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Michael Jackson's This Is It - Overdubbed Vocals

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7even's HIStory Corner
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Hello, I was doing research on overdubbed vocals for This Is It, we know that the vocals in the movie have been edited or replaced with previously recorded album/demo versions of the performed songs, but can someone make a good list of the which songs were dubbed and which songs were edited/autotuned?
 
Jam, TDCAU both use mostly the album vocal track
Billie Jean contains a lot of an unreleased Billie Jean demo
Beat It allegedly uses the Toronto 84 vocal track - it sounds very similar but I'm not sure on that one
Earth Song uses a bit of the album vocal track but heavily uses the demo vocal for the last part

Theres probably more
 
dethorro said:
Wanna Be Startin' Somethin - live vocals from the rehearsals, most likely only from the orange pants day.
Jam - overdubbed with original studio vocals
They Don't Care About Us - overdubbed with original studio vocals
Human Nature - live vocals from the rehearsals
Smooth Criminal - contains a good amount of live vocals but is also partially overdubbed with original studio vocals.
First verse and pre-chorus are overdubbed with studio vocals, the second verse is also overdubbed with studio vocals but contains some live vocals on the end of the phrases:
"So they came in to the outway
It was Sunday, what a black day
Mouth-to-mouth resuscitation
Sounding heartbeats, intimidation."
The rest is live.
The Way You Make Me Feel - the slow intro has live vocals from the orange pants rehearsal day, the rest was overdubbed with studio vocals which were pitched down in order to correspond with the lower key of the song. At the end, the live ad-libs are from June 23rd.
J5 Medley - live vocals from the rehearsals, mainly June 23rd.
I Just Can't Stop Loving You - live vocals from the rehearsals
Thriller - overdubbed with original studio vocals.
Beat It - overdubbed with vocals from the Victory Tour.
Black or White - live vocals from June 23rd, the "I'm tired of this devil..." portion may or may not be live since it is sung very clean, yet his microphone seems to move around a lot, so that one may also be overdubbed - with what, would be the question. It doesn't sound like studio or demo vocals. It may also just be live vocals which were mixed very well.
Earth Song - overdubbed with original studio and demo vocals.
Billie Jean - overdubbed with demo vocals but contains some live ad-libs near the end of the song.
Man In The Mirror - overdubbed with original studio vocals but contains some live ad-libs near the end of the song.
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Thread for this already here.

Source of the TII Vocals

I'm aware that most of the rehearsals don't use live vocals, some come from tours (Wanna Be Startin' Somethin' uses vocals from the Victory tour), others use demos (Billie Jean, Earth Song) and others are a mixture of live and demo vocals (Black Or White), but I'm not sure if the vocals in...
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Oof... I really don't think it's worth trying to catalog this. The whole movie is a masterclass of editing. It's a 2-hour deepfake. Every line is from a different origin, sometimes each word is from a different performance.
 
R1chard said:
Oof... I really don't think it's worth trying to catalog this. The whole movie is a masterclass of editing. It's a 2-hour deepfake. Every line is from a different origin, sometimes each word is from a different performance.
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How'd you know it was that deep?
 
R1chard said:
Oof... I really don't think it's worth trying to catalog this. The whole movie is a masterclass of editing. It's a 2-hour deepfake. Every line is from a different origin, sometimes each word is from a different performance.
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I'm interested do you know any particular examples were they dubbed just a line in a song?

I know there's demo's used (Billie Jean, Earth Song) and album vocals pitched down (TWYMMF) I know they also intercut different days together, like orange pants vocals to match grey suit day
 
analogue said:
That's the biggest mystery to me. Out of all the Beat It vocals they could have used why choose one from a Victory Tour performance? It would have made a lot more sense to use something from the Dangerous Tour.
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Easier to pitch an 80s show. Even MJ used it in 2001.
 
I’ve said this before, but I’m 100% convinced that parts of WBSS were taken from a 2009 studio recording MJ did with MP. The bridge especially sounds nothing like the rest of the rehearsal in terms of quality and delivery. I have no evidence of this, but it’s very clearly a recording.
 
AlwaysThere said:
I’ve said this before, but I’m 100% convinced that parts of WBSS were taken from a 2009 studio recording MJ did with MP. The bridge especially sounds nothing like the rest of the rehearsal in terms of quality and delivery. I have no evidence of this, but it’s very clearly a recording.
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Good observations mate

It's weird you should mention that, because I've always thought Mike's vocals on that bridge, sounds similar to his WBBS 08 vocals. His voice seems to sound More youthful at that point in particular

I wonder how much MP recorded for This Is It?
 
Themidwestcowboy said:
You’re now moving the goal post. Your request was to show a greatly sung live vocal from the mid 90’s onwards. This has been provided. Case closed.
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Cool, he had one decent vocal for about 3 min (in rehearsal with no pressure). If he was vocally good he would have sung live but he didn’t and when he did he mostly sounded crap. I can live with crap vocals in a concert but not with cheating and stealing hundreds of euros out of people’s pockets and that is what he did with his excessive miming. Michael’s live vocals consisted of nauseating screams and yelling “I love you” to the crowd 15 times per concert.

I agree that the case is closed, there is solid evidence Michael was not a good live singer during the 90s and when I go further up to his 2000’s studio vocals I can only conclude he turned mediocre in the studio as well.

I’m enjoying the 70s and 80s though so I’m not complaining too much (except for attending two of those poor HIStory concerts, luckily it wasn’t my money that went to his pockets).
 
dam2040 said:
you’re just a miserable troll.
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What‘s next? I’m not an MJ fan, right?
How sad would that be that I’d be spending so many hours discussing music of an artist I clearly love. The internet knows only black or white, criticism of Michael is not accepted.
 
SmoothCriminal1995 said:
Good observations mate

It's weird you should mention that, because I've always thought Mike's vocals on that bridge, sounds similar to his WBBS 08 vocals. His voice seems to sound More youthful at that point in particular

I wonder how much MP recorded for This Is It?
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I completely agree. He definitely sounds clearer and more deliberate in his phrasing than at any other point. It sounds fantastic.

He only mentioned WBSS and SIM, though he only said MJ recorded some of each before deciding to sing as much live as he could. I’d love to have more details though!
 
My guess

1. Wanna Be Startin Somethin - 100% live
2. Jam - Mix of overdubbed and live
3. They Don't Care About Us - Mostly overdubbed but there are live adlibs
4. Human Nature - 100% live
5. Smooth Criminal - First verse is overdubbed but then it's 100% live after that
6. The Way You Make Me Feel - Intro is 100% live and the rest is overdubbed
7. Jackson 5 Medley - 100% live
8. I Just Can't Stop Loving You - 100% live
9. Thriller - 100% overdubbed
10. Beat It - I'll give it the benefit of the doubt and say it was 100% live.
11. Black Or White - 100% live
12. Earth Song - 100% overdubbed
13. Billie Jean - Mix of overdubbed and live
14. Man In The Mirror - Mostly overdubbed with maybe some live vocals here and there.
 
threatened2020 said:
Can you explain please? I wasn't having a go
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MJ sang Beat It in a much lower pitch in the BWT & DWT, that's my main inspiration. He wanted it to sound more like the record but also be something he could still believeably reach. HIStory tour was just the original pitch more or less.
 
I can imagine it being used as background footage in some type of doc about the tour or behind the scenes material, it was gonna be used for something like that for sure
 
When they pushed back the shows , the press release stated that it was due to changes in the production. Wasn't it later revealed it was because they wanted to give Michael as long as possible to stop being dependent on medication and suffering from paranoia?

Also, considering how close they were to the first show, everything seemed pretty behind, still a ton of work to be done for the first show.
 
Blues_Away2023 said:
When they pushed back the shows , the press release stated that it was due to changes in the production. Wasn't it later revealed it was because they wanted to give Michael as long as possible to stop being dependent on medication and suffering from paranoia?

Also, considering how close they were to the first show, everything seemed pretty behind, still a ton of work to be done for the first show.
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Where'd your hear this?

I think the show would definitely have been delayed again. Stuff wasn't ready and that's probably why it was delayed in the first place.
 
SmoothGangsta said:
Where'd your hear this?

I think the show would definitely have been delayed again. Stuff wasn't ready and that's probably why it was delayed in the first place.
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I'm sure it came out in the Murray trial? I could be talking rubbish but there was defo something from the trial.

Might have been around the time Kenny Ortega was emailing Randy Phillips etc
 
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