Can’t watch this right now, but according to Y2KDaily producer Rodney ‘Darkchild’ Jerkins talks about working with the late, great King of Pop, what he learnt during their recording sessions and about releasing some previously unheard MJ material.
…While I respect Darkchild as a producer (the man has produced some monster tracks – I am eternally grateful for everything on Brandy’s Never Say Never album), I really felt he failed on Michael’s Invincible album. Not saying it’s his fault totally – I can only imagine the control freak MJ was – but the beats he made for the King of Pop sounded dated (even back then) and over produced.
The album as a whole wasn’t bad. A couple tracks on there were great (‘Rock My World’, ‘Butterflies’, ‘Whatever Happens’ etc), but generally – it should have been a lot better. I always wonder what it would have been like if The Neptunes got their way and produced Jacksons’ last album. All the songs for Justin Timberlake’s albums were reportedly written and produced for Michael Jackson. Image that. Jeeze. Michael singing ‘Like I Love You’ or ‘Senorita’. Word.
But again – I really respect Rodney as a producer, just didn’t feel in this instance he got it ‘right’. That’s not to take away from what he’s achieved over the years. And hey, this is just my opinino.
Would be great to hear that unreleased music still though haha.
Rodney Jerkins' sound began to fall off around 2000 – 2001. His signature Darkchild sound which was so melody heavy, rich (in comparison to other producers who could only do beats) just started to sound cold, over-done and too pro-tooled. In many instances he came with songs that were ahead of their time and could roll now, better than they did back then. (Brandy's "I thought" and "What about us?" from 'Full moon', Michael Jackson's "Heartbreaker" and TLC's "Over me" and "Hey hey hey hey" from 3D). But he began to run the sound into the ground and give it to everybody. There was no telling the songs and artists apart.
Even now, I don't think his sound is great. The last song Rodney Jerkins produced which was on that old school Darkchild swag that I thought was KILLER was the Spice girls' "Holler". I don't give a damn if people wanna slate me over that one. But "Holler" was / still is a damn tune. Everything he's done since hasn't really been signature Darkchild. Even his work on Brandy's 'Human' was weak and them two had MAD chemistry on 'Never say never' and 'Full moon'.
[...] Rodney ‘Darkchild’ Jerkins Talks About Working With Michael Jackson – the Pinboard blog has a link to a video interview with Rodney ‘Darkchild’ Jerkins “working with Michael Jackson & unreleased MJ music.” [...]
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