Me too, probably the track I have been replaying the most thus far. It's just got the kind of groove that makes me want to hit rewind as soon as the track is over. That's just something which is basically impossible to replicate when you change the rhythms and hooks that the vocals were sang too, no matter how good those new ones are. Maybe it's because I'm very into jazz and funk where this is especially stressed, but the interplay between all the different instruments in a song is what I find really magical. When those different elements click, they become more than the sum of their parts and the song really takes on a different dimension. It's hard to put into words, it's really a feeling you get when listening to the music. The last minute-and-a-half of Speed Demon is another prime example of this for me. That's the funk.
I think Michael was an absolute genius at molding his vocals around the different rhythms and counterrhythms produced by the other instruments in a song. His timing just seemed naturally great (and I'm sure soaking up everything James Brown at such a young age didn't harm either!). Listen for example to his "o-hoo-oo" in the intro of the demo (e.g. at .37 seconds). It just follows perfectly after that little synth hook. His "hoo!"'s shortly after perfectly punctuate those short notes that are being played at that moment. The stacatto delivery of the verses works well with this drum pattern and the synths in the background, while it could easily sound a little forced/slowing over a different rhythm (it does imo in all remixes of this song). And him accenting the word "slave" in the choruses coupled with the drums being accented by a cymbal hit, gives it that extra oomph. That gritty ad-lib just as the song starts to fade out a 4.28 is just another example of all of the above.
These might seem like small things, but for me it is exactly these minutiae that gives a song that special feeling when it works - much more so than the production.
