Michael Jackson - The Girl Is Mine (Solo Demo)

Minus Paul McCartney and therefore minus the kitschy end dialogue, and with some mega dreamy instrumentation and wonderful ad-libs not heard in the final (and IMO inferior) version. All in CD quality for the first time ever! Yes, Christmas has come exactly 7 weeks early as the official batch of CDQ Thriller demos from the famed early 80’s Thriller sessions have leaked online (thank you to whomever set these timeless gems free). These aren’t the same demos that have been heard on MJ’s Ultimate Collection or even the special edition of Thriller. These are the OH-FEE-SHALL blueprints, son. And if you didn’t enjoy the album version of The Girl Is Mine, then dare I say you might enjoy this.

These tracks were spawned during the beyond legendary Thriller sessions of the early 80’s and have never been heard before in full and in CD quality until now (which is pretty unbelievable). This magical package also includes some songs that were excluded from Thriller (like Carousel, Nite Line, Hot Street and Trouble) which, although they’ve been heard from in some form before, are also available in CDQ for the first time ever. If you’ve been listening to the low-quality demos all this time like I have, then you’ll thank your lucky stars for this momentous leak; for MJ fans, this is big news if you haven’t realized it by now.

Furthermore, I’m a demo freak as I tend to find the early drafts of songs much more fascinating than the finished product; they’re like the raw, creative form of the song before it gets all polished up and, in many cases, over produced in comparision (I’m just talking in general terms here). And if anything, demos are the blueprint for without which the final version would never ever come to fruition. To me, the demos sound like minimalist remixes hailing from an alternate universe. And although Thriller isn’t my personal favourite MJ album (it’s third behind 1. Off The Wall and 2. Dangerous), it doesn’t really get much better than the official demos/blueprints of the biggest selling album of all-time. The holy grail of demos, you could say.

I’ll post more tracks from this treasure trove of wonderfully raw and pure-sounding recording gems as the days go by (due to the limitations of the Tumblr audio posting system). Getting to hear these tracks at all is what the Internet was invented for, I feel. Hell, I’m just so thankful that I have good hearing to experience this (and you should be too). *turning up the volume on my headphones* A good Friday morning to you.