Themidwestcowboy
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Is Thriller, the album, the first instance where MJ sung so high on the record that he couldn't, to the best of his ability, hit some of those notes live and had to resort to lowering the key on some of the songs?
I was watching some live footage starting from Destiny up til Dangerous and it dawned upon me that MJ never changed the key, except for the song he sung when he was a kid like ben and J5 medley obviously, early in his post Motown career. All the songs from Destiny and Triumph were performed in the key they were recorded in. Even the Off The Wall songs were performed in their original key. This all changed after Thriller. MJ lowered the key on the Victory tour for the first time for songs such as WBSS and Beat It. I'm not too sure about Billie Jean or Human Nature but he definitely lowered the key on the first songs i mentioned. This continues on the Bad Tour. Thriller is changed to a different key (I think a half step) and all Bad songs, save for Bad, TWYMMF and MITM, had their key lowered. Some songs like APOM and Dirty Diana had their key lowered even further.
On the Dangerous tour the keys for the Thriller songs were even further lowered. I think it's really interesting that we thriller tracks such as WBSS and Beat It performed in their original key for the first time on the Dangerous tour, 10 years after he recorded them! Other than that he didn't seem to lower the key for his dangerous songs, but I believe that is because he didn¨t sing them live and that the Dangerous track overall didn't require him to sing as high as he did on the Thriller and Bad albums.
I personally think that MJ really pushed himself and his voice during when recording albums especially during and after the recording of Thriller. Take into account the amount of dancing he was doing as well, I understand why he had to do it but I still find it interesting. One thing that has always fascinated me is the change in his voice from 86-89.
What do you guys think?
I was watching some live footage starting from Destiny up til Dangerous and it dawned upon me that MJ never changed the key, except for the song he sung when he was a kid like ben and J5 medley obviously, early in his post Motown career. All the songs from Destiny and Triumph were performed in the key they were recorded in. Even the Off The Wall songs were performed in their original key. This all changed after Thriller. MJ lowered the key on the Victory tour for the first time for songs such as WBSS and Beat It. I'm not too sure about Billie Jean or Human Nature but he definitely lowered the key on the first songs i mentioned. This continues on the Bad Tour. Thriller is changed to a different key (I think a half step) and all Bad songs, save for Bad, TWYMMF and MITM, had their key lowered. Some songs like APOM and Dirty Diana had their key lowered even further.
On the Dangerous tour the keys for the Thriller songs were even further lowered. I think it's really interesting that we thriller tracks such as WBSS and Beat It performed in their original key for the first time on the Dangerous tour, 10 years after he recorded them! Other than that he didn't seem to lower the key for his dangerous songs, but I believe that is because he didn¨t sing them live and that the Dangerous track overall didn't require him to sing as high as he did on the Thriller and Bad albums.
I personally think that MJ really pushed himself and his voice during when recording albums especially during and after the recording of Thriller. Take into account the amount of dancing he was doing as well, I understand why he had to do it but I still find it interesting. One thing that has always fascinated me is the change in his voice from 86-89.
What do you guys think?