Something to freak out Michael Jackson haters
 

A little backstory. Sonic 3 & Knuckles was originally composed as a single game, because Sonic 3 & Knuckles were originally meant to be one game, but they were split up to make double the $$$. To prove it, you can find music from Sonic & Knuckles hidden in the Sonic 3 sound test. So, remember. They were composed as one game. Now, back to the point.

Nobody has known for sure who the hell composed the Sonic the Hedgehog 3/Sonic & Knuckles music. Here's a little story that has hyped in the old days. A lot of magazines picked up on the rumor that after Dreams Come True broke with Sega after Sonic 2, Sega started looking for a more "American centric" musical star to write the music for Sonic 3. They thought it would drive the hype up out the roof. In accordance with that belief, they supposedly signed Michael Jackson (who was already associated with the company *coughmoonwalkercough*) to write the soundtrack. It was reported in old issues of EGM (look it up yourselves).

Supposedly, MJ (and his song writing staff) wrote the music for the majority of the game, but failed to complete the last 20% or so because Sega killed the deal after MJ's child molestation charges. Sega reps say the music was supposedly scrapped, but I call bullsh*t, because other Sega reps reported that he still got paid. In Sonic 3's credits, most of MJ's core song writing team is credited with his name mysteriously missing. Getting weird? Howard Drossin (Sonic Spinball, Comix Zone) was brought in to finish that last 20% or so of the soundtrack. Play Sonic 3 & Knuckles (locked on) and read the credits. You'll find only Howard Drossin is credited for the soundtrack. Sega covered their tracks removing MJ's writing team completely. Now, play the PC version of Sonic 3 & Knuckles. You'll find half the damn soundtrack is altered/replaced presumably for legalities. Making sense now? Now, if you want sources, I'll look the stuff up, but I'm a lazy douche so you'll have to ask.


Supposedly everything after Marble Garden Zone was written by MJ & team, plus the boss themes. Need proof? Play Sonic 3 without Sonic & Knuckles locked on. Get to the first mod-boss (the flame throwing mecha that sets the island on fire). Listen to the boss music. Occasionally you'll hear (though scratchy as hell) a trademark Michael Jackson "Whoo!" in the song at least three times.

Need more proof? Here's the proof you can't argue with. Listen to this clip of Sonic 3's ending theme mixed over top of Michael Jackson's Stranger in Moscow.

Stranger in Moscow meets Sonic 3 ending.

THEY'RE THE SAME DAMN SONG.


I guess you can easily assume Sonic 3's music was written by Michael Jackson and Howard Drossin.

Heh. That's pretty cool.

I've got another one mixed with Ice Cap when I can find it.

*edit*

I actually found a video that proves my point. I'll upload it to Youtube tomorrow.

Chrono Trigger also has music that sounds uncanningly like Rick Astley. Japan dipping into existing music for VGs isnt new. Sonic 3 is the most prolific of 'em

Wasn't the opening music to Megaman 2 identical to some REM song?

Hate Michael jackson and henseforth "freak-ed out"

:tcouch:

Here's the YouTube video.

And here's another.

Sweet Zombie Jesus. The baby dangler tainted one of my favorite console game franchises and I never even knew it.

*shuddering uncontrollably*

I was counting posts until one of you people showed up. :lol:

its weird that you're posting news (if you can call it that), that was noticed years ago.

Aren't you supposed to be some sort of reporter/news hound?

Editorialist, to be exact. I don't post the news. I just bitch about it.

Yeah, I'll say.

I've heard this before, but I'm not convinced. While it's true that it was originally planned for MJ to compose the music, I don't think any of the music in the actual game was composed by him. Several interviews with Sega employees confirmed that his work was removed.

Not quite. Of the 28 tracks used in Sonic 3, people claim that MJ wrote only 9 (32%). And that's not including the Sonic & Knuckles tracks that were also included in Sonic 3, none of which people claim he wrote.

Source?

I don't doubt that some of the people who worked with MJ also worked on Sonic 3's music, but I don't think he wrote any of it himself. Besides, if MJ did compose any of the music, I don't think Sega would risk a lawsuit by removing his name from the credits (which most people probably don't even read).

Well, those credits are just copied over from Sonic & Knuckles, and since the people who worked with MJ didn't write any of the songs in S&K, there was no reason to credit them.

Or, those tracks could have been replaced because they could not be reproduced using MIDI due to the sound samples used in them. Also, the original soundtrack in its entirety remained intact for Sonic Jam (which was recompiled from the original source and was released after S&KC) and all other releases of Sonic 3.

Listen closer, and you can tell that it's not him, it's the same guy who says "Come on!" Speaking of that song, the Act 1 boss theme from S&K is in the game as well, and there's even a trick in Hydrocity where you can hear it in-game. If the Sonic 3 Act 1 boss theme was composed by MJ and they were trying to cover up his work, why wouldn't they use the perfectly good replacement from S&K so that they would have one less track to worry about?

They do sound similar, but the composers for Sonic 3 did work with MJ, so they could have unintentionally borrowed from his song. Besides, if he really did compose that track, wouldn't it kind of cheapen his other song by sounding so similar?

I saw the YouTube videos, and I think the Ice Cap comparison is pretty weak.

Hey... all of this sounds eerily familiar...

Way to debunk it. I'm totally on the fence now. But it isn't uncommon for people to reuse the same music for things, even unintentionally. There's some song that appears in The Muppets Take Manhattan written by Jeff Moss that uses almost the exact same tune he used for a song on Sesame Street called "with Every Beat of my heart." Also, "Part of your world" from the Little Mermaid sounds suspiciously like "Somewhere that's Green" from little Shop of Horrors, also written by the same people (I forget their names at the moment).

So naturally, if they were composers for MJ, they would somehow borrow his music, mayhaps unintentionally. But that's not to say this isn't true, but it doesn't say it is...

Stranger in Moscow was actually from 1996 while Sonic 3 is from 1994 so unintentional borrowing can be ruled out.

Unless MJ's composers borrowed unintentionally FROM Sonic 3.

Maybe the music did make it in (done by the composers, not MJ), and it was changed in other collections ONLY because they would have had to pay them, when coming up with cheaper stuff sounded more finiancially feasable.

Not to be picky here but "Stranger in Moscow" was written by Jackson himself. :D

Nice find. I could've sworn this wasn't the first time I saw this topic being discussed here... :lol:

In that case, we can also rule out the concept that Sonic 3's ending was influenced by Stranger in Moscow. In fact, it now seems like the other way around...

However, like I posted above, the music was only changed in the PC version. Every other version of Sonic 3 released after that retained the original music.

Yes, but from a legal point of view, you are allowed to do whatever you want with the music in the context of the "unaltered" original work, and all console re-releases of the Sonic games have been emulations of the original unaltered Genesis code. Sonic 3&K PC was a rebuild released on another platform, so it would make sense legally that any music he had anything to do with would have to be altered. The argument that the music on the PC version "had to be changed due to the use of voice samples that MIDI couldn't reproduce" doesn't stand either. Almost every track in the Genesis game used scratchy PCM drum samples. Genesis sound emulator wave tables prove this. All those drum samples were replaced in the MIDI versions with equivalent MIDI drum kit sounds. And again, I cite the MJ "Jam" voice sample found in the sound test.

But then there is Sonic Jam, and that was a recompile released a year or so after Sonic 3 & Knuckles PC. Who knows how that gets by.

At the very least we can possibly assume he had something to do with the music early on. His works were likely tweaked and build upon by someone else after his departure (Howard Drossin most likely), but the core similarities are too uncanny to really believe all his work was completely thrown out.

Like you mentioned below, Sonic Jam was also recompiled, but it used the original music, so it's doubtful that there were any legal issues. Besides, see my earlier post where I brought up the Act 1 boss music, which is more evidence against that.

Well, it's not that the Genesis was using samples, it's that MIDI can't reproduce those sounds (specifically, the voices). I find the fact that they composed new music strange, too, but maybe the composers of the original music didn't want their music being used unless it was complete.

I've gone through the entire sound test in the past, and I've never heard that sound at any speed. It would help if they included the sound test number. If it is in there, though, that could just be something they were originally going to use when MJ was involved, but since it's not used anywhere in the game, they didn't bother to remove it.

Sorry, but I don't find the Ice Cap and Carnival Night comparisons very convincing. I do agree with you about the ending theme, although the time difference that Barkworm mentioned lessens that one's credibility as well.

It seems to me that there are unexplainable issues no matter which way people believe. I guess we won't know for sure until we hear from people who were more directly involved.

Timing is always improved upon in music for pacing, there's plenty of prototype variations of popular songs that have contrasting, different temps and tones before the final product.

http://vgmdb.net/forums/showpost.php...68&postcount=1

So that's pretty much it. Brad Buxer put it out there beyond a doubt. Michael Jackson did Sonic 3.

Not like anybody didn't already know, but now we have it in writing from a credible source. Game over. I'm re-tagging my mp3s.

You are such a ****ing drama queen.

Whaaaaaaaaaaaat?

Oh, like you're not?

So that's it?! Game over?! Finally, our long fought battle is won.

VICTORRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYyyyyyyyyyy yyyyyeah I don't care.

This is all true.I remember a few months before he passed while we were in Krayzies studio recording verses for "what have we done" he briefly spoke about his time composing for sega video games and he giggled when we told him that we have sampled music from the sega game "eternal champions" he was well aware of that already and said it was one of the reasons he agreed to work with us.What a beuatiful man he was,May GOD bless his soul,R.I.P.

Now that sir, is an awesome story.

Eternal Champions did have a badass soundtrack. Does anybody know who made that one?

Joe Delia, John Hart, Jeff Marsh and Adrian Van Velssen I believe.

cool MJ wrote music for the sega game cool.

Interesting! Awesome. Love MJ and Sonic. No wonder.

I remember reading about this and seeing a YouTube video about it awhile back. A lot of the music in S3&K is just slightly altered MJ songs. It reminds me of how a lot of the music in the original TMNT for NES sounds a lot like various popular rock songs.

Yeah, no kidding.

The most obvious in TMNT is the Area 5 overworld theme sounding like Come Together.