Michael Jackson MAN IN THE MIRROR Original Studio Multitracks (Listening Session, Analysis)

hey Chris Liepe here with some more Michael Jackson Studio multi-track videos this one we've got Man in the Mirror which was one of if not the last song written for bad was not written by Michael it was written by c.garrett and Glenn Ballard Garrett also does some background vocals on it and it features some amazing things in terms of production and arranging the message of the song is awesome and As Time Magazine put it way back when probably the best use of a gospel choir in a pop song love th

e Blends how Michael's voice interacts with the choir frees him up to do his signature ad-libbing and emoting over this flowing track and the instrumentation the Quincy Jones era I mean enough said this is a singing Channel I get to teach people how to sing by polling from their vocal influences their Idols oftentimes when people try to sing like their favorite singers they go about it completely the wrong way if you want to learn how to pull from your Inspirations the right way without getting

frustrated or comparing yourself to other singers who you think are better than you click the link below and join my free voice course I'll help you clear out the distractions and the fear and help you experiment with your voice in new ways as has become the custom with these videos we will start with the music and then we'll spend the bulk of our time on the vocals I'm floored every time I get one of these multi-track sessions to hear how all of the different percussive elements particularly in

the Quincy Jones era are layered together for just just wonderful sounds wonderful sounds here's uh when the kit comes in [Music] just listen to how this builds [Music] start simple [Music] thank you okay [Music] some bass in there [Music] I mean what there's one two three four five six seven eight nine ten I mean there's a lot of tracks going on here and it still sounds it sounds so simple and unified [Music] I also find this interesting about the bass listen to the base di so mono mono di her

e [Music] foreign but listen to the spread it has once we add the the effects it sounds like a chorusing effect [Music] what I find interesting just in in modern recording if you have a Di and you have you know these these effects things these are all direct so it could be that there's was some crosstalk or something when this stuff is being dumped to digital but why am I hearing a headphone bleed [Music] I don't know it's strange but I like this chorusing it's it's one take I like that you get

the the depth the meat the Bassy sound from the DI [Music] clearly a lower extension and then you've got the width and the the sort of chorusing pitch effect with those other ones [Music] and just have to give a shout out to the incredible piano performance [Music] that's after the key change [Music] put that in with the drums of percussion [Music] listen that run oh man [Music] Greg fillinganes incredible job on the piano this particular passage right here shows you the power of you know we we

have these simple layered static relatively static drums and percussion and then the groove and the pocket the pulling the pushing of the beat and the Soul comes from the the acoustically played performed instruments something that's missing in a lot of music today where if everything is programmed everything is quantized you lose that that push-pull relationship that you get like this [Music] you get that that anticipation and that that movement that you just can't program it has to be performe

d roads Dan Huff not Hoth Huff's guitar [Music] love Dan Huff [Music] and [Music] masterful arranging and execution now let's get to the vocals what we have here is a sum of all of the lead vocals and then we have breakouts of the uh The Winans and the The Gospel Choir section so we can hear some of those isolated which is super cool and Michael's background vocals his lead vocals and anybody else who might be doing background vocals is summed in this stereo track there's so much detail that you

can hear here once you once you isolate this from the music anytime Michael gets a chance to lean in to other vocal performers on stage or in the recording whatever he just goes into a whole other Universe with his vocal freedom and you really get this sense listening from the very beginning all the way through the end how he continues to I mean keychain is huge but he continues to expand his his textures and tonalities and energy in this song there aren't many Michael Jackson songs that have t

his level of like starting here and ending up here from a vocal performance standpoint and I think that speaks to how good of a collaborator he was how he drew from the energy of other performers like not many other artists did my life it's gonna feel real good Gonna Make a Difference signature you know snapping while he's on the mic uh the exits the percussive exits of his notes all things that we've come to know and love about Michael was it his vibrato here his vibrato changes from song to so

ng but for once in my life life this is a very chesty vibrato it's it's not like a lot of singers and not like he does sometimes where he tends to lean into his head life right it's not that life and if you listen carefully there's a bit more and even if you look at the web the uh the waveform you can see that it's it's more of an amplitude thing unless of a pitch thing so almost like a tremolo not necessarily a pure vibrato as we'd normally think about it well once in my life life less pitch va

riation and more more Dynamic variation kind of cool to see and hear kind of put a finger on why his vibrato sounds so different there again turned up on my favorite open this wind is blowing my mind see it's this kind of thing we don't hear enough of anymore here how he finished mind right it's very exaggerating [Music] he is ending that word on purpose it's really easy as a vocalist to just mind not have those sorts of pick-me-ups at the ends of phrases one of the reasons we like Michael Jacks

on so much is the way he exited his notes not just the way he's saying the notes started the note hit the pitch but the way he got out of it and connected it to other rhythmic aspects of vocal performance like beatboxing breathing blowing my mind oh [Music] okay listen to how the Dynamics grow in his voice it just ever I hear it [Music] [Music] I'm asking him to change his ways yes hear how clean he is and then grits it up just enough and then cleans it back up for the for the starting of the ho

ok in other songs and angrier songs because it calls for it he can bring that that perfect Grit in and out where it needs to be you'd think that he would you know start gritty okay let's be gritty for for the hook for the chorus because it's it's up it's big no there's this sense of restraint and I think also lyrically it calls for a cleaner approach on the chorus and so being attentive to what the song needs not just what you can or can't do with your voice is a another huge lesson we can learn

from Michael particularly in this song but I love how he brings that grit in in this in this brief pre-chorus pre-hook setting [Music] the mirror I'm asking him to change his way [Music] I bet the place take a look at yourself and then make a change uh-huh uh cool riff there or ad-lib run anyway it's never smart to try to get the exact notes or inflection that Michael does but listening to something like that and then trying in your own voice it sounds like he's moving his mouth and his tone ar

ound a ton even as he's moving those those notes around oh oh yeah what does that inspire me to do with my own voice that I wouldn't have otherwise been inspired to do even if it sounds nothing like what Michael's doing that's why I love listening to Michael is that I sound nothing like him nothing I can't do almost I can do almost nothing that he does but when I when I try to put some of his ideas in my own voice I almost always discover something like just that right there I've been a victim o

f being a victim of when was the last time that you if you sing did something like that saying with that amount of aggression conviction and percussive overload you think you might think you're being stupid if you're being that exaggerated Michael Jackson wasn't stupid there's so much we can take from his his range of performance I'm not just talking about vocal range although that's impressive too his dynamic range his rhythmic range don't be afraid to experiment like this a selfish kind of lov

e it's time that I realize there too like the way he he made his tone different listen here a selfish it's almost like a yeah yeah just clearing his throat and then somebody doesn't realize a selfish kind of love it's time self is kind of love so different in tone Timbre and placement the love is it's time that I realize it's a time that I realize some that I realize his tone is so cool and so unique because it's dynamic because it's always changing because he places different notes leans into v

owels and differently slightly unconventional ways and draws you in with the variety so many singers oh I'm trying to find my best tone what tone do you think I use all sorts of different tones and let all sorts of different colors you don't see hardly any picture painted with one color very colorful lots of different tones lots of depth is what draws us into all forms of art why should it be any different in how we pursue great vocal tone I'm gonna love could it be pretending that they're not a

lone [Music] [Music] that's why I'm starting with me I love those background vocals there that's why I'm starting starting with me totally clean and and then with that's why I'm starting with me starting with it's got that wonderful grit that he's placing just for this little section and then [Music] I'm asking him to change his ways it's actually kind of cool the this on this chorus there was more attack more compression more grit at the beginning and then he cleaned it up it wasn't like the la

st one he really hit that I'm harder it was more nasal not I'm but I'm and then he backed off light [Music] [Music] no [Music] no yep he's upping the intensity [Music] [Music] I'm asking them to change his ways I gotta hear the way that Harmony goes over this one section again [Music] [Laughter] okay then we'll go to this part where the choir and all that stuff kicks in oh my this is so cool now look [Music] thank you listen to the ah that release there just perfectly positioned as a percussive

instrument really [Music] make that and I love how he leans into the word no mustache [Music] here we go we're gonna we're gonna mute the leads and just listen to The Winans and the choir tracks here so we can fully appreciate them and then we'll add Michael and the other background vocals back in because this is where we really get that sense of Michael transferring into that other headspace that other world where now this stuff is happening and he's free to just improvise and and soar there ar

en't many vocalists that I would use that word sore ah okay here we go [Music] it's kind of cool too to hear like the Winans tracks [Applause] [Music] it's beautiful smaller you better change all those imperfections of group vocals like it's not Pitch corrected it's not time corrected so cool man you better change and change it is up there it's so cool [Music] and in the headphone bleed you can hear Michael in the background doing some of his you know whoops and and improvs and stuff like that i

t would be interesting to know uh in what order or or how you know these things were recorded because I get the I get the feeling I get the energy from Michael that he was reacting to these these group Parts in in his vocals so maybe maybe he did the improvs uh at the same time these guys were recording to get that sort of or maybe not maybe he was just that good at visualizing uh what was going to be there and transporting himself to that place knowing that these were going to be there now list

en to the to the choir we're gonna add the choir in here to the to the Winans group Okay so now we got oh here's just the choir [Music] and then make the change my [Applause] okay so let's let's see if we can get some Clues from the headphone bleed aha so there is headphone bleed in of of Michael in the Winans tracks but but you don't hear that with the choir [Applause] oh we don't want no there [Music] I love those little incidentals but you do hear the headphone bleed of Michael that includes

Michael in this section that man that that section right there so if I had to make an educated guess the choir parts were recorded before Michael's final parts were recorded they were doing their things and then Michael was able to go in and perform to the lay down choir and then the Winans did their stuff after the choir and after Michael did his his ad-libs okay let's put it all together foreign [Music] [Music] demand the man uh one of my favorite Michael Jackson moments is in this song so muc

h energy and his voice is this this instrument it's rhythmic it's propelling the track forward and it's it's it sounds so off the cuff even though we know he's so well rehearsed [Music] [Applause] the place [Music] [Applause] now here's what with with the with the Hoops listen to how the the choir and group vocals interact in light of this and what it what it Spurs on in Michael [Music] [Applause] hear that foot tapping [Applause] [Music] again [Applause] it's like he's revving down with those y

ayas the breaks have been put on and he's going ah and then you you you connect it to the rest of the song so that the way that he crescendos and day crescendos with his voice and and sort of sort of foreshadows where he's going is really really cool [Applause] like I'm gonna make a change it's gonna feel real good yes [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] you got it it's like this call and answer thing that that's happening where you've got you've got Michael at his at his grittiest and

intense uh riffing he's he's vocal riffing here and uh like you know guitar player leaning into a bent note over and over again you know it's just himself yeah [Music] [Applause] [Music] thank you change [Music] mainly [Music] so now how percussive the man in the mirror like it's intentionally short there getting out of the way of what uh you know what Michael has the chance to do here [Music] [Applause] [Music] that is an amazing line [Music] hear that hear the step in his notes there [Music]

Man in the Mirror so bluesy he does it so fast right Man in the Mirror that's hard man getting that that step right there and and and having that compression the grit over it too that fast starting with them starting with the man in the mirror started with the man in the mirror [Music] you have to live and [Music] I have to live a jacket cool like I said the interaction between the group vocals and Michael's energy at the end and how it opens up Michael's energy continues between the track and t

he choir Arrangements it continues to open up and just gives you this like yeah oh I'm empowered it's so well connected to what the lyrics are saying and uh yeah just special Priceless thank you for watching thank you for watching all the way to the end these videos can tend to be long again if you'd like more help uncovering how you can be inspirational with your own voice by drawing from others that you are inspired by click the link below and join my free course we'll see you for more