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Huffington Post article about Sonic 3/Michael Jackson stuff

T

TimmiT

Member
So Todd van Luling of the Huffington Post did an article about Michael Jackson's involvement with Sonic 3. And confirmed that he did work on the game's music and that his work was put into the game:
Sega maintains it never worked with Jackson on Sonic 3, and is "not in the position to respond" to questions about allegations to the contrary. "We have nothing to comment on the case," the company said.

But the men whom Sega credited with writing the music say otherwise. Six men -- Brad Buxer, Bobby Brooks, Doug Grigsby III, Darryl Ross, Geoff Grace and Cirocco Jones -- are listed as songwriters in Sonic 3's endgame scroll. Buxer, Grigsby and Jones tell The Huffington Post that Jackson worked with them on a soundtrack for Sonic 3 -- and that the music they created with Jackson ended up in the final product.
Click to expand...
The rest of the article is about what the community had already found out and how Jackson worked on the game. It's definitely worth reading if you care about this stuff: http://testkitchen.huffingtonpost.com/michaeljacksonsonic
 
S

Sir_Crocodile

Member
I remember lots of talk saying this apparently had some weird contractual obligations. So according to this it was the allegations. Good to know once and for all it happened anyway
 
H

Hot Coldman

Banned
My takeaway from this is that SEGA probably did intend to pull the music out, but ended up not bothering. Hence Drossin's confusion.

Anyway, yeah, nice to see eyewitness accounts of the process.
 
S

SCChappy

Banned
secretanchitman said:
Gametrailers did a Pop Fiction episode about this and confirmed that there are still parts of Michael Jackson's music in the game.
Click to expand...


It should be clear to anyone who listens to 3's soundtrack that Jackson worked on it. I don't understand why so many people seem to think its just an urban legend or something.
 
P

PillarEN

Member
Always nice to see new articles keeping this info fresh in the public's mind. The only thing that bugs me is that Sega will never properly give credits to each of the songs. At least people have spoken about the tracks now and then to drop some crumbs of info and random people have been able to analyze certain tunes to make highly educated guesses.
C'mon Sega. Do what's best for music history and give a proper crediting to all the tracks. For the sake of the tunes.
 
S

SCChappy

Banned
The crazy thing is we only learned of Ice Cap being Hard Times a few years ago. So many theories went around about how it actually was based on a Jackson song.
 
F

Finale Fireworker

Member
The writer refers to Sonic as "the best video game character of all time."

Gamers, even the ones that write professionally, are completely unable to divorce themselves from hyperbole. They don't even try. Their favorite thing and the best thing ever are always synonymous and identical.

I find this so goddamn childish.

Like, all you would have had to do was write "in 1993" and you wouldn't have this issue. Just relate your claim to something measurable, like the popularity of both Jackson and Sonic in the seminal days of 90s culture.

But by the time he gets to that line, he's not talking about that. He's talking about his own experience with the brand. He describes his nostalgia and then, in the same breath, asserts that Sonic the Hedgehog is the "best video game character of all time."

Which is to say, "I am so attached to my childhood memories that I am bold enough to claim the things I like are the best things ever."

Which is so juvenile, and apparently only bothers me. I am the only one on this earth who cares and is embarrassed when players act and speak as if they never left the playground. So then I look like the child for kicking up such a fuss. I feel like I'm taking crazy pills.

Good article otherwise.

EDIT: This post is supposed to be tongue in cheek.
 
J

joedick

Member
secretanchitman said:
Gametrailers did a Pop Fiction episode about this and confirmed that there are still parts of Michael Jackson's music in the game.
Click to expand...

That shouldn't discredit this article though, there's some new info to be found. The whole thing is technically still somewhat unconfirmed with Sega refusing to admit it, so the more sources the better.
 
entremet

entremet

Member
There's something weird with Sonic 3K's rights.

Both games are on the Wii VC, with lock on tech as well--based M2. The original soundtrack is untouched.

However, we never got the Taxport ports of the two games and some ports have messed around with the music.

Weird.

What's holding up the Taxman ports?

Also Taxman ports need to come to PC. Please, SEGA.
 
J

jooey

The Motorcycle That Wouldn't Slow Down
Finale Fireworker said:
Gamers, even the ones that write professionally, are completely unable to divorce themselves from hyperbole.


Which is so juvenile, and apparently only bothers me. I am the only one on this earth who cares and is embarrassed when players act and speak as if they never left the playground.
Click to expand...

psst, that's hyperbole
 
S

SCChappy

Banned
Finale Fireworker said:
Which is so juvenile, and apparently only bothers me. I am the only one on this earth who cares and is embarrassed when players act and speak as if they never left the playground. So then I look like the child for kicking up such a fuss. I feel like I'm taking crazy pills.

Good article otherwise.
Click to expand...

what are you even talking about
are you sure you "left the playground"?
 
I

Iced

Member
Finale Fireworker said:
Gamers, even the ones that write professionally, are completely unable to divorce themselves from hyperbole.

...

I am the only one on this earth who cares and is embarrassed when players act and speak as if they never left the playground.
Click to expand...

Okay

Edit: Beaten so hard - it was the best beating of all time.
 
A

Aaron Strife

Banned
entremet said:
There's something weird with Sonic 3K rights.

Both games are on the Wii VC, with lock on tech as well--based M2. The original soundtrack is untouched.

However, we never got the Taxport ports of the two games and some ports have messed around with the music.

Weird.

What's holding up the Taxman ports?

Also Taxman ports need to come to PC. Please, SEGA.
Click to expand...
I'm guessing that the VC releases (among other things) are ok because they're emulated ROMs of the original and thus the same product in a different format whereas a Taxman port would be a ground-up remake and thus have to enter under new negotiations with Jackson's estate. When Sonic 3 was ported to PC the tracks Jackson most likely composed were stripped out and replaced with new ones.

The Sonic CD iOS version had to use instrumentals of the vocal themes so it doesn't seem too unlikely.

Personally and I know this is an unpopular opinion I would be ok with a Taxman mobile port that just replaced that music. Losing Icecap would suck but I'd rather have the game in some capacity. And maybe they could hash out the rights later and patch the original music into the game, or let you play your own.
 
A

Azure Dream

Member
Pretty much any track with vocal samples in it was probably touched by Michael, or at least related to him in some way.

Even Knuckles' theme, which changed for S&K, has a vocal sample if you let it play long enough.

Ben was a "Blue" -- a hardcore Sonic fan.
Click to expand...

...He was a what now? I don't think I've ever heard of a Sonic fan ever be called a "Blue". Like, ever.
 
F

Finale Fireworker

Member
Iced said:
That's some subtle-ass irony, then.
Click to expand...

This is literally the text you quoted:

>Laments the overuse of hyperbole
>Claims to be the only person on earth who feels a certain way

SCChappy said:
gonna have to point it out for me then bro
Click to expand...


Just forget it.

-

I'm listening to all these Sonic tracks right now. It's crazy to me that somebody could just pick up on this and grow this conspiracy theory into an actual exposé. How often does that actually happen, you know?
 
I

Iced

Member
Finale Fireworker said:
This is literally the text you quoted:

>Laments the overuse of hyperbole
>Claims to be the only person on earth who feels a certain way




Just forget it.

-

I'm listening to all these Sonic tracks right now. It's crazy to me that somebody could just pick up on this and grow this conspiracy theory into an actual exposé. How often does that actually happen, you know?
Click to expand...

I'm not arguing that what you wrote is ironic, I was merely pointing out that it was far too subtle for anyone to know it was intentional.
 
P

PillarEN

Member
Finale Fireworker said:
This is literally the text you quoted:

>Laments the overuse of hyperbole
>Claims to be the only person on earth who feels a certain way




Just forget it.

-

I'm listening to all these Sonic tracks right now. It's crazy to me that somebody could just pick up on this and grow this conspiracy theory into an actual exposé. How often does that actually happen, you know?
Click to expand...

Well the whole "MJ worked on Sonic 3" rumblings must have existed since the time I started browsing the internet for videogame news. So at least since the early 2000s. People have been digging into this for a long time now. This is more of a gathering into one article type of piece.
 
L

lazygecko

Member
The tracks alleged to have been made by the Jackson songwriting team are pretty easy to distinguish from the rest of the soundtrack in that they are much more overtly built on PCM samples, and often use specialized samples unique to the specific tracks instead of the generic drumkit heard in the Sega-composed music. The article mentions that they had to strip down the music a lot for memory reasons, and by that they probably mean they had to cut down a lot on their sample use since this is what primarily consumes memory/cart space, and not the synthesized musical notes which are just a few lines of code.

Within that context the given reason that Jackson was personally not satisfied with the quality also makes more sense. Both the inherent hardware and the specific sound driver used for Sonic 3 are not exactly ideal for high quality sample playback, and with the kind of vision and approach primarily centered around samples they employed for the music it's pretty clear they are working against the hardware rather than with it. A different direction would have yielded better results, but you can't exactly expect someone coming in from the outside with no practical experience to know that.
 
I

Iced

Member
lazygecko said:
The tracks alleged to have been made by the Jackson songwriting team are pretty easy to distinguish from the rest of the soundtrack
Click to expand...

Is there a list out there? I don't think I've ever found one, and I'd love to listen to them vs the rest of the soundtrack to compare them.
 
B

batfax

Member
I wonder if the allegations didn't come up they'd've tried to see if they could get some kind of SEGA CD sound expansion going on for Sonic & Knuckles/Lock-On version. I think Pier Solar did something like that where a CD could be used to replace the cartridge music but I don't know if that kind of thing ever happened back then.
 
A

AlexBasch

Member
Finale Fireworker said:
The writer refers to Sonic as "the best video game character of all time."

Gamers, even the ones that write professionally, are completely unable to divorce themselves from hyperbole. They don't even try. Their favorite thing and the best thing ever are always synonymous and identical.

I find this so goddamn childish.

Like, all you would have had to do was write "in 1993" and you wouldn't have this issue. Just relate your claim to something measurable, like the popularity of both Jackson and Sonic in the seminal days of 90s culture.

But by the time he gets to that line, he's not talking about that. He's talking about his own experience with the brand. He describes his nostalgia and then, in the same breath, asserts that Sonic the Hedgehog is the "best video game character of all time."

Which is to say, "I am so attached to my childhood memories that I am bold enough to claim the things I like are the best things ever."

Which is so juvenile, and apparently only bothers me. I am the only one on this earth who cares and is embarrassed when players act and speak as if they never left the playground. So then I look like the child for kicking up such a fuss. I feel like I'm taking crazy pills.

Good article otherwise.

EDIT: This post is supposed to be tongue in cheek.
Click to expand...
Well, to be fair, a good portion of hardcore Sonic fans are deranged lunatics. Livejournal and Deviantart prove it.

- didn't see your edit. My post is 50/50 serious/joking, to be honest.
 
L

lazygecko

Member
Iced said:
Is there a list out there? I don't think I've ever found one, and I'd love to listen to them vs the rest of the soundtrack to compare them.
Click to expand...

From the top of my head: Knuckles' Theme, Miniboss, Carnival Night, Ice Cap, Launch Base, and the end credits. Conveniently, all of these also ended up being replaced in the PC port of the game.
 
D

DSix

Banned
Azure Dream said:
Pretty much any track with vocal samples in it was probably touched by Michael, or at least related to him in some way.

Even Knuckles' theme, which changed for S&K, has a vocal sample if you let it play long enough..
Click to expand...

I just listened to Knuckles theme by curiosity... and holy shit this is the Ghost beat, like exactly Ghost with different instruments and slightly faster.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_T89V6XJ0as
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UcBQCi_kGpU#t=0m21s
 
V

virtualS

Member
Had I known that Michael Jackson was involved with Sonic 3 at the time of its release, I probably would've asked my parents for a Mega Drive. I remember Moonwalker the game really tempting me to switch sides as a NES only kid.

I wonder what he'd say in one of our SNES vs Mega Drive music threads today.
 
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