RODSERLING said:

thesexofit said:

We have discussed this before and whilst the HBO cancellation was a big deal, Sony US had already made the decision it seemed not to bother with "Earth Song" in America. Despite coming off a landmark no.1 single, Sony US promoted "Money" instead will quite literally a dozen remixes and no video.

Completely different to what the rest of the world did with "History". Around this time, I think a few big albums had different singles in different territories, but Sony US were already looking at failure and the HBO thing just multiplied it.

Sorry, off topic again....

Money was never promoted as a single. There's absolutely no promo of it, even if it was announced on some early stickers of the album. This Time Around airplay, video and possible physical release were clearly given up because of the cancellation of the concert. This HBO concert was Sony's big plan to sell the album for the Christmas season, back to the top ten, and to ship truckloads of it. Earth Song could have received airplay and video exposition if Sony paid for that, even without a physical release. TDCAU didn't receive good airplay, despite good sales. Sony didn't payolaed it at all. Same for Stranger In Moscow, it was only released in October of 1997(!), because these were the unsold shipments in Europe. BOTDF and Ghosts weren't promoted neither. It's obvious this has to do with the fact MJ didn't tour in the US, nor made the HBO concert. Hell, in Europe Sony even agreed to release Smile, only if MJ performed it on TV ( that would have been the official music video). [Edited 3/28/22 4:24am]

I meant "This time around" My bad.

But yeah The HBO cancellation may of made Sony US just give up on the promotion push Sony Europe were willing to do. Still crazy how to fuck up promotion when you just had a historic no. 1 single ("You are not alone"). Possibly the future singles were too poppy for US stations back then? That may of played a part?

GustavoRibas said:

Cinny said:

Bad definitely had an overall more plastic sound than Thriller!

- I always thought I was the only one who thought that. Unfortunately, the mid to end of the 80s favored this kind of production.

Yeah, until 1985 we were still good, but I remember after that popular music went downhill quickly. By then funk, new wave and (post-)disco were replaced by hiphop, electronic music and generic commercial artists like Whitney Houston. And everyone started using digital equipment which brought a certain sound with it. A sound I didn't like at all unfortunately!