put a few songs on that album, similar to what happened with the E.T. storybook.

michael also did we are the world, produced and wrote 'centipede', worked with artists like jennifer holiday, etc. so he was in no shortage of material which got released. i'm one of those folks who's not a fan of constant releases. from a listener's perspective, i like that the infrequent releases don't wear out any welcomes; and from a marketing perspective (especially with someone like michael), you wanna keep the mystery. and perhaps doing frequent releases may pull from the perfectionist mode of an artist like michael.

I love this response. I this is what made Michael so great-the mystery, the anticipation of ANYTHING that he was releasing, the waiting,etc. I think if Michael had released albums more frequently it would not have had the same impact. I also am not a fan of frequent releases. However, we must remember that Michael went through a lot of fucking SHIT and that is the very reason why he didn't have the chance to release things that he had planned. I am thankful for what he did release considering the things that he endured(what no other person EVER has had to endure.)

Free2BMe said:

MJJstudent said:

hmmmmmmmm... i like the fact that nothing was released between the two actually... similar to STEVIE. i like that michael did captain eo in between thriller and bad, and was quite successful with that. if anything, there could have been a series of songs michael produced for the film, as opposed to the two (one of the songs ended up on 'bad' anyways). there was a score released for captain eo, but perhaps michael could have put a few songs on that album, similar to what happened with the E.T. storybook.

michael also did we are the world, produced and wrote 'centipede', worked with artists like jennifer holiday, etc. so he was in no shortage of material which got released. i'm one of those folks who's not a fan of constant releases. from a listener's perspective, i like that the infrequent releases don't wear out any welcomes; and from a marketing perspective (especially with someone like michael), you wanna keep the mystery. and perhaps doing frequent releases may pull from the perfectionist mode of an artist like michael.

I love this response. I this is what made Michael so great-the mystery, the anticipation of ANYTHING that he was releasing, the waiting,etc. I think if Michael had released albums more frequently it would not have had the same impact. I also am not a fan of frequent releases. However, we must remember that Michael went through a lot of fucking SHIT and that is the very reason why he didn't have the chance to release things that he had planned. I am thankful for what he did release considering the things that he endured(what no other person EVER has had to endure.)

What>

And most of the stuff Michael went through he seemed to put himself through it.

I think the reason why Bad did so well was the wait, honestly.

MJ would not have wanted to drop an album too close to the releases of Purple Rain and Born in the USA---for a brief year there, Prince and Bruce Springsteen reigned supreme, and although an MJ album would have been huge, it wouldn't have been as big as bad.

I remember the buzz around Thriller--it was insane. That album re-energized a slumping record industry. Albums and tapes were becoming hot commodities and gifts again. But a side effect of this is that people were getting burned out on MJ. I mean, Pepsi commercials, overexposure--you name it, folks were getting tired of him. I remember radio stations promoting MJ-free weeks.

5 years was a long time between albums, but I think if he would have dropped something 2 years out, it would have been considered market saturation--if not so much in content, then just by presence.

SUPRMAN said:

Free2BMe said:

I love this response. I this is what made Michael so great-the mystery, the anticipation of ANYTHING that he was releasing, the waiting,etc. I think if Michael had released albums more frequently it would not have had the same impact. I also am not a fan of frequent releases. However, we must remember that Michael went through a lot of fucking SHIT and that is the very reason why he didn't have the chance to release things that he had planned. I am thankful for what he did release considering the things that he endured(what no other person EVER has had to endure.)

What>

And most of the stuff Michael went through he seemed to put himself through it.

BULLSHIT.

gunner82 said:

I ask this question simply because I think MJ should have avoided 'Victory' at all cost. He could have saved "State Of Shock" for himself, toured by himself. Wouldn't have been burnt making that commercial [potentially] which could have changed some things that DID happen later on.....

I agree,Michael should have never particpated in the 'Victory' project (album and tour).His brothers were trying to ride on the coattails of his amazing 'Thriller' success .I think he should have done a solo 'Thriler' tour in 1983/84.Can you imagine how incredible that would have been?! Then,when the tour ended,go back into the studio and record a new album for release in early 1985.Release a follow-up in 1987.As you can see,I didn't like those long gaps between albums.

bboy87 said:

One of the main reasons why he held off on releasing an album after Thriller was overexposure. Thriller had 3 videos, 7 singles (the eighth was supposed to be The Lady In My Life but got cancelled) and had a couple of collaborations. He was everywhere so and then when Victory hit, there was a bit of backlash. He did We Are The World and Telethon '85 in Australia and then he decided to disappear for awhile, plus Bad was taking a lot longer to make than he and Quincy had thought AND Captain EO was in production

If you look at articles from back then, there's alot saying "Enough already". He didn't even do Live Aid, so he knew he was overexposed by '85

They said the same thing about Prince.By 1985/86,people were saying that Prince is overexposed,he should take a break,he's flooding the market,etc.And of course,Prince experienced a backlash in 1985,although I don't think he really cared (lol).It would have been cool if Michael had that same "I-don't-care" attitude.

SoulAlive said:

gunner82 said:

I ask this question simply because I think MJ should have avoided 'Victory' at all cost. He could have saved "State Of Shock" for himself, toured by himself. Wouldn't have been burnt making that commercial [potentially] which could have changed some things that DID happen later on.....

I agree,Michael should have never particpated in the 'Victory' project (album and tour).His brothers were trying to ride on the coattails of his amazing 'Thriller' success .I think he should have done a solo 'Thriler' tour in 1983/84.Can you imagine how incredible that would have been?! Then,when the tour ended,go back into the studio and record a new album for release in early 1985.Release a follow-up in 1987.As you can see,I didn't like those long gaps between albums.

From what i understood is that Mike initally also didn't want to participate on the Victory Tour,

but his family discussed with him that it would be a good last time for the brothers to tour.

I think the concept for a Thriller-Tour might've basically been like the Victory-show.

If i remember correctly, the fantasy-intro story was an idea by Mike and also some other interludes with special effects ?

CBS/Sony could've released a double-live album or a video-compilation of the Victory Tour, maybe with a good promotion campaign by Pepsi.

If you watch that professional-filmed footage of "Billie Jean" with the prologue of fans being interviewed in and around venues, then i can imagine

that a complete tape in that quality could've been a top-seller. The market for VHS-tapes was growing and wasn't Mike's "Making Of Thriller" one

of his best sold VHS-tapes at that time ? I think that good sales even kept going on for that video for a while.

So imo, such a live-project on either vinyl or video would've been an interesting project around 1985 ... shoulda coulda woulda

[Edited 4/24/11 11:20am]