I was looking through my old tapes and found a old Shalomar tape and an old Thriller tape and started thinking how great would Howard Hewitt from Shalomar been if he had a great producer like Quincy Jones or Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis? I mean MJ's solo stuff wasn't all that until he hooked up with Quincy Jones and Janets first Cd without Flyte time hooking it up was...well...uhh it wasn't working for her... Jody Watley became big when she went solo because of great song writing and production. It's sad how many great singers went on to be unapreciated and underused most of their careers. I think that's the problem with todays music is that very few have a sound of their own cause they all use the same producers (neptunes ect...) or everyone uses the same 6 producers on one Cd. I just think of Chaka Kahn, Teena Marie, Patti Belle and how much greater they could have been if they had one stretch of time with a great producer/songwriter worthy of their talent. Not everyone can write and produce their own music like Stevie Wonder and Prince can it's just a shame no one got a hold of some of these artist's in their prime.

MJ should've stuck with Quincy on his last album. That's probably why "Invincible" didn't sell as well as it did.

Why he chose to use some of the hot new producers like Rodney Jerkins and stuff is just beyond me.

Exactly you don't see Janet not going back to Jimmy jam and Terry when she has a new album. You don't mess with chemistry.

Grace Jones needed Sly and Robbie.

Sinister said:

Well there's chemistry and there's one tired ass sound. I'm glad she's branching out a bit for this next one. MJ and Quincy knew when to quit. Quincy actually only really played an Executive Producer role on Bad anyway. Teddy Riley was perfect for the transistion for producing halfof Dangerous and Michael did the other half himself, and all the best tracks on HIStory were selfproductions and compositions. Having MJ with his ego after he hit 30 would have been too much for Q. Why destroy a legacy?
[This message was edited Wed Jan 21 21:47:46 PST 2004 by Ellie]

NWF said:

It would've sold more had there been the usual seven or eight single releases. The US got You Rock My World and Butterflies (both radio cuts only) while the rest of the world got You Rock My World and Cry. Heaven Can Wait was also released to radio in the US but Sony didn't bother giving it a push.

Had Unbreakable (which recieved a bit of airplay in the UK), Whatever Happens, Speechless, Invincible and Break Of Dawn been issued then it probably would've sold more than the 9m that it did. Still, not bad sales for an underpromoted and supposedly crap album, eh?

Sinister said:

Actually,I think an artist should work with DIFFERENT producers on each album.That's how you diversify your sound and evolve.I like Jam and lewis,but I think they have simply run out of ideas (this could be the reason why Janet is doing a handful of tracks with Dallas Austin).As much as I love Quincy Jones,I think it was time for Michael to move on after 'Bad'.The only problem is,Mike never seems to work with unique producers and songwriters.He sticks to whomever is "hot" on the R&B charts (R.Kelly,Rodney Jerkins,etc).It's almost as if he's afraid to branch out and make a bold,challenging album.

DavidEye said:

He really should do that.

Have you heard Morphine from the Blood On The Dancefloor album? An extraordinary song and completely self written. Very dark and very different. It at least shows he is capable of doing something out of the norm. Maybe he should move in that direction. It probably wouldn't be very commercial but it would bring artistic rewards for him and that's more important in my opinion, anyway. He's too hung up on sales, tho'.