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Let's end the confusion about MJ's unreleased tracks here

So was L.A. Reid correct when he said MJ did want to put a song out when he sang multiple takes of a song? Considering how many of his sketches were bare. And yet most of the songs he sang top to bottom were provided by others.
 
MJs creative process does line up with that though. To a degree. It's more like, once MJ sang the song top to bottom, it was basically done.

It's just interesting what he did choose to sing one time (Black or White), multiple times (STTR), re-sing (The Toy/Best of Joy, I Am/I Was The Loser ), halfway (Hollywood Tonight), as a sketch (LNFSG), or never (Water, Adore You, Shut Up and Dance).
 
In all fairness, STTR was not written by MJ, so it unusual to try out what works best.

MJ himself said he had some songs in his head already in a complete state before he laid anything to tape. So he knew exactly what to do in those cases.
 
Fuzball said:
In all fairness, STTR was not written by MJ, so it unusual to try out what works best.

MJ himself said he had some songs in his head already in a complete state before he laid anything to tape. So he knew exactly what to do in those cases.
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That's a good point. Though lots of good written songs ended up not making it to him in time to be sung.

But yeah, MJ figured it out in time always
 
Mister_Jay_Tee said:
But yeah, MJ figured it out in time always
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This old tweet of Bottrell gives an idea of how MJs brain was ticking.

I worked on Earth Song for a year.
M. had a lot of songs to work on
E.S. started to languish
I got my friends Steve Ferrone and Guy Pratt to play drums and bass
From then, M. seemed concerned but couldn't describe
Still he sang it, got Andre Crouch and I got George del Barrio for strings.
M. got David Paiche for more keyboards.
M. was still concerned.
I mixed it anyway as the album was wrapping up
M. never got used to something about the direction: too heavy?
It didn't make the album
Later, History sessions, M hired Foster
Worked and worked and by now M. was getting used to my version, Foster expressed his frustration to me at the grammys
My version and mix came out on History with only new vocals in the outro
Legal contract for Foster said he got first credit.
These things happen all the time.

That production, that song, was unique
In that M. was a bit skeptical of the path I took
But didn't stop me. And he didn't release it
Until he was ok with it.
I am so proud of that song and of Michael's wisdom.

Way back in 1986 at Hayvenhurst he and I sat and he screened me "The Emerald Forest" in his theater.
He handed me a vhs tape of it to take home.
He was, even then, choosing me to work on "Earth Song".
I took that mission seriously, and so it was hard when he couldn't quite accept the best version, 4 years later, that we two could come up with together.
And then it didn't matter.

Sometime, as we were no longer working together, he found it as it was, and received it, and released it.
I am grateful for M's patience on this.

David Foster never had a chance against such History.
 
Fuzball said:
This old tweet of Bottrell gives an idea of how MJs brain was ticking.

Later, History sessions, M hired Foster
Worked and worked and by now M. was getting used to my version, Foster expressed his frustration to me at the grammys
My version and mix came out on History with only new vocals in the outro
Legal contract for Foster said he got first credit.
These things happen all the time.
Click to expand...
This stuff is very interesting - I always wondered what Foster's actual contributions to the song were, given how it's pretty much the same as the Dangerous sessions version.

So, this seems to suggest there is another version (or versions) of the track.
 
JohnC said:
This stuff is very interesting - I always wondered what Foster's actual contributions to the song were, given how it's pretty much the same as the Dangerous sessions version.

So, this seems to suggest there is another version (or versions) of the track.
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Sounds to me like the Dangerous Era Version was basically the final version.
 
JohnC said:
This stuff is very interesting - I always wondered what Foster's actual contributions to the song were, given how it's pretty much the same as the Dangerous sessions version.
Click to expand...
another ES tweet posted recently by Bill:

I've written much about Earth Song on this platform.
I won't repeat it here. But the vocal in the outro was falsetto, kind of Marvin Gaye style. There were missing words, etc.
David Foster recorded new vocals for the outro and that went on History.
 
Fuzball said:
another ES tweet posted recently by Bill:

I've written much about Earth Song on this platform.
I won't repeat it here. But the vocal in the outro was falsetto, kind of Marvin Gaye style. There were missing words, etc.
David Foster recorded new vocals for the outro and that went on History.
Click to expand...
That's the demo we have, right?
 
Fuzball said:
another ES tweet posted recently by Bill:

I've written much about Earth Song on this platform.
I won't repeat it here. But the vocal in the outro was falsetto, kind of Marvin Gaye style. There were missing words, etc.
David Foster recorded new vocals for the outro and that went on History.
Click to expand...
Agonum said:
It didn’t yet have those oh so powerful ad libs.
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Fuzball said:
Yep, already confirmed by Bruce. ES (if CT not counted) is the only song on History that wasn't recorded from scratch. Basically just the LV for the ending part was rerecorded.
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dam2040 said:
That's the demo we have, right?
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Yeah, so we figured it out. Glad we ended the confusion about MJ's unreleased track, here!
 
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