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Should MJ have worked with the Neptunes on Invincible

hey y'all

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Spaceship

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According to Pharell, MJ turned them down and most of the tracks they came up for him went to Justin Timberlake. All of the Neptunes tracks on Timberlake's debut album Justified with the exception of "Like I Love You" were originally meant for MJ. Pharrell also said that Usher's "U Don't Have to Call" was originally intended for MJ; in that case, I think "I Don't Know", the only other Neptunes track on Usher's 8701 album, was originally intended for MJ. I think this Usher outtake "What's a Man to Do" was originally intended for MJ:
It's said to be recorded in 2003 when Usher was working on his Confessions album, but Pharrell played the song on piano when he was working with Timberlake in 2002:
So maybe Pharrell already had the beat and presented it to MJ. I wonder if some Neptunes tracks for other artists were originally meant for MJ; maybe some stuff from Ray J's album in 2001? lol

This is an idea of what Invincible would have looked like if MJ worked with the Neptunes instead of Darkchild.

1. Senorita (ended up going to Justin Timberlake)
2. Rock Your Body (ended up going to Justin Timberlake)
3. U Don't Have to Call (ended up going to Usher)
4. Break of Dawn
5. Heaven Can Wait
6. Let's Take a Ride (ended up going to Justin Timberlake)
7. Butterflies
8. Speechless
9. 2000 Watts
10. You Are My Life
11. Nothing Else (ended up going to Justin Timberlake)
12. Don't Walk Away
13. Cry
14. The Lost Children
15. Whatever Happens
16. Last Night (ended up going to Justin Timberlake)

lol honestly the album wouldn't be much better. It's a matter of taste whether the Neptunes are better producers than Darkchild and MJ just isn't bringing his best effort when he's just falling back on the hottest producers to make him hits. Doesn't matter if it's Darkchild, Neptunes, Timbaland, etc. MJ should have produced more songs on his own.
 
This is a Neptunes style beat I love listening to. I can totally imagine Michael working with something similar to this.


or this.


Fun fact: I even wrote a whole fake collab song starring me on rapping the verses while he sings the second verse, using the first beat as a reference, but I want to rewrite it, since I wrote it ages ago. And some of the rhymes are a little cringe, if I'm being honest. šŸ˜­ I'd like to think I've improved on my writing skills since then. It's called "Thank U." I wrote it as a tribute to Michael and everything he's done for me. That's generally what the song is about.

This is also just my humble opinion, but I would've loved to hear a Michael version of Rock Your Body by Justin Timberlake. (Maybe in this day and age, AI can make that a reality, lmao.)

Maybe the Neptunes would've worked with him on a few select songs that could've worked. But honestly, I prefer the production work of Timbaland, considering the amazing work put into the remixes for Xscape, especially on Blue Gangsta. That would be my choice for Invincible. And then Invincible might've gained a better footing in 2001. Might've.
 
For clarification, the Neptunes only submitted the beats to those songs. Had they reached MJ, they wouldā€™ve been completely different.

That said, absolutely not. Keep Pharrell as far away from MJ as humanly possible.
 
Spaceship said:
Only the lyrics would be different if MJ accepted them.
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Honestly? Yeah.

Now, I'm not saying Michael was totally incapable of singing more adult/raunchy lyrics (keeping in mind that Break of Dawn and In The Closet exist...), but... I just can't imagine him saying "Now do that ass shaking thing you do" and "I'll have you naked by the end of this song," lmao. šŸ˜­
There's definitely a big difference when a 22-year-old sings it (the age Justin Timberlake was in 2003, when Rock Your Body was released) versus a 43-year-old (the age Michael was when Invincible was released).

Rock Your Body is still a banger song though. To me, at least. I'd still love to listen to Michael sing it, even with lyric changes made.
 
Spaceship said:
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oh my god, i'm dead! ha!

unfortunately, his voice still sounds like the Justin Timberlake vocal. and that's often the problem with these AI songs, that they always sound too close to the original source. it also sounds hella robotic at times. so... it's not fantastic. but i should've known there was at least AI cover of this somewhere!

another thing I forgot to add: another reason I'm so intrigued by Michael singing this song is due to the beatboxing part. that's something I can imagine him doing! that's how he made the majority of his music, anyway!
 
oh yeah the vid of JT and Pharrell on the piano that I posted is also from the Making of Justified series.
 
lol i think this neptunes song for babyface was meant for MJ
 
yeah i can see why MJ turned them down lol
 
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Remember when Pharrell had to pay $7m to Marvin Gaye family

Unoriginal hack got what he deserved
 
Well Iā€™m glad it didnā€™t happen, I think justified is a pretty generic album. JT made 2 absolute world class albums after his debut, I wouldnā€™t have minded MJ doing some of those songs instead.
 
honestly tho when I listen to crap like "Heartbreaker", "Invincible", "Privacy" and "Threatened" ... yeah, it would have been better if MJ worked with the Neptunes lol. I get that he didn't want the album to sound much like Off the Wall but that sure beats lame ass 'N Sync ish music. I like the whole retro-futuristic vibe in the Neptunes' production style and that would have suited MJ.
 
But being better than rubbish like "Heartbreaker", "Invincible", "Threatened" and "Privacy" is nothing to write home about, honestly. Those didn't sound like typical Darkchild songs, anyway; that was the style that he developed for MJ and carried over to Brandy's Full Moon album. "You Rock My World" had the trademark sound that he was known for and nothing the Neptunes ever made was of better quality. The only real difference between the Neptunes and Darkchild in 2001 was that they weren't as popular; Darkchild was already an established hitmaker, whereas the Neptunes were more of a niche hip-hop team. "You Rock My World" failed to impress critics because it sounded like Darkchild's other big hits. The Neptunes didn't have many huge hit singles at the time; that doesn't mean that their sound was more "original" than Darkchild's. They just didn't have as much mainstream appeal. It wasn't until 2002, after Invincible had come out, that they really had their commercial breakthrough and started making big hits back-to-back; Nelly's "Hot in Here" that year was their first number one on the Hot 100.

Before 2002, their last (and only) top-ten single was all the way back in 1998 ("Looking at Me" by Mase featuring Tupac's Killer). Other than that, they only had three songs to even make the top twenty and none of them were released in 2001, the year Invincible came out. Britney Spears' "I'm a Slave 4 U" was basically a flop, only hitting No.27, and the singles Neptunes produced for Babyface and Ray J did even worse. There were even some external factors at play for some of their hits in 2002 and 2003. For example, Usher's "U Don't Have to Call" was big largely because it was coming fresh off "U Got It Bad", which wasn't by the Neptunes; funnily enough, the Neptunes produced "I Don't Know", which Usher planned to release as a single in 2001 but changed his mind at the last minute because of how generic the song sounded and went with "U Got It Bad" instead. Justin Timberlake's "Rock Your Body" was big largely because it was coming fresh off "Cry Me a River", which wasn't by the Neptunes, either; "Like I Love You" only hit no.11 and "Senorita" basically flopped at no.27. And how can I forget about "I'm Loving It"; that was a flop altogether.

The majority of the Neptunes' top-ten hits in their whole career were rap songs, or had rap verses and MJ wasn't really working with any relevant rappers for Invincible after the Diddy collab fell through; the Biggie sample doesn't count and Fats was a nobody. Pretty obvious none of the songs that they made or could have made for MJ would have been more successful than "You Rock My World". Probably not even as successful. MJ was correct to turn down their beats back in 1998/1999; there was no reason to work with them at the time as they weren't well-known and even with the benefit of hindsight, looking at their whole career, he wouldn't have gained much from the collab.
 
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