When the King of Pop passed away on June 25, 2009 he had unfinished business. No, I’m not talking about the fifty ill-fated ‘This Is It’ concerts that awaited him in London. I’m talking about music – and lots of it.
Michael Jackson is notorious for taking longer than most artists to complete and release studio albums. This is because he was a perfectionist. For each album Jackson and his collaborators would work on more material than they needed, selecting only the very best tracks for the official release.
“As usual [Michael] goes in the studio and he does a lot of stuff, like hundreds of tapes and stuff, you know, and it was great,” recalls Quincy Jones – producer of Jackson’s ‘Off The Wall’, ‘Thriller’ and ‘Bad’ albums.
“And [‘Bad’] is the [album] where I asked him to write all the tunes,” continues Jones. “I could see him just growing as an artist and understanding production and all that stuff. Michael had written thirty-three songs, and they were saying, ‘Well okay it’s showdown time – we gotta pick it.’ … You can’t put thirty-three songs on a record. And he’d written some fantastic stuff! Really, really fantastic.”
One of the thirty-three songs that Jackson had written during the sessions that ultimately resulted in 1987’s ‘Bad’ album was called “Scared Of The Moon”. It did not make the final cut and for many years remained unknown to fans and unreleased.
“We used to record on tape,” recalls Brad Sundberg – Jackson’s longtime studio technical director and engineer. “Big two-inch, 24-track tapes.”
Matt Forger, another of Jackson’s longtime collaborators and studio engineers, recorded the original demo to “Scared Of The Moon” at Westlake Studios. Jackson, a true professional, laid down all the vocals in a single session.
“They just did the background vocals, the lead vocal and the piano. That was it,” adds Sundberg.
“Then Matt broke the number one rule that you never break – he gave Michael the master tape. And once you hand anything to Michael Jackson you may as well just chuck it off a pier because you’re never ever going to see it again.”
A month or two passed by after recording Jackson’s “Scared Of The Moon” vocals, before Forger got a call from the engineer at Evergreen Studios.
“The engineer was there at Evergreen, calling Matt, saying, ‘Hey I’ve got this Michael Jackson session for ‘Scared Of The Moon’. Michael is here and the string players are here but we don’t have a tape. Can you run the tape over?’ And Matt’s like, ‘I don’t have the tape… I gave it to Michael!'”
So they went back and forth for a while, trying to figure out what could be done.
Fortunately, Matt still had a cassette copy of the original session, so he drove the cassette over to Evergreen. It wasn’t the original multitrack, but it was something.
They the proceeded to transfer the cassette tape onto the new multitrack, recorded the strings onto the multitrack, and then mixed it down.
“Now, from a recording engineer’s standpoint that’s just breaking every rule in the book,” says Sundberg of their experiment. “You can not take a vocal from a cassette and then put it back onto a multitrack and have it still sound that good.”
“Cassettes always have a little bit of hiss or warble, and I told Matt that it’s pure genius,” continues Sundberg. “It’s just absolutely amazing that it worked because that was the original vocal, and it was just a hokey, cute little song that Michael wanted to do – and we did dozens of those – we’d do lots of little snippets where Michael would have an idea and we would do a demo. But how ‘Scared Of The Moon’ came about technically shouldn’t have worked, but it does. It was like the little engine that could. It’s the little song that could.”
“Scared Of The Moon” was not selected for 1987’s ‘Bad’ album, and did not re-surface until around 1999, shortly after Jackson commenced collaborative sessions for the ‘Invincible’ album.
“There are things that just stuck in his mind,” says Michael Prince – who worked extensively as one of Jackson’s trusted studio engineers between 1995 and 2009.
“Sometimes he writes new songs, and sometimes he wants to bring up something from the past that he knows is an unpolished gem.”
“I remember we did a little work on ‘Scared Of The Moon’ for the ‘Invincible’ album, actually. And I remember Steve Porcaro joking, ‘Oh that song again?’ It’s so funny because I’d never heard it before. But that’s Michael’s way of doing things – he always revisited some of his favourite stuff. He’d say, ‘Why didn’t we put this on our last album? Let’s listen again. Can we make it any better?’ Sometimes it makes it on the album and sometimes it doesn’t.”
In the end, the little work that was done on “Scared Of The Moon” during the ‘Invincible’ sessions was not applied to the pre-existing version of the song, and it went back into the vault in its pre-‘Bad’ state.
Then, in November 2004, Sony Music Entertainment’s Epic Records released a career-spanning box set of Michael Jackson’s finest work, consisting of both released and unreleased material. The set, called ‘The Ultimate Collection’, features a newly mixed version of “Scared Of The Moon”.
Listen to “Scared Of The Moon” below – as featured on ‘The Ultimate Collection’.
Matt Forger was fittingly called back to put the finishing touches on the track, which is justly listed on ‘The Ultimate Collection’ as a “demo”. Forger’s final mix includes the 24 tracks of strings, the original cassette vocal/piano and guitar tracks.
Despite the demo being officially released on ‘The Ultimate Collection’ four years earlier, Jackson still wasn’t done with “Scared Of The Moon” in 2009.
It, along with many other tracks from different stages throughout his career, was featured in an extensive “to do” list Jackson never had the chance to action during his life. The handwritten note, seen below, details the titles of 28 songs he had hoped to “finish” (including “Cheater”; also from the ‘Bad’ sessions – also released on ‘The Ultimate Collection’). The note was found taped to the King of Pop’s bedroom wall at the time of his death, on June 25th 2009 – twenty-four years after that “hokey” little demo was recorded at Westlake Studios.
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“Then Matt broke the number one rule that you never break – he gave Michael the master tape. And once you hand anything to Michael Jackson you may as well just chuck it off a pier because you’re never ever going to see it again.” <<<Hahahaha.
Always a joy to read your articles =)
For some reason I believed it was a pre- Thriller song – I think that’s how it’s marked in Vogel’s nook, ad OTW era. Is it possible that Sundberg didn’t know of its prior existence?
I personally wouldn’t put a huge amount of stock in what Joe Vogel has to say. He went on record as calling the Cascio tracks ‘classic Michael’ and vouched heavily for their authenticity in his book ‘Man in the Music’. He actually has a lot of inaccuracies in his discussions around MJ’s art, not only in his book and reviews but in the Bad 25 documentary as well.
It’s simply not true, he didn’t vouch for them in the book. He commended on the controvercy giving both sides on the story and gave very brief comments on each track carefully choosing the phrasing to avoid alleging a specific writer or vocalist. You are biased.
I’ve been thinking a lot about my comment regarding Joe for the past day or so. I think I was a bit too aggressive there and I don’t think it was fair. And you’re right, I think I have been a little biased. I went back and re-read the particular chapter we were both referring to in his book. Read it for the first time since it came out. How I perceived it at the time was definitely different to how it reads when looking at it through the perspective you illustrated. Joe did choose his words carefully, he was being very subtle. For a long time I just threw anyone who remotely defended those tracks into the same category, and that was wrong. I’m still really raw about some issues and I think like many others, I will be until they’re resolved. Look I think Joe has written some wonderful things, I love a lot of Man in the Music and his piece on Earth Song is probably the most comprehensive discussion ever written around a single Michael Jackson song. So yeah, sorry for being too aggressive in that comment.
Great article as always 🙂
Another brilliant article, Damien. It’s great to learn about the songs creation and journey. I’d have loved to hear Michaels vision for the complete song. If the quality of his 2008-2009 work is anything to go by (Best of Joy), it would have turned out even more amazing than it already is! Thank-you for taking the time and effort to detail the process of Michael’s art for his fans. Keep doing what you’re doing!
Great job Damien. I love that story and I appreciate your re-telling it. Morinen, truthfully I have not read Joe’s book (nor was interviewed!), but I know Joe does a great job of compiling as many facts and stories as possible. Michael was a very complex guy with a lot going on at any given time, so I try to avoid thinking or saying I know every detail about every song and project. Moon, however, according to my friend Matt Forger, was after Thriller and before Bad. I know many of Damien’s readers have grown up on CDs and iPods, so the crummy quality of a cassette pre-dates you. In the studio we went to great lengths to make every cassette for Michael, Quincy and Bruce sound as pristine as possible. Still, it would never be regarded as “master quality.” That is why I love this story, and this song, so much. As Damien stated, it shouldn’t work… but it did. Nice job.
Thanks, Brad, for your comments here. I enjoyed reading your words, also. Your professionalism is very apparent. No wonder Michael wanted to work with you.
Thanks Brad!
Thanks for commenting on this Brad! See you in Paris next week 🙂
Amazing, as always!! :-)!!
I love reading the history of little gems like Scared of the Moon. Thanks, Brad, for your input and knowledge. Just to set the record straight, Joe Vogel dates Scared of the Moon between Thriller and Bad, and credits Buz Kohan as co-writer. (Man in the Music pp. 128)
Yes, what Joe wrote is accurate.
Great Job once again Damien. And I sooooo love that song. I just played it and my hyper dogs fell asleep almost immediately with the soothing vocals of Michael and that my friend means something. Thanks for the info as always greatly appreciated.
Thank you 🙂
“Scared of the Moon” is a quiet Masterpiece!!!!
Thanks for the interesting details.
Would love to hear from Matt Forger (or Brad if he knows) what the inspiration was behind this song, “Scared of the Moon”. MJ’s storytelling was triggered by so many interesting things…
You’re welcome!
Oh what a lovely song. It sounds like a lullaby and I can envision Michael perhaps singing it to his little children as they drift off to sleep.
This website is not only an excellent resource for current fans to learn about their idol, but the info that Damien collects & presents here will be helping people understand how Michael worked, and the specific journey of some of his songs, for decades to come.
*APPLAUSE*
Thanks brother. I truly appreciate your kind words. Documenting Michael’s art and legacy is very important to me. His legacy as the greatest recording artist and entertainer of all time is built around forty years of hard work and dedication to his craft. His art is what we’ll be talking about when we are old men and women sitting on rocking chairs. His art is what we’ll introduce our children and grandchildren to. That’s what will define Michael Jackson forever and for all time. Michael’s TRUE story is his music. It’s important that we get the story straight.
I agree Damien
Damien, your articles take me to the place where Michael lives. In his music. In the HIStory of the music, away from the very public noise and pain of his loss. Thank you, and please continue!
Great article, once again.
Thank you Damien
I am wondering, what was the little bit of work that was done for the song during the Invincible album sessions that Michael Prince spoke of. And why was it not applied?
I can read Hollywood tonight , so michael did this song? I’m surprised. Damien twitted that he wanted ti hear Hollywood tonight demo, and I thought ‘it looks like Billie Jean, MJ will never do another Billie Jean. But he did. Hollywood tonight is not produced by the Cascio brothers by the way. It might have been a real song….
Thank you for doing this great article! I’m so glad this song could! I can relate to it and it’s beautifully done. Like everything MJ does! (I still cannot use the past tense). This is very valuable information I eager to get more and more from the real Michael Jackson.
Keep it up and let’s keep his legacy alive.