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What made Invincible such an expensive album ?

Darth Sidious said:
Mj shouldve toned down his ego & made cheaper vids for promo. You dont need big budget to make good film, look at Terminator vs T3, T1 is creative guerilla filmmaking by genius director & T3 is expensive retread mess. Mj is creative genius and couldve made good vids without mega $$$$
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If MJ was so down to earth we would never have Thriller, Smooth Criminal, Bad, Remember The Time etc...
 
Darth Sidious said:
Mj shouldve toned down his ego & made cheaper vids for promo. You dont need big budget to make good film, look at Terminator vs T3, T1 is creative guerilla filmmaking by genius director & T3 is expensive retread mess. Mj is creative genius and couldve made good vids without mega $$$$
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Perfectionism is not necessarily ego.
 
Darth Sidious said:
T3 is expensive retread mess.
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I disagree. I love that movie. T1 & T2 are better but T3 is not bad at all. Just imagine if Arnold was few years younger. T4 was a retread mess. I hope T5 will be awesome again and judging by the trailer, it will. And Arnold is back!
 
Hess said:
MJ was a big spender. Everything had to be over the top. Best hotels, best studios, best producers - he wanted all the best to create the best. And that costs a lot of money.

Also how many times was Invincible delayed?

I actually think I read once that MJ wanted Invincible to be the first album released in the new millenium, so he planned to release it 00:01 on january 1st 2000. (first it was planned earlier of course, but when delayed I read this was the plan) - Then it was pushed back again and again. And as time went, more money went into the record, producers standing by, record studios, hotels etc. etc. Many people involved was paid for longer time and so on.

When it came to his art MJ spared no expense.
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Maybe they were on purpose building up more and more anticipation for that release.
 
I just friggin wished he did a video for BUTTERFLIES.
It was a legit hit in the states with NO video, and a video would have made that soar even more.

Michel Gondry (one of the best music video directors ever!) wanted to do the video for that song sooo badly.

From an old interview:

While Gondry has worked with plenty of A-listers, there is one star who
keeps alluding him: Michael Jackson. “‘Butterflies,’ I think, is one of
[Jackson's] best songs ever, and I’ve asked millions of times to do a
video for him [for that song],” the director said. “I’ve even said I’d
do it for free, and I get no response.”

My top 5 directors for short films I would have loved MJ to collaborate with would have been:
Michel Gondry
Spike Jonze
Chris Cunningham
Hype Williams
The Saline Project
 
OnirMJ said:
I disagree. I love that movie. T1 & T2 are better but T3 is not bad at all. Just imagine if Arnold was few years younger. T4 was a retread mess. I hope T5 will be awesome again and judging by the trailer, it will. And Arnold is back!
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Man T3 is an abomination to the franchise. Even T4 made more sense. Do you think the new movie genesys will be any good?
 
Themidwestcowboy said:
Man T3 is an abomination to the franchise. Even T4 made more sense.
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I strongly disagree. It's not a classic like T1 & T2. Too bad that James Cameron and Edward Furlong weren't involved, but it is a good movie, definitely not "abomination to the franchise" in any way.

T4 didn't make any sense to me. It was more like Mad Max than Terminator movie. And what's with Marcus character? Cyborg with a heart? Come on!

Themidwestcowboy said:
Do you think the new movie genesys will be any good?
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Judging by the trailer and early reviews by people who read the script, absolutely. Old Arnold is going to fight young Arnold from the first movie in what is described as an epic scene, even better that the fight between Arnold and T1000 in T2. Also the story that they come up with (suggested by James Cameron himself) is brilliant.
 
OnirMJ said:
I disagree. I love that movie. T1 & T2 are better but T3 is not bad at all. Just imagine if Arnold was few years younger. T4 was a retread mess. I hope T5 will be awesome again and judging by the trailer, it will. And Arnold is back!
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Themidwestcowboy said:
Man T3 is an abomination to the franchise. Even T4 made more sense. Do you think the new movie genesys will be any good?
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OnirMJ said:
I strongly disagree. It's not a classic like T1 & T2. Too bad that James Cameron and Edward Furlong weren't involved, but it is a good movie, definitely not "abomination to the franchise" in any way.

T4 didn't make any sense to me. It was more like Mad Max than Terminator movie. And what's with Marcus character? Cyborg with a heart? Come on!



Judging by the trailer and early reviews by people who read the script, absolutely. Old Arnold is going to fight young Arnold from the first movie in what is described as an epic scene, even better that the fight between Arnold and T1000 in T2. Also the story that they come up with (suggested by James Cameron himself) is brilliant.
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"I'll be back" when this thread's back on topic.
 
Does anyone else think there would have been an invincible tour if it wasent for the court case.
 
^^ The trial was in 2005, four years after Invincible was released.
 
Mike was planning an Invincible tour in 2002, but it was postponed after 9/11 and eventually canceled when promotion for Invincible fell through, due to the behind the scenes MJ verses Sony debacle, not sure how developed it was but Michael Prince was involved.

Mike wanted tracks like Unbreakable & Threatened as singles with ideas for short films, which Sony wouldn't support. I would imagine those short films & singles would have been performed as part of the tour, but when they didn't happen, a large part of what MJ was possibly planning & dreaming up fell by the wayside.

Sony wasn't playing ball & MJ wasn't playing ball. I don't think Sony would have funded the tour either, since they lost all interest in promoting the album, which essentially is what the tour is, a promotion. If they weren't going to provide a budget for a 20+ minute Unbreakable short film, they sure as hell weren't going to indulge him in a state of the art live production.
 
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kevin_1990 said:
was he not accused in 2003 ?
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Yeah, he offered himself up in November 2003 for questioning, but 2 years had past since Invincible & was already working on One More Chance. Sony also refused to release a physical single of What More Can I Give which upset MJ even more, they also did petty little things like block the Jay Z remix of YRMW. I think Mike for his part went too far also with his public attack of Mottola. Truth be told, Invincible was doomed after YRMW, the first single.

So a tour was out of the question, when they couldn't even agree on the singles & direction of the album, not to mention their complete lack of promotion & unwillingness to support Mikes vision.
 
kevin_1990 said:
was he not accused in 2003 ?
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Accused in 03, taken to court in 05.

I think that Sony wouldn't go with those videos because they simply were already over budget on this. They mustn't have had major faityh in the album either if they didn't want to take the financial risk. The internet was already seriously damaging music sales, so putting lots and lots of money into a single was not as likely to pay off as it would have in the 80's to mid 90's.

I genuinely feel that Michael just wanted to be over with Invincible. He didn't do a tour and even with This Is It we only hear 2 lines of Speechless and an instrumental cameo for Threatened. YRMW may have been performed because it was a popular single. I just don't think it stood out to Michael as his greatest work or nothing on this planet would have stopped him from making sure the world had heard it. Everything about this album seems to go against his earlier work, aside from the debut of YRMW. No Tour, only 2 singles, no live performances of ANY of the songs at award shows/tv shows, giving up after only 2 singles after working on it since HIStory.

Too much money was spent on the lacklustre (to me) production of this album which hurt the marketing and promotion for the album. Hiring out loads of studios, and paying for Jerkins to be exclusive (which back fired for me because the songs all sound tied to 00/01 now to me, an era I loathe).

I love Invincible, but as an MJ fan but it cost way more than it should have with the outcome we were presented with and at the end of the day it backfired and hurt the album because what it cost will always be compared to what it sold, and we only saw 2 singles. I like to hope that Michael learned a lesson from this album and would not have repeated these mistakes had he released another album.

Invincible sounds like there was more money involved than creativity, aside from a couple of songs.
 
Hmm, food for thought there. MJ also announced this would be his last album with Sony, which must have pissed them off no end. It cost the price of a small country to produce. Also the fact that Mike had the ATV Catalog possibly made some of the Sony suits resentful? But even with all my reasoning, it's his weakest album, which kills me a little because of tracks like Unbreakable, Heartbreaker, Break Of Dawn, YRMW, Butterflies, Speechless, Whatever Happens & Threatened are up there for me as some of his best material, then of course there's the tacks that weren't used, which also include some sure hits. The whole era/campaign was doomed!
 
kevin_1990 said:
Does anyone else think there would have been an invincible tour if it wasent for the court case.
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Court case has nothing to do with it. I think that if Sony didn't cancel the promotion of the album that there would be some kind of a tour.
 
No, you're all wrong. Wrong wrong wrong. Invincible was a fine album.

I don't think MJ's lack of promo had anything to do with a lack of faith in the material on his part. You only have to watch his fairly ropey (by MJ standards) performance at MSG or the 101-ways-to-hide-my-face YRMW video to see why he didn't promote the album more. He was clearly desperately self-conscious during this period of his career, covering his face excessively and appearing doped up to the eyeballs at times.

I think this was the main reason MJ refused to make a video for Cry and why ultimately MJ showed little interest in promoting the album.

Even just a year later, he was looking much healthier, his smile was coming back (it didn't look right in 2001) and he appeared in much better spirits. Compare any of the 2001 appearances to MJ accepting his Billboard award from 2002 live via satellite at Neverland. He looked so much better and it's only a year on from Invincible's release. I think 2001 was literally the worst possible time for Michael to release new music, as he just wasn't looking or acting healthy at the time. None of us know exactly what happened in 2001, but he'd changed drastically (both physically and in his mood) from the year before. Look at him at the Elizabeth Taylor gala at the Royal Albert Hall, only one year before Invincible. He looked a million dollars. Fast forward one year and it was a completely different story.
 
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innuendo141 said:
No Tour, only 2 singles, no live performances of ANY of the songs at award shows/tv shows, giving up after only 2 singles after working on it since HIStory.
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And nothing you mentioned here is MJ's fault. So I don't get what's your point here?
 
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aazzaabb said:
Hmm, food for thought there. MJ also announced this would be his last album with Sony, which must have pissed them off no end.
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Yes, that is the reason why they stopped the promotion.
 
MattyJam said:
No, you're all wrong. Wrong wrong wrong. Invincible was a fine album.

I don't think MJ's lack of promo had anything to do with a lack of faith in the material on his part. You only have to watch his fairly ropey (by MJ standards) performance at MSG or the 101-ways-to-hide-my-face YRMW video to see why he didn't promote the album more. He was clearly desperately self-conscious during this period of his career, covering his face excessively and appearing doped up to the eyeballs at times.


I think this was the main reason MJ refused to make a video for Cry and why ultimately MJ showed little interest in promoting the album.
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Most absurd post I ever read.
 
OnirMJ said:
And nothing you mentioned here is not MJ's fault. So I don't get what's your point here?
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your double negative confuses me here so I dont know what way you are coming at my point.

My my point was plain and simple that every side was to blame and you can't blame Sony not putting more money towards promo because of how ridiculously expensive this album was to make.
 
MattyJam said:
No, you're all wrong. Wrong wrong wrong. Invincible was a fine album.

I don't think MJ's lack of promo had anything to do with a lack of faith in the material on his part. You only have to watch his fairly ropey (by MJ standards) performance at MSG or the 101-ways-to-hide-my-face YRMW video to see why he didn't promote the album more. He was clearly desperately self-conscious during this period of his career, covering his face excessively and appearing doped up to the eyeballs at times.


I think this was the main reason MJ refused to make a video for Cry and why ultimately MJ showed little interest in promoting the album.


Even just a year later, he was looking much healthier, his smile was coming back (it didn't look right in 2001) and he appeared in much better spirits. Compare any of the 2001 appearances to MJ accepting his Billboard award from 2002 live via satellite at Neverland. He looked so much better and it's only a year on from Invincible's release. I think 2001 was literally the worst possible time for Michael to release new music, as he just wasn't looking or acting healthy at the time. None of us know exactly what happened in 2001, but he'd changed drastically (both physically and in his mood) from the year before. Look at him at the Elizabeth Taylor gala at the Royal Albert Hall, only one year before Invincible:
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He looked a million dollars. Fast forward one year and it was a completely different story.
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when i watched david gest life of an icon the other day again he did say at the 2001 30th anniversary concer michael was taken ages to turn up so they went to his hotel and he was sleeping and spike lee said he looked really doped up and seemed like he was trying to get out of doing the concert.
 
kevin_1990 said:
when i watched spike lee's life of an icon the other day again he did say at the 2001 30th anniversary concer michael was taken ages to turn up so they went to his hotel and he was sleeping and spike lee said he looked really doped up and seemed like he was trying to get out of doing the concert.
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David Gest, Spike didn't even star in the movie.. come on dude. And the guy who said Michael was on demerol, i think it was Frank Cascio.. not sure but he was a baldy...
 
Zakk said:
David Gest, Spike didn't even star in the movie.. come on dude. And the guy who said Michael was on demerol, i think it was Frank Cascio.. not sure but he was a baldy...
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is it david gest sorry i thought his name was spike lee my mistake
 
innuendo141 said:
your double negative confuses me here so I dont know what way you are coming at my point.

My my point was plain and simple that every side was to blame and you can't blame Sony not putting more money towards promo because of how ridiculously expensive this album was to make.
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My mistake, I meant "nothing you mentioned here is MJ's fault". I agree that both sides are to be blamed. But nothing you mentioned is MJ's fault. MJ's fault is that he spent too much money, kept delaying the album for 2 years, tracklist could have been much stronger judging by what we've heard from those sessions, allegedly said to Sony that he will not go on tour to promote the album. Everything else is Sony's fault. MJ wanted to do Unbreakable, they went with YRMW, then MJ wanted Unbreakable, they went with Cry in spite of MJ's refusal to promote the song. By this point it was all over. They saw the album is not performing as they expected, MJ said he doesn't want to go on tour so they stopped investing in more promotion (they refused to give him money for short films and all singles were cancelled).

But even earlier, when the album was not out yet, MJ saw Sony's promotion plan for Invincible. He was not satisfied with promotion budget. So he took all of his masters and threatened that he'll not release the album at all. He hide all masters in Teddy Riley's studio. Mottola was super pissed. MJ finally gave him the masters but said this will be his last album with Sony and that he will be leaving the label - that was MJ's biggest mistake, you can't say that to a record company executive. He could kept that for himself and tell them later when the promotion is over. So even before the album was released there were behind the scenes schemes. The album was doomed before it even came out.

So I'll say it's 20% MJ's fault and 80% Sony's fault.
 
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