The first single, “Love Never Felt So Good”, from the upcoming Michael Jackson album, ‘XSCAPE’, has officially been released to iTunes and serviced to radio stations across the globe.
Two versions of the track, one a solo Jackson rendition and the other a duet featuring Justin Timberlake, have been released in a marketing campaign reminiscent of the way Mariah Carey, and other major artists during the ’90s and ’00s, launched singles.
The concept of issuing alternate versions of the same single is designed to maximise the track’s exposure by appealing to more than one demographic. The solo Jackson version of “Love Never Felt So Good”, co-produced by John McClain and Giorgio Tuinfort, will likely fare well on the Adult Urban charts, while the Timberlake duet, co-produced by Timbaland and J-Roc, will be a hit with younger audiences and could even make an impression on the Pop charts. Sales and airplay from both versions will be combined the song’s overall Singles Chart position will be determined.
Both versions of the track are very organic and borrow from the sonic approach Daft Punk and Pharrell took on their super-hit “Get Lucky”. Neither remix actually feels like a remix to me and, in my opinion, Justin’s vocals fit the Timbaland mix perfectly. You’ll also notice that Timbaland pays homage to Jackson’s 1979 hit “Working Day & Night” by sampling percussion and breaths from the track.
Check out “Love Never Felt So Good” by Michael Jackson, featuring Justin Timberlake, below:
And the solo Michael Jackson version:
Discuss below…
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Both versions sound Great!!!!
I was never crazy about the “Love Never Felt So Good” demo. The new solo version sounds nice, but just nice. The Timbaland version rocks my socks, but I lost excited to hear the second verse replaced with Justin’s vocals. They could have let Justib do everything else he did on the track… his background harmonies on the chorus sound so wonder… and I like the talking parts he do. Most importantly, it’s the music of the Timbaland version that I like. If only that was the music that went on the solo version. Anyway… this song was the one that would challenge me most, but I do like it much more than the demo with just piano.
The solo version is really nice 🙂
Did you forget to include the link? Not showing up via iTunes search.
I thought I heard the percussion and breaths from “Working Day And Night.” Thanks for confirming what I thought I heard. I love them both…real toe tappers. I bought the solo version on iTunes and thought I would wait for the album with the version featuring JT. Thanks for explaining that they combine the sales of both to determine chart position. That ‘s interesting and I am glad it works that way.
The solo McClain version is sloppy. I’m hearing quite a few sync issues between the added music and the original demo. The drumming in the second verse is totally off with the demo, and the handclaps in the following chorus actually go HUGELY off beat. Can’t believe this got released this way. Sonically, the whole thing sounds uninspired too, the drums sound like they’re sampled off an old record, which is fine for hiphop, but not for the smooth disco-revival sound this mix tries to emulate. I also can’t believe they used a song for which the only source is a noisy stereo track and then not cleaned it up. The fact that they didn’t get rid of some of the high frequency sibilant noise distorting the vocal is odd, considering the Timbaland version actually did this fairly well. This sounds like a polished noisy demo.
The JT version is better in all these regards. It feels more like an actual full-fleshed song, and not a demo that was overdubbed, which has a lot to do with how they processed the vocal, even if it’s a little thin (which is not solved by the slight boost in the lower frequencies). The production is a bit too subtle, but sonically it really improves on the McClain version. I wish we had a sort of hybrid between these two versions because that would’ve been the one to use.
Tom, make a hybrid! 🙂 I did, it’s fun and they overlap fairly well, except for the JT version being slightly faster and having the added part in the middle with the Working Day And Night breaths.
very good !
Bad things:
I’d hoped they had a cleaner recording of the vocals than the one from the leaked demo, but apparently the didn’t. When you listen to the tracks in proper studio headphones the vocals sound as if you’re listening to them through a set of bad computer speakers. And the handclaps in the second chorus are weirdly off-beat, as Tom said. Once you notice them, they become extremely hard to ignore when listening again.
And all in all, it is sort of weird to take a mellow type of love song and go all “let me see you move”on it. Justin Timberlake seems slightly comical with all his “dance, come on” on this.
Good things:
All in all I think they both are okay tracks.
I really like the melody and Michael’s singing style (as I did when listening to the demo), even though it does sound very early eighties and, in my opinion, might not be the perfect song to try to contemporize. But I agree that they didn’t overproduce it, they kept it fairly simple and didn’t drown the vocals. I recommend listening to the song in a medium to low quality set of headphones or speakers, as that makes the demo-sound of the vocals less obvious. I also had a lot of fun putting the two versions on top of each other in a sound editing program – which, apart from being great, geeky fun for a few hours made me like both versions quite a lot, flaws and all, after listening to them a million times. 🙂
Agree with Tom about the second verse and the syncing… can’t believe they released it that way…great shame, but the JT remix is superb!!!
do you think they purposely made the solo one flawed so that they can push the JT version.
i dont know. i still like the solo version.
I felt that way as well a bit upon hearing both. I just think Timbaland did such a more wonderful job. They should just let the mix and music he did be for the remix AND solo version. Goodness I wish there was a way to throw that idea towards the estate.
maybe theyve done it on purpose so that the songs cant be web ripped and sold on. let me know if anyone has heard them on itunes to see if the production and quality of the songs are significantly better.
I got them through itunes, it’s the same.
I think they just figured (and probably rightly so) that most people won’t notice the noisy vocal track, because you won’t if you play it in mp3 quality from your phone or ipod with the standard earphones.
The super annoying thing is that the discrepancy between the music and the vocal track will be even more audible on the cd. Usually the only reason I would buy the cd would be because the quality difference between mp3 and lossless music formats is very obvious when it comes to Michael’s voice, because it’s so high, so I just hope the quality vocal tracks on the rest of the material are better.
Or maybe they did it to avoid changing MJ’s voice? Surely they don’t want the whole “imposter” thing to happen again.
The “impostor” thing only happens when an impostor is involved.
A lot of people think that such an imposter was involved in the Michael album. And to my surprise some think that it’s not Michael singing in LNFSG. There are a few disturbing comments under the two videos in YT.
Clearly these people are uninformed, but if I were to listen to a new MJ song, without knowing anything about it, my first thought wouldn’t be that it’s fake. This just shows how much negative impact had the situation with the previous album on the fans.
An impostor was most definitely used on the ‘Michael’ album.
Yes, and sadly, for fans to refer to anything new that comes out, that is MJ singing, calling it fake, it discredits the initial real claims on the MICHAEL album. Then you have those who don’t care either wY because they are 100% against any kind of posthumous releases and call fans who love it “not real fans.” #JustAMess
When you see the name “Cascio” on it – then you know it’s fake. Those songs are Breaking News, Monster & Keep Your Head Up. All other released songs are real MJ songs.
I like both versions but the JT version is better throughout. In the McClaine version, the out of time hand claps 1/2 way through (starting around 2 minutes), would have driven MJ crazy !!
I personally think this was a great choice as a single especially for radio airplay. A peppy song is always warmly received and this indeed is an upbeat dance number. A lot of people have commented that they were reminded of the OTW era which is great! Also shows that this song is going to be a hit! I am happy with the new versions and can’t wait to hear the rest of the tracks!
I believe they are trying to release the least best track, to show how strong the album is, by showing thT the weakest track is so good compared… kind of like how it was done with Thriller and “The Girl Is Mine”.
It blows my mind to know that if at least 3 singles are released, that one of them could truly be “Blue Gangsta”, “Xscape”, or “Slave To the Rhythm”.
The “Working Day and Night” grabs are kind of disappointing. Seems insulting to the listener, but maybe I’m still over-sensitive. Justin’s vocal is also way stronger and he’s the one doing call-outs, which really imbalances the duet version. They couldn’t find audio of MJ saying the word “dance?” Because I’m pretty sure he said it a billion times. I definitely agree with others that the mixing feels sloppy and the decision to go with a song whose lyrics WERE actually finished later and released by another legendary singer just adds to that feeling. There are at least five lyrically complete songs that could’ve made for strong candidates. Womp womp…
Billboard says they started from 24 tracks and worked down to 8. Here’s hoping none of those are repeats from prior releases like The Ultimate Collection or scratch vocals where he was just trying to get the melody down on tape like “LNFSG.”
Btw, the first few seconds of this videoclip have more of the chorus from the new version of “Xscape” and I think I may actually love it. So that’s hopeful.
Man, I BET “Serious Effect” was one. Lawd, that’s the only song missing from XSCAPE. Well, that and “What More Can I Give”.
they could have taken “let’s dance” from space dance even
someone needs to do a mash up of lnfsg and butterflies. that music would mesh awesome with this track.
5 seconds of the song XSCAPE can be heard at the beginning of this interview:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eDWiTqPOlRM
Sounds great! 😀
I played these 5 seconds in a loop a million times 😀
Why has the Solo version of this song been removed by VEVO?
Maybe because the single is out, anyway it’s strange.
I found the song “Slave to the rhythm” with Justin Bieber, I just can’t understand why it won’t be on the album… it’s related to those two songs with the same title that will be on the album… mystery…
That Justin Bieber version was not authorized by MJ Estate meaning it is not official – it is a bootleg. But it is the same song. What are they releasing now is MJ solo version (as he left it, unfinished) and new finished version produced by Timbaland.
@Judith Mason
It’s now reuploaded.
I haven’t seen anyone mention this but maybe politics are involved?
This single is tied to the same people who worked on This Is It (or I Never Heard)..This could be a case of the creators pulling hard to get money from Sony and the estate or Sony kissing up to certain people. I think I read Paul Anka had an issue with Sony using This Is It without permission
or something.
Out of all the known material out there they pick these? LA Reid even said he only went for songs with finished lyrics.
Seems sketchy.
I always find interesting how some serious music detailed ppl dissect the songs. I bet you 99% of the general public out there (including me) wouldn’t hear absolutely ANYTHING wrong with these two tracks. They are both amazing in their own right. And to expand, I am soooo glad I am not a music techie.
Xscape will be released tomorrow May 9th in some countries like Austria, Germany, Switzerland.
So it will be possible to hear a sample of all the songs in iTunes Store starting tomorrow 😀
I’m excited!