Michael Jackson

[lilacmess]

14 hours ago, RussTCB said:

I'll try to give both a listen tomorrow

I like the original version better. I'm no expert in different versions or remixes at all. I just like the feeling of the ov more. The melancholy.

[TheGeneral]

@Mendez @RussTCB @lilacmess

If you never have, you need to listen to the 2010 version, IMHO it blows them both out of the water.

It was supposed to be on the "Michael" album, but I they decided against it. They put a similiar song called "Another Day" on it (which is also fantastic), so I guess that was the reason for leaving it off.

[Mendez]

I did this Sony esque (keep the vocals and nothing else) re-work of "Why You Wanna Trip on Me?" a while back. I created modern sounding elements

 

Wish I could find a higher quality version of the acapella, as well as the vocal harmonies stems

 

Edited November 7, 2021 by Mendez

[TheGeneral]

One thing that I've always found weird was how Michael stopped singing choruses on (and after) "Invincible".

I mean he still sang them, but the "main vocals" were the ad libs and many choruses were sang by background singers while he just ad libbed over them. That would have made live performances of those songs harder and a bit awkward.

"You Rock My World" from MSG is the best example. Instead of singing the main chorus of "You rock my world / you know you did ..." he stayed true to the original and just quietly sang "You rock my wooorld ... you rock my woooorld ..." into the microphone.

I don't know if it's just me but I want to hear the singer sing the chorus and sing along to it instead of him doing his own little thing. It makes the chorus so much stronger.

[-Jaro-]

On 11/2/2021 at 7:22 PM, lilacmess said:

Oh, it's one of my least favorite on that album too, but that album is insane! So many hits. One fabulous pop song after the other! It's my favorite MJ album for its consitency.

My Bad song ranking: 1. Dirty Diana 2. Smooth Criminal 3. Man In The Mirror 4. Liberian Girl  5. Another Part of Me 6. Speed Demon 7. Leave Me Alone 8. Bad 9. IJCSLY 10. The Way You Make Me Feel 11. Just Good Friends

MJ fans, please join in to the Bad discussion/ranking. I'd love to read your thoughts.

1. Man in the mirror

2. Dirty Diana

3. The way you make me feel

4. Leave me alone

5. Liberian Girl

6. Smooth Criminal

7. Bad

8. Another part of me

9. IJCSLY

10. Speed Demon

11. Just good friends

 

 

Note: i owned cassette without Leave Me Alone and until recently considered it as stand-alone single 😂

[ChineseDemocracy2004]

On 11/2/2021 at 6:22 PM, lilacmess said:

MJ fans, please join in to the Bad discussion/ranking. I'd love to read your thoughts.

Smooth Criminal,
Man In The Mirror,
Liberian Girl,
Leave Me Alone,
Dirty Diana,
Speed Demon,
The Way You Make Me Feel,
Bad,
Another Part Of Me,
I Just Can't Stop Loving You,
Just Good Friends.

[Towelie]

22 hours ago, TheGeneral said:

One thing that I've always found weird was how Michael stopped singing choruses on (and after) "Invincible".

I mean he still sang them, but the "main vocals" were the ad libs and many choruses were sang by background singers while he just ad libbed over them. That would have made live performances of those songs harder and a bit awkward.

"You Rock My World" from MSG is the best example. Instead of singing the main chorus of "You rock my world / you know you did ..." he stayed true to the original and just quietly sang "You rock my wooorld ... you rock my woooorld ..." into the microphone.

I don't know if it's just me but I want to hear the singer sing the chorus and sing along to it instead of him doing his own little thing. It makes the chorus so much stronger.

YRMW chorus vocals are all MJ, stacked on top of eachother. MJ had always adlibbed over his choruses, so it was really nothing new.

2000 Watts and Break of Dawn are the only songs where he doesn't sing the main chorus.

Edited November 8, 2021 by Towelie

[TheGeneral]

43 minutes ago, Towelie said:

YRMW chorus vocals are all MJ, stacked on top of eachother. MJ had always adlibbed over his choruses, so it was really nothing new.

2000 Watts and Break of Dawn are the only songs where he doesn't sing the main chorus.

I know that he still sang the YRMW chorus and I also know that he always adlibbed. But the main vocals were the adlibs instead of the main chorus which kind of bothers me, because to me it feels like instead of going with the flow of the chorus he's just there, waiting to deliver his lines. If you get what I mean.

"One More Chance" has the same problem, where the main vocals in the chorus are Michael's "One more ..." instead of the main chorus.

Imagine if TWYMMF had something like that, it wouldn't be such a good song that goes with the flow so well. To me, although I really like them, it's what keeps those songs from being on the same level as previous hits.

[lilacmess]

The 'Slashing Chinese Democracy to 45 Minutes' thread on D&N reminded me that a while ago I (like a nerd) made my own Invincible cut. I have my own little running order. And I think it works well. What do you guys think?

1. Unbreakable 

2. Heaven Can Wait 

3. Heartbreaker 

4. Invincible 

5. Break of Dawn 

6. Blue Gangsta 

7. Speechless 

8. You Rock My World 

9. The Lost Children 

10. Whatever Happens 

11. Threatened 

I encourage you to try it out and mercilessly critizise me. 😉

Edited November 27, 2021 by lilacmess

[RussTCB]

On 11/26/2021 at 12:32 AM, lilacmess said:

The 'Slashing Chinese Democracy to 45 Minutes' thread on D&N reminded me that a while ago I (like a nerd) made my own Invincible cuts. I have my own little running order. And I think it works well. What do you guys think?

1. Unbreakable 

2. Heaven Can Wait 

3. Heartbreaker 

4. Invincible 

5. Break of Dawn 

6. Blue Gangsta 

7. Speechless 

8. You Rock My World 

9. The Lost Children 

10. Whatever Happens 

11. Threatened 

I encourage you to try it out and mercilessly critizise me. 😉

I've done this a few times with Invincible over the years. I dig what you've got here. 

[jimisbatman]

On 11/5/2021 at 1:11 PM, Mendez said:

MJ stans are gonna flame me, but the Chicago rewprk that was released on Xscape is a banger. The original is also a banger

Totally agree, Chicago and Xscape songs, remix and original, are masterclass pop songs. Shame the estate isn't going to be releasing any more albums. They have the songs too do so, check out the clip of bounce' listening to unreleased MJ track, you can slightly hear it and sounds amazing. There's also an unreleased mj music wiki page, detailing some songs. Apparently, invincible producer is sitting on heaps of unreleased tracks from the era too. Such a shame 

[Jw224]

The Wikipedia page is notoriously unreliable and has lots of false info. I'm pretty sure a lot of stuff listed there just isn't real. (Unless it's been majorly overhauled since the last time I checked it). 

[RussTCB]

New video on my channel that's MJ focused

 

 

[jimisbatman]

On 11/26/2021 at 6:32 PM, lilacmess said:

The 'Slashing Chinese Democracy to 45 Minutes' thread on D&N reminded me that a while ago I (like a nerd) made my own Invincible cut. I have my own little running order. And I think it works well. What do you guys think?

1. Unbreakable 

2. Heaven Can Wait 

3. Heartbreaker 

4. Invincible 

5. Break of Dawn 

6. Blue Gangsta 

7. Speechless 

8. You Rock My World 

9. The Lost Children 

10. Whatever Happens 

11. Threatened 

I encourage you to try it out and mercilessly critizise me. 😉

If your gonna use non_album, but period song, Blue Gangsta, did you forget to include xscape/shout/we've had enough/Chicago or APWno Name, or do you not like them? 

[RussTCB]

I'm going to see MJ: Live tonight. It's a decent tribute show that I've seen a few times. 

[lilacmess]

23 hours ago, jimisbatman said:

If your gonna use non_album, but period song, Blue Gangsta, did you forget to include xscape/shout/we've had enough/Chicago or APWno Name, or do you not like them? 

I didn't forget. That's the tracklist I wanted. 😊

[RussTCB]

MJ focused episode today:

 

[lilacmess]

I love how passionate you are about this @RussTCB 

 

My favorite song on the album has always been They Don't Care About Us. It's one of my all time favorite songs.

I don't even know why, but the line "I have a wife and two children who love me." makes me really sad. Maybe because it didn't work out and it would have been nice for him. 

I really like Money and D.S., but I'm just warming up to Stranger In Moscow. I know it's a fan favorite, but I don't really feel it. Same with Childhood.

I love the covers Come Together and Smile.

My least liked song (I don't like it) has always been You Are Not Alone.  

Edited January 11, 2022 by lilacmess

[RussTCB]

3 hours ago, lilacmess said:

I love how passionate you are about this @RussTCB 

 

My favorite song on the album has always been They Don't Care About Us. It's one of my all time favorite songs.

I don't even know why, but the line "I have a wife and two children who love me." makes me always really sad. Maybe because it obviously didn't work out and it would have been nice for him. 

I really like Money and D.S., but I'm just warming up to Stranger In Moscow. I know it's a fan favorite, but I don't really feel it. Same with Childhood.

I love the covers Come Together and Smile.

My least liked song (I don't like it) has always been You Are Not Alone.  

Haha, there's really no end to how fired up I can get about MJ. 

The very first time I heard the album, I instantly loved They Don't Care About Us. Then I was kind of indifferent to many of the other tracks. 

Stranger was the next song that I really connected with. I get why it's a slow burn though. I can totally understand not liking You Are Not Alone too. I don't dislike it, but I certainly don't love it. 

It's always been one of those songs that puzzles me as to why it was as big of a hit as it was. I think there are far, FAR better songs on this album than that. 

 

[merryfnchristmas]

was daydreaming the other day about an alternate reality where Say Say Say was on Thriller instead of The Girl Is Mine. That'd be cool. The album seemed to do fairly well regardless 

[Dean]

Just thought I'd throw this in here - have any of you seen the Janet Jackson 4 part documentary? I've only made my way through the first episode, but she revisited the hometown they were all brought up in and broke down upon seeing a Muriel that the locals had done of the Jackson 5. Pretty touching.

[RussTCB]

21 minutes ago, Dean said:

Just thought I'd throw this in here - have any of you seen the Janet Jackson 4 part documentary? I've only made my way through the first episode, but she revisited the hometown they were all brought up in and broke down upon seeing a Muriel that the locals had done of the Jackson 5. Pretty touching.

It's on my list of things to get to. I'm not a huge Janet fan. I don't dislike her at all, but I'm just not as big of a fan of her as I am of Michael. 

I'm sure there's so much more to her story than I'm aware of, so I'm looking forward to learning more. 

[North Korean Democracy]

The main problem with Invincible is too many ballads and not enough uptempo pop songs which always were MJ's best songs. And what's worst: in the later half of the record there are too many consecutive ballads.

Here's how I would fix Invincible, cutting ballads and subpar tracks that drag the album (Cry, Don't Walk Away, etc) and putting in their place uptempo and better songs from the same sessions. I made this version on Spotify and it flows very well imo.

1. Unbreakable
2. Heartbreaker
3. Invincible
4. Break of Dawn
5. Heaven Can Wait
6. You Rock My World
7. Butterflies
8. Blue Gangsta (I'd put the Xscape version because the original sounds too much like a demo, it wouldn't flow well with the album)
9. Speechless
10. (I Can't Make It) Another Day
11. Chicago (same as Blue Gangsta)
12. The Lost Children
13. Whatever Happens
14. Threatened

Edited February 3, 2022 by North Korean Democracy

[RussTCB]

2 hours ago, North Korean Democracy said:

The main problem with Invincible is too many ballads and not enough uptempo pop songs which always were MJ's best songs. And what's worst: in the later half of the record there are too many consecutive ballads.

Here's how I would fix Invincible, cutting ballads and subpar tracks that drag the album (Cry, Don't Walk Away, etc) and putting in their place uptempo and better songs from the same sessions. I made this version on Spotify and it flows very well imo.

1. Unbreakable
2. Heartbreaker
3. Invincible
4. Break of Dawn
5. Heaven Can Wait
6. You Rock My World
7. Butterflies
8. Blue Gangsta (I'd put the Xscape version because the original sounds too much like a demo, it wouldn't flow well with the album)
9. Speechless
10. (I Can't Make It) Another Day
11. Chicago (same as Blue Gangsta)
12. The Lost Children
13. Whatever Happens
14. Threatened

I agree with you overall. Personally, I really think Invincible would have benefitted from being split into two different albums. 

Basically take the ballads, split them up into 2 piles, then add MJ bangers to each. Done. Then release them about 3 years apart with a tour in the middle to support. 

[RussTCB]

New video