Can a single from Michael Jackson be bad? Well unless you're talking about the title track of his third album then surely not. But when we're dealing with such an acclaimed and truly remarkable artist as Michael Jackson, we have to consider the good, the excellent and the downright stunning. Michael Jackson's "Ghosts" single falls into the latter category mentioned above. Claiming the title of his second most expensive video, with work contributed from the famous author Stephen King, this track was obviously designed to be a landmark on his "Blood on the Dancefloor" album. After "Dangerous", Michael Jackson's career started to veer towards becoming just that. With continually falling sales for each new album released, things weren't looking too good. While sales for each album were remarkable by normal standards, for Michael Jackson it simply wasn't up to scratch. His "Blood on the Dancefloor" album, in my opinion is actually pretty fantastic but since it was seen as a cash-in, with remixes from HIStory, it suffered greatly when it came to people forking out. On this album, "Ghosts" was one of the new tracks and the one I am now going to review...
THE CREDITS
This track was written and composed by Michael Jackson and Teddy Riley and was mixed by Dave
Way. Brad Buxer and Doug Grigsby also contributed to the keyboards and synthesizers. . The drum programming is courtesy of Matt Carpenter, Doug Grigsby, Andrew Scheps, Rob Hoffman and Alex Breuer. This information isn't really important for reviewing the track but you may recognise some of the names who helped in its production.
THE SETTING
For the video, Michael wanted nothing but the best and so hired the skills and talents of Stephen King. The story is about a strange man who haunts an old house. No surprise that Michael plays the strange man. The family are very traumatised by the man and beg him to leave. In the video, he takes the stage in the hall of the mansion, dancing with a whole throng of ghouls and ghosts. He is wearing a white shirt and tight black trousers. During his dance routine, Michael changes into a rotting skeleton, but continues to dance in his usual manner. This may sound odd but the video is truly spectacular and it immediately becomes obvious that it has had a lot spent on it.
THE TRACK
So we've covered the setting and video and now we come to the track itself. The track kicks off with church-like vocals that quickly increase in volume to break into a beat, where an odd metallic sound drums into it which actually sounds excellent and fits into the track well. The beat is very thumpy and has an element of percussion in the background. Having worked into a steady beat, Michael kicks in with his lyrics, talking about how the house is haunted (or rather singing). As he continues, a backing sound creeps in, to accompany the other sounds which creates a truly wonderful sound for the track. For the first chorus, Michael only sings the former stages, followed by a trademark yelp. The track is truly excellent as it incorporates ghostly and haunting sounds into it, including grunts and screams. Now the track really gets into its stride and the verses are a mixture of Michaels usual singing voice with a more high pitched repetition between sections of "Don't understand it". This is then proceeded by singing to the end of the chorus which ends with "Tell me, are you the ghost of jealousy". As the track progresses, more yelps and sound effects interject to work into the track wonderfully. The track is also excellent as it uses the backing sound at appropriate sections to really build up the track to sound exciting, only to then break down all sound to the basic beat. In the latter stages, this basic beat is followed by a sound which sounds like a cross between the backing sound and the church-like vocals from the beginning which sounds truly excellent, exciting and makes the track very paced and enjoyable to listen to. This is follwed by one more verse and chorus section and then repeats for the end, with Michael adding sparing vocals on top of the mixture. The track then ends on a single line from Michael followed by a ghostly banging sound to round things off. The track definately has a very spooky and ghotsly feel to it throughout the entire piece and is structured excellently to bring in appropriate sounds, tunes and beats at various sections to really build things up. This is not a "catchy" track but is deeply impressive and definately very impressionable. Personally, I find it to now be my favourite track on the whole "Blood on the Dancefloor" album and one of my favourite offerings from Michael of all time. Now thats saying something.
BLOOD ON THE DANCEFLOOR
This is the album that this track comes from and is now my favourite track on the album. I have actually written a review on "Blood on the Dancefloor", so if you found this review interesting then I recommend reading that one also. At the time of writing it, I had not given this track a fair listening and so did not review it within the album review.
CONCLUSION
Whatever you may think of Michael Jackson, even what you think of his later music, this track really is an excellent piece of work that suggests endless talent from the man himself. If you ever get the chance to listen to this track, make sure you do and you won't regret it - this must be heard! The "Blood on the Dancefloor" album can now be bought for £5:00 if you shop around and so may be worth buying the album since there are plenty of remarkable tracks from Michael on there.
So that sums up this review. I hope you enjoyed the read and I encourage you to listen to this track. I also recommend reading the review for the album which reviews most of the other tracks on there too.
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I have the 'Blood on the Dance floor' album. Don't remember how Ghost goes though!
Ryan74 08.02.2004 00:38
Great op. I'm not a big fan of 'Ghosts' and his later work but his work ranging from 'Off The Wall' to 'Bad' was absolutely phenomenal, truly brilliant stuff. It's a pity then that since then he has gone absolutely crazy.
![Michael Jackson - Ghosts [VHS TAPE]](http://picnicb.ciao.com/uk/81423623.jpg "Michael Jackson - Ghosts [VHS TAPE]")
![History/Ghosts [CD 1] - Michael Jackson](http://images.ciao.com/ide/images/icons/no_pic_generic_S1.gif "History/Ghosts [CD 1] - Michael Jackson"){kind=icon}
Feb 7th, 2004
very helpful by (100%):
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