12 years after the release of Michael, the first posthumous collection of Michael Jackson‘s unreleased songs, three songs have been removed from streaming services after several claims that the vocals are not his. According to Stereogum, the official story is that Jackson recorded the songs “Breaking News”, “Keep Your Head Up” and “Monster” featuring 50 Cent back in 2007 with the songwriting and production team of Edward Cascio and James Porte. However, fans believe that the vocals belong to Italian-American R&B singer Jason Malachi.
Devoted fans have expressed their doubts about the songs’ authenticity for many years. Malachi reportedly admitted to recording the vocals in a Facebook post from 2011, but the post has since been removed and claimed to be fake by Malachi’s manager. In 2014, a fan named Vera Serova later filed a class-action lawsuit over the three songs for alleged violation of consumer laws, unfair competition and fraud. However, the court ruled that it didn’t matter whether or not Jackson had really sung on the tracks.
Even members of Jackson’s family believe that the vocals are fake. According to American Songwriter, Jackson’s mother Katherine Jackson said that “some of the tracks on the album are fake.” His nephew Taryll Jackson tweeted, “How they constructed these songs is very sneaky and sly. I know my uncle’s voice, and something’s seriously wrong when you have immediate family saying it’s not him.”
Sony Music has removed all three songs from streaming services including Youtube, Apple Music and Spotify. In response to a fan page, a spokesperson for Jackson’s estate says, “The removal of these three songs has nothing to do with their authenticity. The Estate and Sony Music believe the continuing conversation about the tracks is distracting the fan community and casual Michael Jackson listeners from focusing their attention where it should be — on Michael’s legendary and deep music catalog.”
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