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The truth behind "No Friend Of Mine/Gangsta" (Pras, Tempamental ft MJ)

mj_frenzy

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Was that song to be officialy released (apart from Tempamental's myspace) ?

MJ's spokewoman officialy and categorically denied (at that time) even knowning a person named "Pras", but the song itself sounds better than other, earlier releases (for example, much better than the monotonous and repetitive "Shout").
 
Pras is Pras Michel from Fugees. Michael probably knew him because he worked with Wyclef Jean. But "No Friend Of Mine" was completely 100% unofficial and illegal project. Someone (probably Pras) got the hold of MJ's unreleased song - Blue Gangsta and used MJ's vocals in Tempamental's track. MJ was not involved in this in any way.
 
Pras worked on 2 Bad (Refugee Camp Mix)

Song and lyrics by Michael Jackson
Music composed by Bruce Swedien, René Moore and Dallas Austin
Produced by Michael Jackson, Jimmy Jam & Terry Lewis
Remix and guitar by Wyclef Jean
Additional production by Te-Bass and Pras
Rap by John Forte
Bass by Te-Bass
Mixed and engineered by Warren Riker
 
OnirMJ said:
Pras is Pras Michel from Fugees. Michael probably knew him because he worked with Wyclef Jean. But "No Friend Of Mine" was completely 100% unofficial and illegal project. Someone (probably Pras) got the hold of MJ's unreleased song - Blue Gangsta and used MJ's vocals in Tempamental's track. MJ was not involved in this in any way.
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Pretty bizarre story ...
 
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mj_frenzy said:
Pretty bizarre story ...
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It was basically a leak of Blue Gangsta snippets remixed into a new song. I think it has to be Pras who did that. It's not the first time one of MJ's coworkers leaked an unreleased track. Stuart Brawley gave a copy of Xscape to a fan who leaked it in early 2003.
 
OnirMJ said:
It was basically a leak of Blue Gangsta snippets remixed into a new song. I think it has to be Pras who did that. It's not the first time one of MJ's coworkers leaked an unreleased track. Stuart Brawley gave a copy of Xscape to a fan who leaked it in early 2003.
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It seems to me that MJ gave up protecting his own copyrighted, studio material after what he had been through during the Invincible era.
 
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It was made available in 2006 when it appeared on Tempromental's MySpace page. In 2011 Dr Freeze did an interview with MJFrance.com, & said he didn't know how Tempromental got hold of the song, & he & MJ were miffed.
 
Think Slave To The Rhythm scam with Bieber, it's the same way only 6 years earlier.
 
mj_frenzy said:
It seems to me that MJ gave up protecting his own copyrighted, studio material after what he had been through during the Invincible era.
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That's not true. You simply can not control what thieves do. They steal from the studio. He thought those people were his friends and coworkers, not thieves. Same happened with Hold My Hand in 2008.
 
InvincibleTal said:
Think Slave To The Rhythm scam with Bieber, it's the same way only 6 years earlier.
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No, not the same way, that was different. Actually completely different. First the song leaked on the internet in full (Tricky Stewart version). Then Tricky Stewart himself gave the song to Max Methods who remixed it with Bieber vocals. Still unofficial, but different.
 
^ How's the chronology of things making it 'completely different'? Max and Bieber didn't just remix the leaked version, they had the song from a first hand source. They both recorded a fake "featuring" song without anybody's permission and then leaked it while trying to force a release (Pras and Tempamental claimed it's a brand new song). Both of them tried to get to the pages of history with a fake collaboration they secretley recorded in their studio and both of them failed. I get that you might wanna disagree but it is not actually completley different.
 
InvincibleTal said:
^ How's the chronology of things making it 'completely different'? Max and Bieber didn't just remix the leaked version, they had the song from a first hand source. They both recorded a fake "featuring" song without anybody's permission and then leaked it while trying to force a release (Pras and Tempamental claimed it's a brand new song). Both of them tried to get to the pages of history with a fake collaboration they secretley recorded in their studio and both of them failed. I get that you might wanna disagree but it is not actually completley different.
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Everything you said is the same. And I agree with all that. But the chronology is important and that's what I meant by completely different. Because Blue Gangsta was not leaked. It was "brand new", never before heard MJ song by anyone. Every single fan heard Slave To The Rhythm prior to Max Methods remix being leaked. Meaning is that Pras caused bigger damage to MJ because it was previously unreleased & unleaked.
 
Yes, if we're talking about damages then the initial leak is more harmful. By the way, "Slave To The Rhythm" with Bieber was damaging as well, they used to play it on the radio in some stations, and JB fans think this shit is real. I caught in on the radio more than once (Before and after Xscape got released) and I talked with a JB fan which thought it was official. Hell, they even talked about it on the news, didn't they? But these people (those who didn't know) aren't really an audience that could damage things for real, as they listen to music on youtube or get it with illegal downloads anyway. I see Tricky as responsible for both initial leak and the "duet" so for me he's just as bad as Pras.
 
I don't think Pras caused much, if any damage to MJ with the No Friend of Mine mix, it was something only hardcore fans knew about, but the Bieber STTR was played on the radio and got media coverage, plus Bieber also tweeted about it. Not really any comparison interms of "damage" IMO.
 
Bieber didn't do any damage to anything. It's a case of fans being irritated with the fact that he was on the song to begin with.
 
OnirMJ said:
That's not true. You simply can not control what thieves do. They steal from the studio. He thought those people were his friends and coworkers, not thieves. Same happened with Hold My Hand in 2008.
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Such things never happened during Dangerous era ...
 
mj_frenzy said:
Such things never happened during Dangerous era ...
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Yes to what Respect and Invicible said.

Also am I off here or wasn't a truck containing the first pressed CD's of Dangerous hijacked and then sold illegally? Not exactly the same thing but still..
 
^ You aren't off although it's not the same


[h=1]Michael Jackson Album a Hit--to Robbers Who Steal 30,000 Copies From Warehouse[/h]

Sue Satriano, a spokeswoman for Sony Music Entertainment, which is marketing Jackson's album on the Epic Records label, said 30,000 CDs, cassettes and long-playing records were stolen, and placed the retail value of the loss at between $250,000 and $300,000.
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http://articles.latimes.com/1991-11-21/local/me-551_1_michael-jackson-album

By the way, your inbox is maxed out and that's why I couldn't send you the article you were looking for yesterday
 
InvincibleTal said:
^ You aren't off although it's not the same



http://articles.latimes.com/1991-11-21/local/me-551_1_michael-jackson-album

By the way, your inbox is maxed out and that's why I couldn't send you the article you were looking for yesterday
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Oh it is? Thanks for bringing that to my attention. I wasn't even aware of it!

It's kinda crazy how bootlegging has been around since forever. Many people I have talked to concerning bootlegging thinks that it started with the inception of the Internet.
 
Gold Pants Girl said:
I don't think Pras caused much, if any damage to MJ with the No Friend of Mine mix, it was something only hardcore fans knew about, but the Bieber STTR was played on the radio and got media coverage, plus Bieber also tweeted about it. Not really any comparison interms of "damage" IMO.
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No Friend of Mine also got media coverage. Even bigger than Slave To The Rhythm. There were news reports about new MJ song, even here in Croatia. Also MJ was alive back then, so the damage was even greater.
 
AlwaysThere said:
Bieber didn't do any damage to anything. It's a case of fans being irritated with the fact that he was on the song to begin with.
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I disagree, like others have said, that remix caused damage to Slave To The Rhythm (song) and Xscape (album) because people heard the leak somewhere before its initial version and maybe thought that that crappy version will be on the album.
 
mj_frenzy said:
leak is not bad at all during a period when an artist is not as succesful as before...
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WTF?? It's even bigger. Because when your song gets official release, no one will care anymore because they heard the song months before and illegally downloaded it. So, no, completely opposite. It's very damaging. Like Madonna's new album leaked 3 months before its release. Her new single with huge promotional campaign and performances on huge events didn't even enter the Hot 100. That wouldn't be the case for sure if she released brand new single simultaneously on the radio and itunes.
 
mj_frenzy said:
They wouldn't have allowed leak. Note, that leak is not bad at all during a period when an artist is not as succesful as before...
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At this point I can not tell if your comments are for real or it's just your second attempt in 24 hours to make a discussion out of nothing.
 
OnirMJ said:
I disagree, like others have said, that remix caused damage to Slave To The Rhythm (song) and Xscape (album) because people heard the leak somewhere before its initial version and maybe thought that that crappy version will be on the album.
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Reviews all pointed out that Bieber was not involved with the version that was commercially released. The solo version was performed at the Billboard awards, and I haven't heard any discussion of it since.
 
OnirMJ said:
That's not true. You simply can not control what thieves do. They steal from the studio. He thought those people were his friends and coworkers, not thieves. Same happened with Hold My Hand in 2008.
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Nobody can be really sure if it is true or not.

InvincibleTal said:
At this point I can not tell if your comments are for real or it's just your second attempt in 24 hours to make a discussion out of nothing.
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Different opinions are not attempts to make a discussion out of nothing.
 
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