Michael's Unreleased Material - How Much is Left?

This is one of the biggest discussed topics in the community, at least as far as I've seen - how much unreleased material is left in the vaults? (Ranging from 1977-2009; J5 material doesn't count.) Now, over the years, numbers have varied and have shrunk ever since Michael's death. In 2008/2009 reports stated that he had over 200 unreleased songs in the vault. After his death, those numbers have shrunken from 150 to 100 to 50.

Various people have given specific numbers and estimates of how much material can be released; however, the only true way for anyone to know how much material is left is if each of Michael's collaborators reveal themselves how many songs they have. Over the years there have been over 200 unreleased titles collected and compiled by fans, all of which have been noted at some point in Michael's life; dozens of titles were revealed in Michael's 1993 Mexico court deposition alone. It's very hard to believe that only a handful of these titles are complete enough for release.

It's also unknown if all of Michael's collaborators have handed over all of the material they have. For instance, Cory Rooney had submitted a finalized version of She Was Loving Me from circa 2000 for the Michael album, a song the Estate wasn't aware was completed. It remains unregistered (as far as I'm aware) and unreleased to this day, as do a number of songs done with RedOne, will.i.am, etc. So it's very plausible that there are songs out there that have yet to be discovered.

Now, when I speak of unreleased material, I'm not talking about songs that have been 100% fully finalized with people like Bruce Swedien, nor am I talking about demos of songs that have already been released. I mean songs that have vocals complete enough to become a completed song, like I'm So Blue or Hollywood Tonight. (Hollywood is supposedly only around 60% completed, and that song came together pretty nicely.)

So this is a place to discuss and speak: how much material do you think is left?

I have the book For The Record. There is just so many unreleased songs mention in that book. I could list them if you want me to. And who knows how many songs there is that wasn't mention in that book. Like Abortion Papers. I didn't even know that song even existed. It was never mention in For The Record. And I have the revised version of that book.

Michael NEVER stopped recording throughout his life. He may have taken his time releasing his albums but in between he always recorded something. So think of the past 35 years with nonstop music. Clearly there is much to be heard.

We can't possibly know, most of us if not all didn't even know about a lot of songs on Bad 25.

I think there's a lot. We just don't know how much of it was recorded, but I bet the number is still pretty high.

dam2040 said:

We can't possibly know, most of us if not all didn't even know about a lot of songs on Bad 25.

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Best way to put it! I remember a magazine where they mentioned a track from the bad era called ''Apocalypse Now''. There are just so many songs we have no clue about. I really think the amount of unreleased songs are of great abundace.

I just hope that most of Michaels recordings are safe and in good hands. I bet many recordings were destroyed or were stolen over the years. Im so excited about new songs. Songs like "Free" are so magical, it's sad that it has been in an archive for so many years. Thats why I think there are still so many good songs out there.

I think there's enough to last several years (if done properly)

I'm sure Michael kept most of his unreleased work in his archives but his collaborators may have more and might not be willing to hand over everything

Either way, I think we can look forward to more unreleased work in the future

Personally I think that theoretically there were plenty ready to be released. And when I say 'ready', I mean that these songs would have been considered 'ready enough'. Now, since the MICHAEL album fiasco, I believe the number has shrunk substantially. Now, it seems that the Estate has realized that a lot of fans don't want over produced, over processed music, which in turn, doesn't leave them with much. If we didn't raise hell about the way the songs on the MICHAEL album were handled, they'd continue to use those songs that they figured were 'release ready.'

So personally, I don't think there's much when we look at the situation in a 'quality release' type of way. Just my opinion anyway.

It's difficult to assure how much is left in fact but I'd certainly buy a record full of demos as long as those aren't touched like people involved did in Michael.