The iconic duet between Michael Jackson and Paul McCartney on ”Say Say Say” is among the most recognizable and beloved musical collaborations in popular music. But now the song, from 1983’s Pipes Of Peace album and one of three tracks on which the two superstars worked together, has been remixed to feature alternative vocals from Paul and the late Michael which have never before seen the light of day.
The song launched exclusively on Facebook today (Tuesday October 6th), with an accompanying dance video that replaces the original featuring MJ and McCartney playing traveling con men in the Wild West. Directed by the choreographer and performance artist Ryan Heffington – recently noted for his choreography work on Sia’s “Chandelier” promo – and filmed in LA, the video follows a teenage boy on a journey through his neighborhood.
Paul McCartney and Michael Jackson 'Say Say Say [2015 Remix]'
Paul McCartney and Michael Jackson – '#SaySaySay [2015 Remix]'Song taken from 'Pipes of Peace 2015 Remaster' – in stores nowVideo directed by Ryan Heffington#PaulMcCartney #MichaelJackson #PipesOfPeace
Posted by Paul McCartney on Tuesday, October 6, 2015
While working on the remasters for 1983’s Pipes Of Peace album and accompanying bonus material at Abbey Road Studios in January this year, Paul was listening to an instrumental remix of “Say Say Say” by DJ John ‘Jellybean’ Benitez when he recalled there were unused vocals. The original multi-track masters were located and Paul’s Chief Engineer at his studio in Sussex, Steve Orchard, along with Paul fused the unheard recordings to the Jellybean mix. The extended track – which stretches to seven minutes compared to the original single’s 3 minutes 56 seconds – was then given a further polish with a remix by Mark ‘Spike’ Stent.
The groundbreaking partnership of two of the biggest stars in the music world began with a phone call which Paul received out of the blue after Michael got hold of his personal number and called, suggesting they should collaborate.
Paul remembers: “He (Michael) rang me up, and I didn’t believe it was him, so I said “who’s this?” He said ‘Michael’. ‘Are you sure… Michael who?!’. Anyway, we had a joke about that kind of thing, and he said, ‘yeah, I’d like to come over and write with you’, so I said great. So he came over to England and we just sat down. I thought, well, it’s not easy to just sit down with anyone you don’t know and just write, start songwriting because you’ve got to get the chemistry right. But I thought, it is Michael – you know, I’ll just try! If it doesn’t work, we’ll just throw it away …”
Orchard says: “Paul remembered that there were two unused lead vocal performances by Michael and himself. He said we should try putting the unused lead vocals onto the Jellybean mix. The Jellybean mix is a 12″ and is much longer than the original version. It was originally made by making edit sections of the song with different instruments being muted to make up new sections and then spliced together.
“I needed to edit and arrange the alternative lead vocals to fit the 12″ format. We then rearranged the vocal sequence and inverted the original performance so that Michael opened the first verse instead of Paul, to give the song a different take to the original version. Then we added additional backing vocal parts from the original multi-track to further enhance the instrumental mix. Paul then said it would be great to get Spike Stent to mix the new version of the track to give the song a new vibe.”
Photo: Getty Images
