Michael Jackson’s Secret Rock and Roll History!

In hindsight, it seems strange that a song featuring Michael Jackson wouldn’t  be released as a single. But that’s what happened with ‘Who’s Right, Who’s  Wrong,’ a deep cut from Kenny  Loggins‘ ‘Keep the Fire,’ on which Jackson’s background vocals are  distinctly heard in the chorus. The album’s big hit was ‘This Is It,’ which  features background vocals from another star, five-time Grammy winner Michael  McDonald.

One of the few people whose fame arguably eclipsed Jackson’s was Paul  McCartney. The former Beatle  penned ‘Girlfriend’ for 1979’s ‘Off The Wall,’ marking the beginning of  what was once a good friendship between the superstars. McCartney later appeared  on the ‘Thriller’ track, ‘The Girl Is Mine,’ while Jackson reciprocated the  favor, duetting on ‘Say Say Say,’ from the latter’s 1983 album ‘Pipes of  Peace.’

‘The Girl Is Mine’ climbed to No. 2 on the Billboard Hot 100 in 1983, but  ‘Say Say Say’ topped the chart. Perhaps most surprisingly about ‘Say Say Say’ is  that it ranks as Michael Jackson’s biggest hit on the Billboard  charts.

The friendship between Jackson and McCartney would suffer irreparable damage  when, a year later, Jackson outbid McCartney for ownership of the publishing rights to  more than 250 Beatles songs. Jackson drew further ire from McCartney in 1987  when he licensed the Beatles song ‘Revolution’ to be used in a commercial for Nike.

After Jackson unexpectedly passed away in June 2009, McCartney was gracious  and forgiving, described his former song partner as a “massively  talented boy-man with a gentle soul. I feel privileged to have hung out and  worked with Michael,” he said.

Best known for his 1977 hit, ‘We  Just Disagree,’ as well as his time in Traffic  and guitarist-for-hire, Dave Mason duetted with Jackson on 1980’s ‘Save Me.’ The  funky track, which appeared on Mason’s album ‘Old Crest on a New Wave,’ only got  as high as No. 71 on Billboard’s Hot 100.

Michael Jackson’s rock collaborations didn’t stop with Paul McCartney. Van Halen‘s Eddie  Van Halen agreed to record a free  and uncredited guitar solo on the song ‘Beat It’ as a favor for ‘Thriller’  producer Quincy Jones. Van Halen reportedly cut his 20-second solo in less than  a half hour.

In an interview with CNN, Van Halen marvelled at the fact he believed that his  bandmates would be none the wiser to his appearance on ‘Thriller.’ “I said to  myself, ‘Who is going to know that I played on this kid’s record, right?  Nobody’s going to find out.’

But according to the Van Halen News Desk, Van Halen says that the collaboration  did not go over well with the other members of the band. “Certain people in the  band at that time didn’t like me doing things outside the group. But  [singer David  Lee] Roth happened to be in the Amazon or somewhere, and Mike  [Anthony, bassist] was at Disneyland and Al  [Van Halen, drummer] was up in Canada or something, and I was home alone. So  I thought, well, they’ll never know.”

After having suggested an alternate arrangement for ‘Beat It,’ Van Halen  didn’t quite know how Jackson would react to the changes he made to the  song.

“I was just finishing the second solo when Michael walked in,” he recalled.  “And you know artists are kind of crazy people. We’re all a little bit strange.  I didn’t know how he would react to what I was doing. So I warned him before he  listened. I said, ‘Look, I changed the middle section of your song,’ Now in my  mind, he’s either going to have his bodyguards kick me out for butchering his  song, or he’s going to like it. And so he gave it a listen, and he turned to me  and went, ‘Wow, thank you so much for having the passion to not just come in and  blaze a solo, but to actually care about the song, and make it better.’

As a side note, the guitar riff that underpins ‘Beat it’ was played by Steve Lukather of Toto.

In 1983, Freddie Mercury  spent six hours in Jackson’s home studio, laying  down vocals on three songs, ‘There Must Be More to Life than This,’  ‘State of Shock’ and ‘Victory.’ Both parties eventually deemed the songs  unsuitable for official consumption and have been frequently bootlegged,  although the first two were released in other forms (see below). In 2013, Queen guitarist Brian  May said that he was building upon the outtakes for a forthcoming album.

In order to raise money for African famine relief, Jackson and Lionel Richie  co-wrote ‘We Are the World.’ The two, with Quincy Jones producing, gathered  together an incredible array of some of the era’s most popular musicians under  the name USA for Africa. Among the rockers who contributed to the track were Bruce  Springsteen, Bob  Dylan, Billy  Joel and Paul  Simon. ‘We Are the World’ was No. 1 for a month and raised a reported $63  million.

When it came time to record the follow-up to ‘Thriller,’ Quincy Jones  reportedly called producer Ted  Templeman to ask who he could recommend to perform a guitar solo on the song  ‘Dirty Diana,’ which would become another No. 1 hit for Jackson. Not wanting to  repeat themselves by bringing Eddie Van Halen back into the studio, Templeman  recommended Billy  Idol guitarist Steve Stevens.

When Jones made the initial call to Stevens, the guitarist didn’t believe the  person on the other end of the phone line. “I was living in New York at the time  and I got a phone call from Quincy Jones,” he said. “The phone rang and I thought someone was f—ing with  me. I hung up the phone but then the phone rings again and he goes, ‘Don’t hang  up, because this is the real deal.'”

Stating that the original version of ‘Dirty Diana’ that he performed on was  over seven minutes in length, Stevens didn’t expect the song to be as dark and  heavy as it was.

“Michael was very musical,” he continued. “The things he requested and asked  for were all really cool ideas. He understood what I was about and was trying to  get the best out of my performance. It was a great session.”

Jackson’s desire to seek unconventional collaborations continued with 1991’s  ‘Dangerous.’ The pop star selected Guns  N’ Roses guitarist Slash to play on the track  ‘Give in to Me,’ although many mistakenly believe the legendary guitarist played  on Jackson’s single ‘Black or White.’

Slash set the record straight in a 2010 interview, saying, “I did not play on [that song]. The  sound of the guitar [on that song] is very happy. It just doesn’t sound like me,  anyone would know that. It’s not the guitar sound you would expect from me, but  somehow I got pigeonholed as the guy who played on that song.”

Of course, that didn’t stop Slash and Jackson from eventually performing ‘Black & White’ together live.