Dangerous1991
Proud Member
I don’t post too often on MJJ, I don’t post much since Michael was with us, it’s not that my loyalty level has decreased, or my interest in the man himself, it’s just that as 99.9% of you will understand, it just ISN’T the same without Michael.
I wanted to just post something to bring us all a little bit closer regarding the whole XSCAPE experience.
I am on the boards regularly, browsing and occasionally posting, but in the past week, it seems like we are failing to ENJOY what Michael left us.
Let’s take ourselves back to 2010’s ‘Michael’ album, which we were ALL desperate to hear what MJ had been working on, and also songs from the vault, it was never going to be the same as having the man here himself, but we wanted to hear it – the album was somewhat rushed, then came the controversy, the promotion (or complete lack of) the Cascio saga, the videos, the production, the cheesy “Billie Jean” adaptation of Hollywood Tonight, all in all, I think we can all admit that this was not a Michael album, there were/are some decent stuff on it, but its wasn’t what we needed and failed to fill the void left by Michaels passing, we weren’t afraid to show our disappointment, either on here, or directly to Michael’s estate and/or the record label in some cases.
What we have had over the years is the luxury of hearing Michael’s demo’s and unreleased tracks and so on, from Cheater to Slave To The Rhythm, from We’ve Had Enough to Monkey Business and Serious Effect, a luxury that, in my opinion, has come back to bite us on the a*re in some cases, especially with A Place With No Name, to which I will come too –
In my opinion, from what I have seen so far from XSCAPE, is that EVERYONE involved, was, or did try pull in the right direction to get something that Michael would have been proud of and something that us, as fans would be proud to call a Michael Jackson song or album. Now I know it will never be the same, it’s impossible, Michael isn’t here and nothing will recapture to magic of self promotion and so on, so we have to learn that things will always be different, and what can sometimes seem what is complete lack of promotion, is just what it can be like when an artist is no longer with us. I am from Kent/London and I haven’t seen a great magnitude of promotion if I am completely honest, BUT what I can see is a huge difference to 2010’s ‘Michael’ in terms of confidence, which tells me a lot, it seems like the Estate and the label have more confidence on XSCAPE being a success, which to me shows they have put more into it.
I like many others, I have heard ‘Love Never Felt So Good’ both versions, and about 2.30 of ‘Chicago’ (wow) and I have restrained myself to listening to ‘Slave To The Rhythm’, ‘ A Place With No Name’, ‘Loving You’ and any of the new leaks/streams as I really want to get the full experience Monday  (of course I have heard the demo’s etc from years gone by) - BUT I have been scouring the threads each time a track is streamed from Sony, and watching peoples reviews, and that is what this about really –
First of all before anyone says this, YES, I am completely aware that this is a forum and that means it is full of opinions, whether they are positive or negative, but what I have noticed is that it’s OK not to like a song, and on the other hand, its fine for someone to like a song that someone else doesn’t, its music and that’s what it does, if everyone liked the same the world would be a boring place – but the manner in which some people are displaying the negativity is not good, not good for the fan community. Briefly back to the demo’s, if we had never heard the demo of ‘APWNN’ a few months back then I would almost guarantee that half of the negative comments on it would be changed to positive on hearing something new and exciting from Michael Jackson (even though I haven’t heard it), Im just using an example, where we have previously been spoilt with leaked tracks etc we feel we have to criticise anything different on this album, who’s to say Michael would have kept the song the same, after all, Michael’s demo’s to final versions of songs have changed dramatically through the years – I love the original of APWNN, and I may or may not like the new version, but who cares, we STILL have the demo and we are getting it on this album! We literally as a fan community wanted Blue Gangster, APWNN, DYKWYCA, STTR, Xscape all on albums in the future and the fact of reality is that we are getting them all on the same album has worn off on some people, people are starting to knit pick, I have read people BLAMING producers “Stargate messed this whole album up”, “Timbaland ruined Xscape” etc and I think its damn right crazy considering they are ALL doing this without Michael’s expertise or finishing touch, it will never be the same.
For example, as much as I like 2000 Watts it is an MJ tune that has split reviews, IF they put this on the album and Michael never put it on Invincible, lots and lots of people would be saying “This isn’t a Michael track etc” sometimes different is good, especially when we get the originals still.
When the album was in the works we said we wanted an album of “Newish’ updated MJ, we got that with pretty much the entire album, we said we wanted upbeat tracks that make you want to dance and groove with typical Michael sounds, we have got that on the album, we said we wanted the original versions of the the reworks (I don’t like the term remix, I think of a remix as a finished version that has been adapted) and we got that, we got 8 tracks of NEW versions and 8 of how Michael left them, something we were kicking and screaming for after the ‘Michael’ album. We got undoubtedly one of the most sought after producers in the industry to work on it in Timbaland, I like Timbaland, he may not be every ones cup of tea, but I think it’s a slight upgrade on Cascio wouldn’t you say? lol
This isn’t a rant or a dig at anyone, it’s just for some people to take a step back, take a deep breath in, and realise this is pretty much what we asked for, what we wanted, and you are not going to like every track on XSCAPE or every track on any album that they continue to bring out.
Like I say, I understand that everyone has an opinion and I don’t expect everyone to like everything (myself included) but when we start getting our knickers in a twist over a 30 second piece of production on a Michael Jackson track that has been reworked, just think about what could have been. We could have been experiencing ‘Michael’ 2 - I also realise that we are all excited about it and the positivity is outweighing the negative comments and its not a personal post to anyone - Just to apprecite what we are getting when we think its not good enough
I for one will be completely behind the album like many, many others and will and just enjoy the piece of music presented too us, new and old, that Michael has left us and what the new producers have done for us – Lets all get behind XSCAPE, with our backing I really think this could be a successful Michael album.
L.O.V.E
I wanted to just post something to bring us all a little bit closer regarding the whole XSCAPE experience.
I am on the boards regularly, browsing and occasionally posting, but in the past week, it seems like we are failing to ENJOY what Michael left us.
Let’s take ourselves back to 2010’s ‘Michael’ album, which we were ALL desperate to hear what MJ had been working on, and also songs from the vault, it was never going to be the same as having the man here himself, but we wanted to hear it – the album was somewhat rushed, then came the controversy, the promotion (or complete lack of) the Cascio saga, the videos, the production, the cheesy “Billie Jean” adaptation of Hollywood Tonight, all in all, I think we can all admit that this was not a Michael album, there were/are some decent stuff on it, but its wasn’t what we needed and failed to fill the void left by Michaels passing, we weren’t afraid to show our disappointment, either on here, or directly to Michael’s estate and/or the record label in some cases.
What we have had over the years is the luxury of hearing Michael’s demo’s and unreleased tracks and so on, from Cheater to Slave To The Rhythm, from We’ve Had Enough to Monkey Business and Serious Effect, a luxury that, in my opinion, has come back to bite us on the a*re in some cases, especially with A Place With No Name, to which I will come too –
In my opinion, from what I have seen so far from XSCAPE, is that EVERYONE involved, was, or did try pull in the right direction to get something that Michael would have been proud of and something that us, as fans would be proud to call a Michael Jackson song or album. Now I know it will never be the same, it’s impossible, Michael isn’t here and nothing will recapture to magic of self promotion and so on, so we have to learn that things will always be different, and what can sometimes seem what is complete lack of promotion, is just what it can be like when an artist is no longer with us. I am from Kent/London and I haven’t seen a great magnitude of promotion if I am completely honest, BUT what I can see is a huge difference to 2010’s ‘Michael’ in terms of confidence, which tells me a lot, it seems like the Estate and the label have more confidence on XSCAPE being a success, which to me shows they have put more into it.
I like many others, I have heard ‘Love Never Felt So Good’ both versions, and about 2.30 of ‘Chicago’ (wow) and I have restrained myself to listening to ‘Slave To The Rhythm’, ‘ A Place With No Name’, ‘Loving You’ and any of the new leaks/streams as I really want to get the full experience Monday  (of course I have heard the demo’s etc from years gone by) - BUT I have been scouring the threads each time a track is streamed from Sony, and watching peoples reviews, and that is what this about really –
First of all before anyone says this, YES, I am completely aware that this is a forum and that means it is full of opinions, whether they are positive or negative, but what I have noticed is that it’s OK not to like a song, and on the other hand, its fine for someone to like a song that someone else doesn’t, its music and that’s what it does, if everyone liked the same the world would be a boring place – but the manner in which some people are displaying the negativity is not good, not good for the fan community. Briefly back to the demo’s, if we had never heard the demo of ‘APWNN’ a few months back then I would almost guarantee that half of the negative comments on it would be changed to positive on hearing something new and exciting from Michael Jackson (even though I haven’t heard it), Im just using an example, where we have previously been spoilt with leaked tracks etc we feel we have to criticise anything different on this album, who’s to say Michael would have kept the song the same, after all, Michael’s demo’s to final versions of songs have changed dramatically through the years – I love the original of APWNN, and I may or may not like the new version, but who cares, we STILL have the demo and we are getting it on this album! We literally as a fan community wanted Blue Gangster, APWNN, DYKWYCA, STTR, Xscape all on albums in the future and the fact of reality is that we are getting them all on the same album has worn off on some people, people are starting to knit pick, I have read people BLAMING producers “Stargate messed this whole album up”, “Timbaland ruined Xscape” etc and I think its damn right crazy considering they are ALL doing this without Michael’s expertise or finishing touch, it will never be the same.
For example, as much as I like 2000 Watts it is an MJ tune that has split reviews, IF they put this on the album and Michael never put it on Invincible, lots and lots of people would be saying “This isn’t a Michael track etc” sometimes different is good, especially when we get the originals still.
When the album was in the works we said we wanted an album of “Newish’ updated MJ, we got that with pretty much the entire album, we said we wanted upbeat tracks that make you want to dance and groove with typical Michael sounds, we have got that on the album, we said we wanted the original versions of the the reworks (I don’t like the term remix, I think of a remix as a finished version that has been adapted) and we got that, we got 8 tracks of NEW versions and 8 of how Michael left them, something we were kicking and screaming for after the ‘Michael’ album. We got undoubtedly one of the most sought after producers in the industry to work on it in Timbaland, I like Timbaland, he may not be every ones cup of tea, but I think it’s a slight upgrade on Cascio wouldn’t you say? lol
This isn’t a rant or a dig at anyone, it’s just for some people to take a step back, take a deep breath in, and realise this is pretty much what we asked for, what we wanted, and you are not going to like every track on XSCAPE or every track on any album that they continue to bring out.
Like I say, I understand that everyone has an opinion and I don’t expect everyone to like everything (myself included) but when we start getting our knickers in a twist over a 30 second piece of production on a Michael Jackson track that has been reworked, just think about what could have been. We could have been experiencing ‘Michael’ 2 - I also realise that we are all excited about it and the positivity is outweighing the negative comments and its not a personal post to anyone - Just to apprecite what we are getting when we think its not good enough
I for one will be completely behind the album like many, many others and will and just enjoy the piece of music presented too us, new and old, that Michael has left us and what the new producers have done for us – Lets all get behind XSCAPE, with our backing I really think this could be a successful Michael album.
L.O.V.E
