bboy87 said:

Personal tastes aside, while other producers, arrangers, and writers played a significant part (as they do for all artists) ...

Not for Prince...

modified said:

bboy87 said:

Personal tastes aside, while other producers, arrangers, and writers played a significant part (as they do for all artists) ...

Not for Prince...

Prince prided himself on doing everything and being in control of it all. Not all artists want or have the need to do everything like that and are fine with collaboration and working with others.. Sometimes, maybe it would been a good thing if Prince had used an outside producer

Not everyone is one man band.

[Edited 9/27/18 10:26am]

modified said:

Effin millennials and their clueless explaineritis. This "analysis" is an embarrassment to white people. Reminds me of Patrick Bateman's music reviews in American Psycho.

Michael Jackson is massively overrated as an artist. He was an OK singer and a mediocre songwriter - Beat It for example sucks, whiny, childish, like many of his songs.

His producers are the real talents and visionaries behind his music; the Mizell Brothers for the early Jackson 5 hits, Quincy Jones for his 1980s heyday, several top producers Teddy Riley and Rodney Jerkins for the occassional half-decent track in the 1990s.

[Edited 9/11/18 10:55am]

I guess he got lucky with producers in the 70's, 80's, 90's, and some of the 00's... Just amazing luck.

Derek1984 said:

modified said:

Effin millennials and their clueless explaineritis. This "analysis" is an embarrassment to white people. Reminds me of Patrick Bateman's music reviews in American Psycho.

Michael Jackson is massively overrated as an artist. He was an OK singer and a mediocre songwriter - Beat It for example sucks, whiny, childish, like many of his songs.

His producers are the real talents and visionaries behind his music; the Mizell Brothers for the early Jackson 5 hits, Quincy Jones for his 1980s heyday, several top producers Teddy Riley and Rodney Jerkins for the occassional half-decent track in the 1990s.

I guess he got lucky with producers in the 70's, 80's, 90's, and some of the 00's... Just amazing luck.

I LOVE those producers' other work, but it is funny how their biggest works were with Michael's writing.

Cinny said:

Derek1984 said:

I guess he got lucky with producers in the 70's, 80's, 90's, and some of the 00's... Just amazing luck.

I LOVE those producers' other work, but it is funny how their biggest works were with Michael's writing.

I think with Q and others, people think of producers in the modern sense. Guys like Quincy, Arif Mardin, Jerry Wexler, and George Martin weren't beat makers.

They did quality control, kept things on budget and on time, brought in the musicians and engineers that would give the best results, staying on theme, and choosing the best material

I remember hearing someone say if this was today, Rod Temperton would be credited as co-producer on Thriller since he was participated in choosing the songs and lead some of the recording sessions on the songs he wrote

Derek1984 said:

The producers of the classic first Jackson 5 singles were the legendary Mizell Brothers, who went on to make many other great records. MJ had no influence in selecting them. From day one MJ had people and money behind him with interest in building up his career. Charles Stepney for example was also lined up to produce him before he died. Google these people.

Written, produced, played by Mizell Brothers:

Another Mizell Brothers production:

modified said:

modified said:

MotownSubdivision said:

modified said:

Not for Prince...

Why does every artist have to be like Prince?

Exactly

Producers, songwriters, arrangers and such exist for a reason. Not everyone produces music in a self contained vaccum, and not everyone wants to. It also doesn't discount or discredit people and their talents/skills who have songwriters and don't produce themselves

bboy87 said:

MotownSubdivision said:

I know producers like Quincy and Nile Rodgers have the capability to translate the song into lead sheets for different instruments (strings, horns). But that doesn't mean it was written on those instruments, if Mike sang it to them to communicate the idea.

Cinny said:

I know producers like Quincy and Nile Rodgers have the capability to translate the song into lead sheets for different instruments (strings, horns). But that doesn't mean it was written on those instruments, if Mike sang it to them to communicate the idea.

modified said:

Cinny said:

I know producers like Quincy and Nile Rodgers have the capability to translate the song into lead sheets for different instruments (strings, horns). But that doesn't mean it was written on those instruments, if Mike sang it to them to communicate the idea.

We've all heard the demo for "Don't Stop 'Til You Get Enough", the meat of the song is there.

Cinny said:

modified said:

We've all heard the demo for "Don't Stop 'Til You Get Enough", the meat of the song is there.

Exactly. Quincy added parts that were essential to the final version but anybody who has heard the demo can hear the song was already there. Same goes for the demos to

Billie Jean

Beat It

Working Day and Night

The Girl Is Mine (although the demo is superior to the album version, imo)

That's a traditional producer's job.

Picking the right songs, bringing in the right musicians and staff, and adding elements to a song to get the best results.

The multitracks to Don't Stop Til You Get Enough are circulating online. Without the strings, it's still a great song, but WITH them? It takes to another level

[Edited 10/3/18 12:38pm]

[Edited 10/3/18 12:40pm]

https://www.makingmichael.co.uk/single-post/2016/04/19/EXTRACT-Inside-the-Bad-sessions-and-the-split-with-Quincy-Jones

https://www.makingmichael.co.uk/single-post/2016/11/21/Full-interview-with-longtime-Michael-Jackson-collaborator-and-friend-Matt-Forger

Cinny said:

We've all heard the demo for "Don't Stop 'Til You Get Enough", the meat of the song is there.

That was an interesting thing about hearing that home demo when they released it: the core of the groove is all there, but so too are lots of details like the guitar/synth (?) riff that recurs between the vocal phrases, and the one that closes out the song. Fair play to Quincy for just fleshing out what was there and not trying to mess around with it too much.

The analysis in the clip seems a bit flat-footed, but it's symptomatic of trying to describe popular music -particularly styles like funk - using the language of Western music theory. Not to say that that's of no use, but you have to tweak the toolkit a little. I often find that such analyses simply redescribe the composition in a more abstract language, rather than really explaining anything about how or why it works.

Still, I hadn't paid attention to the tritone/augmented 4th in the melody before. He'd have been banned for using the 'Devil's interval' by the Church, if he'd lived in Renaissance Europe (and that story hadn't been made up).
https://www.npr.org/2017/...s-interval

deebee said:

Cinny said:

We've all heard the demo for "Don't Stop 'Til You Get Enough", the meat of the song is there.

That was an interesting thing about hearing that home demo when they released it: the core of the groove is all there, but so too are lots of details like the guitar/synth (?) riff that recurs between the vocal phrases, and the one that closes out the song. Fair play to Quincy for just fleshing out what was there and not trying to mess around with it too much.

A lot of MJ's demos are like that. Getting certain parts down to the point because that was his way of having more input on the songs. He'd do a rough demo, then a home studio demo then others after.

The demo of The Girl Is Mine is so fleshed out, I prefer it over the album version

tump said:

Always loved the tracks Bill Bottrell worked on. Laughed when I found out about L.T.B. - the rapper on Black Or White https://www.vice.com/amp/...-white-213 The making of Black Or White https://www.soundonsound....k-or-white

Bill recently did a seminar with Michael's associate engineer, Brad Sundberg who tours with a seminar about working with MJ.

I didn't know how involved Bottrell was in the 1983-1986 Hayvenhurst sessions with MJ and John Barnes until a few years ago when I read his posts on Gearslutz. Also didn't know he was fired from the project after they got to Westlake and at the behest of the team there