nice

actually it's the first time I heard his version, great song

I love Michael's original version. No need for JT on that track!

One thing hearing this version accentuates is how unfinished the MJ version sounds, especially in terms of the lyrics, which seem to be semi-improvised and are even a bit nonsensical in parts. I mean, they did a good job of taking an old demo tape and tarting it up, but it seems to me they did pretty much hit the limits of how far you can mine a dead artist's unreleased tapes for anything of sufficient quality for inclusion on even a shameless cash-in project. Nice to hear a finished version - even if the way the other writers fleshed out the lyrics in this one does seem a bit 'by numbers'.

DMSR said:

I love Michael's original version. No need for JT on that track!

Agreed.

deebee said:

One thing hearing this version accentuates is how unfinished the MJ version sounds, especially in terms of the lyrics, which seem to be semi-improvised and are even a bit nonsensical in parts. I mean, they did a good job of taking an old demo tape and tarting it up, but it seems to me they did pretty much hit the limits of how far you can mine a dead artist's unreleased tapes for anything of sufficient quality for inclusion on even a shameless cash-in project. Nice to hear a finished version - even if the way the other writers fleshed out the lyrics in this one does seem a bit 'by numbers'.

There are quite literally dozens and dozens more FINISHED unreleased MJ songs. The problem is that the Estate does not have them.

Dancelot said:

nice

actually it's the first time I heard his version, great song

SeventeenDayze said:

DMSR said:

I love Michael's original version. No need for JT on that track!

Agreed.

^^^ This, too, x 7.

Militant said:

deebee said:

One thing hearing this version accentuates is how unfinished the MJ version sounds, especially in terms of the lyrics, which seem to be semi-improvised and are even a bit nonsensical in parts. I mean, they did a good job of taking an old demo tape and tarting it up, but it seems to me they did pretty much hit the limits of how far you can mine a dead artist's unreleased tapes for anything of sufficient quality for inclusion on even a shameless cash-in project. Nice to hear a finished version - even if the way the other writers fleshed out the lyrics in this one does seem a bit 'by numbers'.

There are quite literally dozens and dozens more FINISHED unreleased MJ songs. The problem is that the Estate does not have them.

Where are you getting the idea that there are dozens and dozens? The estate are only missing the will.i.am tracks (about 5/6) Neff-U tracks who only worked with him for a year and Joy owned by Teddy Riley. Or are you including the throwaway Jacksons/J5 tracks then theres dozens and dozens owned by Motown. But those don't interest many.

Dilan said:

Militant said:

There are quite literally dozens and dozens more FINISHED unreleased MJ songs. The problem is that the Estate does not have them.

Where are you getting the idea that there are dozens and dozens? The estate are only missing the will.i.am tracks (about 5/6) Neff-U tracks who only worked with him for a year and Joy owned by Teddy Riley. Or are you including the throwaway Jacksons/J5 tracks then theres dozens and dozens owned by Motown. But those don't interest many.

The Estate don't have many of the songs John Barnes worked on with Michael between 1983 and 1991, like "Make or Break". They also don't have ANY of the material Michael did in Bahrain. The family have possession of a lot of masters, too. There are other producers, who have confirmed that the Estate haven't so much as been in touch with them.

It's the exact same thing that happened with Tupac's estate in the late 90's and early 00's (I worked with them, so I know what went down) - Producers will not hand over songs, claim they don't have possession of certain masters, or that they've lost them. Either because the Estate haven't offered them any work, or simply because they don't want to see the songs remixed and bastardized by the likes of Timbaland. It's impossible for the Estate to prove that anyone has anything, or even to forcibly take masters from anyone.

Out of the 9 songs released on Xscape, only TWO were songs that hadn't previously leaked - "Loving You" and "Chicago". Don't you think the Estate and Epic wants to release things that they know fans haven't already heard? Of course they do. But they need people to co-operate and that hasn't happened. Akon and Paul Anka were among the first to co-operate. That's why "This Is It", "Hold My Hand" and "Love Never Felt So Good" were all lead singles.

Furthermore, a source I have within the Estate who worked heavily on "Bad 25" confirmed to me that a LOT of stuff is missing from the archives that they KNOW exists, and they have a full time staff member whose job is purely to try and track these things down.

Dilan said:

Militant said:

There are quite literally dozens and dozens more FINISHED unreleased MJ songs. The problem is that the Estate does not have them.

Where are you getting the idea that there are dozens and dozens? The estate are only missing the will.i.am tracks (about 5/6) Neff-U tracks who only worked with him for a year and Joy owned by Teddy Riley. Or are you including the throwaway Jacksons/J5 tracks then theres dozens and dozens owned by Motown. But those don't interest many.

I was wondering the same thing you were. According to Paul Anka during his interview with one of those tabloid shows, there's possibly more material to come. He was being coy but I think there isn't as much material as he'd like for us to be. Nowadays, they can digitally alter demos or unfinished songs and keep putting out albums every few years...

I miss Michael....

Nice, I can't say I'd heard this version before. I didn't realise there was even an uptempo-ish sounding version before the two on Xscape.

ChickenMcNuggets said:

Nice, I can't say I'd heard this version before. I didn't realise there was even an uptempo-ish sounding version before the two on Xscape.

Johnny's version came out in 1984.

IMHO this is better than MJ's version.