I just want to say it's nice to hear his voice again. Thanks for the links guys!

SchlomoThaHomo said:

Does anyone else think Loving You sounds just a tiny bit sped up compared to MJ's natural singing voice?

Its really nice to see this thread active again

Yes familiar faces again and something positive to discuss

[Edited 5/6/14 6:47am]

Scorp said:

it's so funny how things go full circle and return to the point where things are tangible and authentic where the presentation or the talent can stand on its own merit

this is not directed towards all...but there was a time prior to the release of THRILLER 25 where a litany of MJ current following rejected the music of his initial adult solo career stage, from 1979-1984

but when they realize there was nothing else coming down the pike after INVINCIBLE, they acknowledged his prior body of work during that time period.....not out of choice, but because there was no other choice to do

funny how a song, a song that MJ worked on in 1983 is the frontbiller for this XSCAPE album, where the title track itself was a collaboration w/Rodney Jerkins as they began working on the INVINCIBLE album during the spring of 1999

to show how dynamic MJ really was when he was tapping into his talent in the most definitive way, in his mind, as good as LOVE NEVER FELT SO GOOD is, the standards was so high that MJ had for his music, he never released this song

just like he didn't do with AL CAPONE

the estate had to dig deep, real deep to find a song that could support this album coming out the gate.....and they reached back into the period of MJ'S life and career where he truly was at his unequivacle best......

no monikers, no controversy, no overproduction, no over budgeted videos, no innuendo

just simply MICHAEL JACKSON.....

MJ could have still been making music on this level to this day if he wasn't asked to jettison his natural being and obliterate his true measure..........

that's what's so unfortunate about this whole situation, what we witnessed post-Thriller never, IT never had to happen...

[Edited 5/4/14 7:11am]

It's funny you say this, when the Thriller era is the least liked era by MJ fans generally (I'm speaking more of the stans than the casual fans) because they feel MJ was kinda faking it with the baby voice and all that other Disney imagery. That's not saying people don't like it but comparing it to BAD and Dangerous, he tried to go within himself to discover otther sonic sounds and landscapes, his social messages became more bold as well! For those saying that the bad and dangerous albums sound dated, I guess a lot of modern day musix sounds dated too because those sound landscapes is what's inspiring the current indie r&b landscape. Liberian Girl, Another Part of Me, Dirty Diana and Leave me alone have been inspirational for producers the last 6 years or so, with many new artists covering songs from the BAD era. The Weekend, Bruno Mars, Kanye West are just some of the artists that are heavily inspired by the sonic sounds of this period of MJS career.

His most beautiful videos were done during the BAD era and 90s and I think MJ himself would say this. I don't know in what world you live in, but to the contrary his work during Off the wall and Thriller is always what MJ has been known for, which is pretty sad since his later work is much deeper and profound. As a a 90s kid, I always remember people talking about OTW & thriller when I grew up as a teen during the 00s, so again I don't know who these people you be talkin about? I mean Chris Brown, Ginuwine, Usher, JT, Britney Spears, Destinys Child, Eminem, Fall out boy etc that were popular during the 00s for the most part referenced to the early stuff because that's what they grew up on. Now that we are seeing the kids that grew up on BAD & Dangerous era, we are seeing a natural interest to those influences. That's pretty normal.

Although I'm a huge fan of his work during OTW & Thriller and I'm a huge Jacksons fan, I think from a composition and songwriting point of view - he wrote his best pieces in the 90s. The songs are more complex and more revealing and they shed a light on his life that he hadnt shared before.

But anyways I didn't care much for Chicago, the production is very poor and it's a shame that Timbo didn't respect MJ enough to give him a better beat than that. Those synths and drums are bad and I'm 100 % this would have NEVER ever been released had MJ been alive, he was a perfectionist and such small details was the reason MJ could be working on a song for years because he believed in creating timeless sounds or at least attempt to create something timeless. LOVING YOU is another story tho, I love this song! MJs vocals are beautiful and I just love the song! Hopefully there are more songs like this on the album!!!

I find it odd how some feel that Bad sounds outdated, that album has held up extremely well over the years and many of the songs on it sound just as fresh today as they did back then--however this is only my opinion. There are only but a few songs on Bad that have that dated, 80s sound: Just Good Friends, Bad, Speed Demon...but the rest of the songs carry that timeless sound in them and they sound just as good today as they did back in 87: Liberian Girl, The Way You Make Me Feel, Smooth Criminal, Man In The Mirror, Dirty Diana, even Leave Me Alone, which does have a slight touch of dated-ness on it but is still sounds as amazing and jam worthy today!

Even a few of the outtakes that were recorded for Bad but not included: I'm So Blue, Don't Be Messin Around, Free, sound as if they could have been recorded in any decade. So imo Bad has held up very well over the decades and counts as one of his most influential albums. The music and style of the Bad era has influenced some of singers of today

GoldDolphin said:

But anyways I didn't care much for Chicago, the production is very poor and it's a shame that Timbo didn't respect MJ enough to give him a better beat than that. Those synths and drums are bad and I'm 100 % this would have NEVER ever been released had MJ been alive, he was a perfectionist and such small details was the reason MJ could be working on a song for years because he believed in creating timeless sounds or at least attempt to create something timeless. LOVING YOU is another story tho, I love this song! MJs vocals are beautiful and I just love the song! Hopefully there are more songs like this on the album!!!

MJ has released a ton of worse songs (DS, Privacy and half Invincible )

liked all the songs.

public interest in Chicago.

the song topped the list after less than one day ... Love ... not even in the top 10 so far.

Scorp said:

Justin Timberlake was added on this 1983 song original because Sony and the estate don't believe Michael Jackson (because of the superficial image over the past quarter century) can not sell this record by name alone.....

No JT was added to the song because the demo was only a verse and a chorus. It has nohing o do with that BS youre talking about

In the video about the collaborators you hear like a 7 second snippet of Xscape. I like the horns Rodney added. That mix i might like better too.

LOVING YOU!!! Great track! I LOVE it! BEautiful vocals; you can tell its from the BAd era with the vocals! PRoducer did an astounding job! I can see why some people don't like the contemporized Chicago, but comeon, you gotta love this one I like the lyrics too

[Edited 5/6/14 12:08pm]

'Loving You'

His vocals are fantastic. Great track.

Not mad on 'Chicago' tho.

FnkyManifesto7 said:

LOVING YOU!!! Great track! I LOVE it! BEautiful vocals; you can tell its from the BAd era with the vocals! PRoducer did an astounding job! I can see why some people don't like the contemporized Chicago, but comeon, you gotta love this one I like the lyrics too

[Edited 5/6/14 12:08pm]

Timbo did slave to the rhythem , Do yo know where your children are , Chicago and Loving you ( with that other weird producer Jerome jroc Harmon i think ?

Can you imagine the duck sounds on DYKWYCA? Or do you think he will be innovative and use a goose instead?

I think it depends on the song. I really think the original Chicago is going to blow me right out the parc

motownlover said:

FnkyManifesto7 said:

LOVING YOU!!! Great track! I LOVE it! BEautiful vocals; you can tell its from the BAd era with the vocals! PRoducer did an astounding job! I can see why some people don't like the contemporized Chicago, but comeon, you gotta love this one I like the lyrics too

[Edited 5/6/14 12:08pm]

Timbo did slave to the rhythem , Do yo know where your children are , Chicago and Loving you ( with that other weird producer Jerome jroc Harmon i think ?

Can you imagine the duck sounds on DYKWYCA? Or do you think he will be innovative and use a goose instead?

I think it depends on the song. I really think the original Chicago is going to blow me right out the parc

I do agree with your Chicago statement! I can't wait to hear the original but I do kinda dig the new version of Chicago because of the awesome gritty Mj vocals! I really hope they didn't muck up DYKWYCA, but hey, if they did, we still have the AWESOME original that still rocks!

"Loving You" is utterly fantastic.

Militant said:

"Loving You" is utterly fantastic.

It really is. It's ridiculous how breezy vocals were to Michael. If these vocals were from a demo, well he just takes the piss. How easy it was for him.

GoldDolphin said:

Scorp said:

it's so funny how things go full circle and return to the point where things are tangible and authentic where the presentation or the talent can stand on its own merit

this is not directed towards all...but there was a time prior to the release of THRILLER 25 where a litany of MJ current following rejected the music of his initial adult solo career stage, from 1979-1984

but when they realize there was nothing else coming down the pike after INVINCIBLE, they acknowledged his prior body of work during that time period.....not out of choice, but because there was no other choice to do

funny how a song, a song that MJ worked on in 1983 is the frontbiller for this XSCAPE album, where the title track itself was a collaboration w/Rodney Jerkins as they began working on the INVINCIBLE album during the spring of 1999

to show how dynamic MJ really was when he was tapping into his talent in the most definitive way, in his mind, as good as LOVE NEVER FELT SO GOOD is, the standards was so high that MJ had for his music, he never released this song

just like he didn't do with AL CAPONE

the estate had to dig deep, real deep to find a song that could support this album coming out the gate.....and they reached back into the period of MJ'S life and career where he truly was at his unequivacle best......

no monikers, no controversy, no overproduction, no over budgeted videos, no innuendo

just simply MICHAEL JACKSON.....

MJ could have still been making music on this level to this day if he wasn't asked to jettison his natural being and obliterate his true measure..........

that's what's so unfortunate about this whole situation, what we witnessed post-Thriller never, IT never had to happen...

[Edited 5/4/14 7:11am]

It's funny you say this, when the Thriller era is the least liked era by MJ fans generally (I'm speaking more of the stans than the casual fans) because they feel MJ was kinda faking it with the baby voice and all that other Disney imagery. That's not saying people don't like it but comparing it to BAD and Dangerous, he tried to go within himself to discover otther sonic sounds and landscapes, his social messages became more bold as well! For those saying that the bad and dangerous albums sound dated, I guess a lot of modern day musix sounds dated too because those sound landscapes is what's inspiring the current indie r&b landscape. Liberian Girl, Another Part of Me, Dirty Diana and Leave me alone have been inspirational for producers the last 6 years or so, with many new artists covering songs from the BAD era. The Weekend, Bruno Mars, Kanye West are just some of the artists that are heavily inspired by the sonic sounds of this period of MJS career.

His most beautiful videos were done during the BAD era and 90s and I think MJ himself would say this. I don't know in what world you live in, but to the contrary his work during Off the wall and Thriller is always what MJ has been known for, which is pretty sad since his later work is much deeper and profound. As a a 90s kid, I always remember people talking about OTW & thriller when I grew up as a teen during the 00s, so again I don't know who these people you be talkin about? I mean Chris Brown, Ginuwine, Usher, JT, Britney Spears, Destinys Child, Eminem, Fall out boy etc that were popular during the 00s for the most part referenced to the early stuff because that's what they grew up on. Now that we are seeing the kids that grew up on BAD & Dangerous era, we are seeing a natural interest to those influences. That's pretty normal.

Although I'm a huge fan of his work during OTW & Thriller and I'm a huge Jacksons fan, I think from a composition and songwriting point of view - he wrote his best pieces in the 90s. The songs are more complex and more revealing and they shed a light on his life that he hadnt shared before.

that all depends on who u ask......

if u ask the majority of MJ post-Thriller, or from the 90s on, that's probably true what u said that they would not hold his work with OTW and Thriller in the same light as his following albums...

if u ask those who grew up watching MJ from 1969-1984, there's no question right out the box the majority of them are going to hold OTW and THRILLER at the highest level

see, the majority from 1969-1984 is larger than the majority post-THRILLER, but the perception is the total opposite...

the problem is...there never should have been 2 distinct fanbases, it should have been a continuation of what was already established

the superficial image created post-Thriller is what created the 2 fanbases......the continuum ceased at that moment

the problem is, commercial media never acknowledged in equal representation the original following after THRILLER......

I'm not referring to his contemporaries....I'm referring to the record buying public

no video is ever gonna top that Thriller video.......nothing ever gonna top it

that was the alpha and omega of music videos or as Lionel Richie put it, the Gone of The Wind of music videos....

I'll never support the argument MJ's music became outdated....I don't look at it like that

the message was always consistent and that's why I enjoy listening to all his albums

[Edited 5/6/14 16:56pm]

I dislike the APWNN mix.. Imagine if we only knew the song like they mixed it right now? Its night and day compared to the old version... glad we get the originals

^ I agree. I have enjoyed all the mixes up to this point. This one is just sorta "eh", the original is actually a pretty solid song, so at least it will be on the deluxe version. I think they should have let Timbaland or maybe asked Dr. Freeze to rework the song.

Loving you.. he touched my soul right there. Only Mike..

I LOVE APWNN

The new version of APWNN is fairly terrible. It just sounds like they tried to remake the "Leave Me Alone" groove underneath is but failed.

The thing that I don't like about A Place With No Name is that they ditched the guitar part from the original song! The whole point of the original demo imo was to rewrite a classic and make it recognizable, but different! The song was a dreamy piece of pop music and played with the listeners expectations because a lot of people would recognize it as A Horse With No Name but be surprised with different lyrics. This version sounds cool, but you could tell that the producers never heard the original version. This version drops the whole idea of how dreamy the original version was and just goes for club appeal.

Actually, that's my biggest gripe about the whole album so far, it's all going for club/dance appeal/. Where are the sweet ballads? Sure, Invincible has enough slow songs on it to last 3-4 MJ albums but this album zero slower songs on it. Chicago and Blue Gangsta are tge slowest songs on the record! What about showing the other side of MJ who sang songs like Little Susie, She's Out Of My Life, or Liberian Girl?

Eh, oh well. Still like what I'm hearing anyway and I'm glad I can get the original versions on the bonus disc.

APWNN does seem to fail at digging a real groove, but I will say that the paired down arrangement really accentuates the vocals, which is a good thing. Especially, the "she started liking me, kissing me and hugging me," verse. So gritty!

Yeah they F up. Even though i dont think mike wanted to release the original, it sounds like a jam session and it was a nice breezy track. All of that is gone

Is it me or did they change the pitch or tempo in the new mix of APQNN ?