Where Invincible went wrong

I dont understand your "aged out of Top40" argument. It just seems to be opinion only. You can always find stats the verify someone's opinion. Kylie Minogue is now 55 years old and she has a top 40 hit in Padam Padam in the US, UK and Australian charts
Are you sure about that because I'm looking at the Billboard Hot 100 right now and there is nothing by Kylie Minogue on it. Kylie was never really a big thing in the USA anyway, she just has 3 or 4 big hits.
 
The only listing I see in Billboard for the Kylie song is on the dance chart, which has nothing to do with radio airplay. It tracks what songs are popular in clubs. Club songs don't generally get played on the radio, especially if they're like techno music.
 
Stranger in Moscow - fantastic song, but wasn't a hit,
It was though. Perhaps it could be described as a modest hit by Michael's standards. Its US performance was crap and its performance in the year-end charts was crap but that's not the whole story, of course. Top 10 in ten countries? Sounds OK to me.

SIM - No.1 in Spain, Italy, the Czech Republic / No. 4 in the UK / Top Ten in Hungary, Denmark, Taiwan, New Zealand, Switzerland, Australia / Top 20 in Finland, Ireland, France / Top 30 in various countries.
 
Do you think Justin Timberlakes Rock Your Body and Like I Love You would have been better for Michaels comeback than YRMW?
 
I'd guess that if Mike released that track, then that might have prevented the Janet & Justin Superbowl fallout from happening. But that hurt Janet's career more than Justin's.
 
I'd guess that if Mike released that track, then that might have prevented the Janet & Justin Superbowl fallout from happening. But that hurt Janet's career more than Justin's.
Well, yeah, if Janet isn't exposed on live tv, then they wouldn't really have any reason to go on the warpath against her. Not that they ever did really have a reason. But I can't say there be a sum consequence of nothing for exposing yourself on TV.... Just overblown though. It's complicated.

But more importantly,

That means Janet and MJ together at the superbowl mayhaps. Assuming Timbaland still calls up Janet, since she was on JTS album. Except Timbaland... wouldn't be in MJs record.

Actually, it would probably still happen. Or at least something wild and somewhat raunchy.

But I rather daydream about MJ being the guest at Janet's show.
They come together to perform his new song, then they launch into Scream to close out. It's his...


Nah, never mind. None of this really tracks. You're seeing a drafted comment play out in real time.
 
Too many cooks in the kitchen (songwriters/producers)
Too many ballads
Mike's heart didn't seem to be in to it. (Just a feeling I have when I listen to it)

I think that's where Invincible ''went wrong''
 
It was though. Perhaps it could be described as a modest hit by Michael's standards. Its US performance was crap and its performance in the year-end charts was crap but that's not the whole story, of course. Top 10 in ten countries? Sounds OK to me.

SIM - No.1 in Spain, Italy, the Czech Republic / No. 4 in the UK / Top Ten in Hungary, Denmark, Taiwan, New Zealand, Switzerland, Australia / Top 20 in Finland, Ireland, France / Top 30 in various countries.
Charts outside uk and us don’t matter.
 
Cry wasn't used as a 9/11 song. Missed opportunity.
Cry wasn't even released in the US.
Another reason, why Invincible didn't sell.
 
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I really wish Mike hadn't have given away People Of The World and finished the demo.
That melody is so beautiful and memorable. That song has more depth and sincerity than most of Invincible if I'm honest. It would have been a spiritual successor to Heal The World

The lyrics that are there are wonderful too
"Life should be harmony, in this world of self destruction
Nations lift your voices and sing"
 
I really wish Mike hadn't have given away People Of The World and finished the demo.
That melody is so beautiful and memorable. That song has more depth and sincerity than most of Invincible if I'm honest. It would have been a spiritual successor to Heal The World

The lyrics that are there are wonderful too
"Life should be harmony, in this world of self destruction
Nations lift your voices and sing"
He could have released an English version, or at least recorded it.
 
US Charts barely matter either tbh.
The charts in themselves might not matter that much in the long run (because there are a lot of mostly forgotten hits, even #1s), but the US music market does. Many of the acts that are remembered the most were popular it in the USA. The Beatles, Rolling Stones, & Led Zeppelin are more remembered than The Dave Clark 5, who weren't that popular in the US. Or at least they are still promoted & written about the most. They also generally made music that originated in the USA (blues, R&B, rock, jazz). The US has a bigger market than a lot of other countries, that's why all of those British acts tried to make it here. Gold & platinum in the US and in other countries are different amounts, which are mostly a lower number outside of the USA.
 
Samual Hoskins:
I'm one of the co writers of this song [Shout]. The reason this amazing song didn't make the invincible album was the politics with the different producers and the bad blood that formed between MJ and Tommy Motola. We had very high hopes and felt this song was a huge hit but unfortunately things just didn't work out the way we hoped for. There were also inner circle beef. So bad blood, inner fights and producers who's name I'll leave out was hating cause this song would've outshined alot of songs that were planned to come out. So there you have it, the Why.
 
There's at least one song everyone likes from this album. It varies from person to person, but nobody dislikes every song on here. That's really all you can ask for, MJ just got people used to liking every song on the record.

It's time to just move on already. The next generation already has.
 
Samual Hoskins:
I'm one of the co writers of this song [Shout]. The reason this amazing song didn't make the invincible album was the politics with the different producers and the bad blood that formed between MJ and Tommy Motola. We had very high hopes and felt this song was a huge hit but unfortunately things just didn't work out the way we hoped for. There were also inner circle beef. So bad blood, inner fights and producers who's name I'll leave out was hating cause this song would've outshined alot of songs that were planned to come out. So there you have it, the Why.
They should rerelease Shout on a new album with a mix that highlights the vocals. Back in 2001 when I heard it on the Cry single, I liked it. I liked the message, the aggression and how unusual it sounded. Shout is Invincibles real rock song.
I wonder if Jerkins was one of the producers who were against Shout.
And Shout is still relevant today:
A war is taking place, no substitution for restitution
The only solution for peace is increasing the height of your spirituality
 
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Samual Hoskins:
I'm one of the co writers of this song [Shout]. The reason this amazing song didn't make the invincible album was the politics with the different producers and the bad blood that formed between MJ and Tommy Motola. We had very high hopes and felt this song was a huge hit but unfortunately things just didn't work out the way we hoped for. There were also inner circle beef. So bad blood, inner fights and producers who's name I'll leave out was hating cause this song would've outshined alot of songs that were planned to come out. So there you have it, the Why.

Doesn't really explain why that particular song was targeted and seems a bit far fetched. So other producers didn't like it because it was too good and Tommy didnt want it on the album because it was a potential hit? I kind of don't buy it. I am not sure that the song is so fantastic. I can kind of imagine it getting off the ground with a good film clip and if you could actually hear some of what he's saying in the verses. But the reasoning here misses the mark a little for me. Basically "song didn't make it because it was too good and everyone was jealous". it doesn't really stack up.
 
Doesn't really explain why that particular song was targeted and seems a bit far fetched. So other producers didn't like it because it was too good and Tommy didnt want it on the album because it was a potential hit? I kind of don't buy it. I am not sure that the song is so fantastic. I can kind of imagine it getting off the ground with a good film clip and if you could actually hear some of what he's saying in the verses. But the reasoning here misses the mark a little for me. Basically "song didn't make it because it was too good and everyone was jealous". it doesn't really stack up.
Shout could have been one of the good songs, that didn't make Invincible, like Jerkins said:
“Michael is like no other. He records hundreds… really, hundreds of songs for an album. So what we did [was] we cut it down to 35 of the best tracks and picked from there. [It’s] not always about picking the hottest tracks. It’s got to have flow. So there’s a good album’s worth of [unreleased] material that could blow your mind. I really hope this stuff comes out because it’s some of his best.”
 
Is anyone else getting sick and tired of Invincible chat and all the ridiculous excuses as to why it didn't perform well?

The album was just not good enough.

There's a poster who is obsessed with the album and keeps bringing up threads or creating new ones about it.

Let it go!! 😴
 
Is anyone else getting sick and tired of Invincible chat and all the ridiculous excuses as to why it didn't perform well?

The album was just not good enough.
Tired of too many ballads.
they're like anaesthetics
 
Is anyone else getting sick and tired of Invincible chat and all the ridiculous excuses as to why it didn't perform well?
Sony didn't promote Invincible during commercials of the MSG 2001 TV Special.
That's evidence how Sony sabotaged Invincible.
 
Is anyone else getting sick and tired of Invincible chat and all the ridiculous excuses as to why it didn't perform well?

The album was just not good enough.

There's a poster who is obsessed with the album and keeps bringing up threads or creating new ones about it.

Let it go!! 😴

Invincible isn't a great album, I'll agree. But its performance isn't solely based on its quality, or lackthereof.

1) Promotion. By any reasonable standards Sony purposely underpromoted the album - Butterflies was blowing up on radio play alone and yet they decided not to officially release it. It doesnt really get more obvious than that.
2) Choice of singles. Michael did not get his usual input in singles or their film clips
3) Song choice. If we are to believe there are great songs in the vault, clearly Invincible doesn't contain too many
4) Michael himself. Michael's image was tarnished and he seemed to jump from one scandal to another. He also physically looked drugged most of the time, and image is incredibly important in marketing.

For me, Invincible sold about half of what it could have, but that doesn't make it a great album. it just means it had enough redeemable qualities that could have been marketed to make it a small success rather than the flop that is largely remembered as.

I recall a lot of the big hit R&B albums of the time - Usher's 8701, Justin Timberlake Justified, Sisqo's album, TQ, for instance - and all of those albums had their share of filler, but they knew what their hits were and they pushed them. Invincible didn't seem to be about anything and clearly they didn't know what their best songs were when promoting the album. Maybe because a lot of it is middle-of-the-road and forgettable but I think any Invincible album campaign that doesn't release Whatever Happens is out of its mind.


Shout could have been one of the good songs, that didn't make Invincible, like Jerkins said:
“Michael is like no other. He records hundreds… really, hundreds of songs for an album. So what we did [was] we cut it down to 35 of the best tracks and picked from there. [It’s] not always about picking the hottest tracks. It’s got to have flow. So there’s a good album’s worth of [unreleased] material that could blow your mind. I really hope this stuff comes out because it’s some of his best.”

I think we like to believe that there is another Thriller hidden in the vault but evidence suggests that isn't so. If it were, why were we getting fake tracks on the very first posthumous release, and why are we getting entirely incomplete tracks like Hollywood Tonight?

There's an illusion or myth about the amount Michael recorded and what quality it was at but we're really yet to see anything that suggests that.
 
Sony didn't promote Invincible during commercials of the MSG 2001 TV Special.
That's evidence how Sony sabotaged Invincible.
See I think the whole promotional sabotage is just an excuse.

I see no reason why the record company would want to sabotage it's own artist to this extent, especially MJ - they spent millions on it.

If the artist themselves is being extremely difficult to work with and their demands unreasonable, I think the record label were right to put a halt on things.

This is Michael Jackson after all, if he wanted to make multiple videos and release them and go on tour - he had the power to do so.

It's a poor album, there was Invincible promotion, heck I remember seeing massive billboards everywhere about it , MJ himself did that album signing. It never sold well because MJ was passed it and the songs of a lesser quality.
 
For the same reason it's always done in the music industry: you rely on outside writers when you don't have good material of your own, or when your material isn't commercial enough, and you add in fake credits to make money off publishing.
So you can lie about credits ? Did not know that.
 
Reading the article now, and I can see that Michael's initial criticism of Rodney Jerkins was that much of his stuff sounded like everything else. I still come to that same conclusion when listening to the Invincible album. I think time proved Michael's initial intuition to be correct. A lot of it is overproduced to the point of being unrecognizable as music, especially the "dance tracks", where by comparison an outtake like Xscape still holds up really well - a completely missed assignment not releasing that song on the album.

It's interesting reading the strive for greatness Michael apparently embodied and yet the album is just so ... average really. I just can't imagine the Michael Jackson I know listening to it and thinking it was a record worthy to stand among the greats he'd recorded before.

Michael was apparently pushing Rodney to capture sounds from the world around him, completely relearn how to make music, bash on things, whaever the case might be. I cant hear the result of any of that on Invincible. Just some incredibly stilted dance tracks....
 
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