What do Michael Jackson and Bob Dylan have in common? Both have recorded much more than we ever heard. Michael Jackson recorded 20-30 songs for every album, and even though he didn’t have an official record contract for the last three years of his life, and was distracted for the four years before that, there is evidence of songwriting and recording by Michael Jackson during these “missing” seven years.
Recording Bob Dylan was once described by one of his producers as like “trying to capture lightning”. Bob famously comes up with a number of versions of every song and the one we happen to hear in the end is often just the one we happen to allowed to hear. His record company vaults are full of unreleased tracks, which used to be a headache for Dylan but isn’t now.
That backlog made it virtually impossible for Dylan for contemplate moving to another record company. He did briefly in the 70s, recording one studio album (‘Planet Waves’) and a live album, possibly as a show of strength but he quickly hurried back soon after. The problem was that Columbia could have kept raiding the cupboard for years. While contracted to the company Dylan can control the output. Dylan’s official “bootleg” series is the obvious compromise finally arrived at. Slowly the shelves are being cleared, at the same time satisfying our thirst for the old Dylan and giving Bob himself the freedom to amuse himself with the present. Which he has.
In October, Sony Legacy will be releasing The Bootleg Series Vol. 9, and a box set of the first eight Bob Dylan albums in mono. Bob’s Leeds Music and Witmark demos dating back to 1962 are expected to be included.
In November Sony – no coincidence, there aren’t many majors left – is also releasing a “new” Michael Jackson album, the first in a 10-album, seven-year deal the Jackson estate agreed with Sony BMG in March 2010. When he died the previous June MJ was without a contract, hanging by a Beatles thread to the Sony Corporation and in serious financial trouble. Within hours of his death he’d become a money-spinning industry.
The ‘new’ as-yet Jackson untitled album reaches back to that leftover material from the 80s, reconnecting us and Jackson with his heyday. There will also be material he recorded in 2006 around the time of the ‘Thrilller 25th Anniversary’ project with Black Eyed Peas’ will.i.am. Well, you would wouldn’t you, considering the Black Eyed Peas’ commercial appeal? Just this week ‘I Got A Feeling’ became the first song to reach the 6 million mark in digital downloads.
Beyond that there are the hard drives Jackson left behind, filled with unheard music. His manager Frank DiLeo claimed that the singer’s vaults contains more than 100 completed and unreleased songs, including collaborations with contemporary artists Akon and Ne-Yo. There’s an album’s worth of new Michael Jackson songs which “belong” to Rodney ‘Darkchild’ Jerkins. Jerkins is a family friend. For Jackson’s ‘Invincible’ CD, his last official album Jerkins produced six songs, including the hit “You Rock My World.” He and Jackson subsequently worked on more than 200 tracks and “musical ideas” over three years. Perhaps Jerkins could play spoiler and hold them back from the “new deal”, but Jerkins is a career producer – he’s currently working with Britney Spears – and there’s no way he’d shit in his own nest and damage his future for the sake of a handful of contentious millions.
However, there are still a few loose threads which might just unravel the best laid plans of the corporate machine. It took many years to clear up Jimi Hendrix’s leftovers and bring them all together under safe “control” under one roof. Despite the instant Jackson industry and Sony’s eager re-embracing of their lapsed hero not everything is in their keeping.
In 2006 there was an announcement that Jackson had signed a contract with a Bahrain-based label called Two Seas Records. Later Two Seas said that the deal was never finalized. Are there some recordings that date from that period which might be contractually compromised?
And then there’s sister La Toya who IS a proven spoiler – she said Michael was a child molester when she needed the headline – and maybe she WOULD take a financial opportunity if there is one to be taken. In the immediate aftermath of Michael Jackson’s death, within hours, it was La Toya of all people who rushed to her brother’s rented home to “rescue” the hard drives of unreleased songs. Are the all songs contained thereon now amongst the material safely in the family’s keeping? Jackson’s manager, Frank DiLeo, said he was “pretty sure” they are.
There are even songs ‘intended’ for Michael Jackson. Ne-Yo was sending Jackson three or four drafts a week prior to Jackson’s unexpected death. What’s the fate of the submissions that were never touched by MJ?
There IS a positional minefield inside all of this, waiting for unscrupulous exploitation. History can easily repeat itself. Way back in 1971, when the Jackson 5 shot to fame and success, a record company the brothers had momentarily recorded for released a Jacksons-style single by Ripples And Waves, even adding a “with Michael” to the label credit. We were supposed to think it was the Jacksons and THAT Michael. It wasn’t. It wasn’t the Jacksons and there was no-one called Michael in the group. That single, “Let Me Carry Your School Books”, wasn’t a success but if you look at some Jackson 5 histories they’ll tell you Michael and his brothers DID once record as Ripple And Waves.
What I’m listening to: Danger Mouse and Sparklehorse (Dark Night Of The Soul), Snow Patrol (A Hundred Million Suns), The Kills (Midnight Boom)
ED SAID 