Infectious Groove Podcast - New Episode Every Monday

There's also the misconception that because someone is exceptionally gifted, they find it easy. Will.i.am said that MJ spent hours warming up his voice before hitting the studio when they worked together and that he'd never experienced anything like that before with anyone else he'd worked with. Fans love to think of MJ as being superhuman,but he couldn't just roll out of bed and produce an exquisite vocal performance on a tap without intense warming up of the vocal chords first. Of course, MJ had a naturally beautiful tone, but take a look at the WMA 2006 when they literally shoved a microphone in front of him to try and force him into a performance. He sings a little and although he doesn't sound bad, he's using head voice/falsetto to produce some of those higher notes. On the studio demo he sings those same parts effortlessly in a mixed voice and sounds great. The media tried to push the angle that MJ had lost his voice, but the great live performances of IJCSLY and Human Nature on TII prove that was bs. With the WMA 06, he hadn't anticipated someone literally bullying him out onto stage and therefore didn't prepare or warm up the voice.

Another misconception about singing is that you can always reproduce the same results once you've trained. Singing is a discipline like learning to play any instrument, and if you don't practise everyday, you will start to suck. The larynx is a muscle, which has muscle memory. If you don't use that muscle regularly, it won't work. MJs vocal coach on TII said that they'd worked extensively on building MJs voice back up and this would be because he hadn't toured or recorded in many years and it would've taken time to get his voice where it needed to be. There are dozen of variables that effect how good you sound, and tiredness is a big one. Singing can be a very frustrating artform to practise, because one day you can be hitting all the notes with ease and the next it can take an hour and a half of warming up the voice first to produce the same result. The difference is usually down to something physical, like how well rested you are or whether you've had a stressful day. Tiredness and tension are the enemies of a singer. My singing teacher used to get me to use the Alexander technique to relieve tension and it's incredible to see how carrying lower tension in your back for example, can adversely effect what you're capable of producing with your voice.

If MJ was sleep deprived on the HIStory tour, there is no way he would be able to give decent vocal performances night after night. HIStoric questionned why he didn't try and perform some of the slower songs like Stranger In Moscow, but even that song has a very demanding chest voice section at the end (the "we're talking danger" part). That is the part of MJs voice that would be the most challenging for him to produce, as is evidenced by the fact that whenever The Voice/X Factor singers cover Earth Song, they pretend as if the What About Us section of the song doesn't exist. I keep talking about Earth Song, because that is one of the most extreme examples (probably alongside Keep The Faith), where he is singing with that aggressive, shouting chest voice for a prolonged period of time. That's why it makes me laugh when you see those graph charts of singers ranges and it looks like people like Justin Timberlake or Prince hit higher notes than MJ. Yes, maybe they do using their head voice or falsetto, which is relatively easy to accomplish, but these guys would never be able to replicate MJs chest voice range even on their best day.

The reason why MJs songs became increasingly more challenging from a technical standpoint is because he used that "Earth Song voice" a lot, albeit fleetingly on many songs on Bad, Dangerous, HIStory and Invincible. And it's the transition between the two, from the clean mixed voice, to the angry chest voice which is challenging, and would cause MJ to struggle to perform much of this material live. When you really study his catalogue from a vocal perspective, there are songs which sound deceptively easy, where you wouldn't necessarily identify him using that "Earth Song voice", but he does it fleetingly to accomplish the higher notes, instead of using head voice or falsetto like many singers would. A song like You Are My Life for example, the middle eight section, the "love was always here waiting for me" line uses that angry chest voice. It's just one line, but I'd wager that if MJ were just to roll out of bed and try and sing that song, he would have to use his falsetto to sing that bit, as his angry chest voices isn't something that can just be turned on like a tap. If a singer like Usher or Timberlake were to sing that same song, they would not be able to pull off that line without copping out and using falsetto, no matter how many takes they did.

I personally believe this is why MJ didn't perform more songs from the Dangerous album on the Dangerous tour and why the new songs on HIStory were all lip-synched on the HIStory tour. He transitions constantly from his mixed voice to his chest voice on those albums, making it almost impossible to pull off a lot of those songs live on a two and a half hour show. Perhaps if he was doing a one-off performance, then it would be more realistic.

What MJ achieved vocally on Bad, Dangerous, HIStory and Invincible is nothing short of spectacular, and utterly, utterly world class. But in essence, MJ became a studio singer after the Bad tour, focusing his efforts on producing vocal performances in the studio which other singers could only dream of pulling off. He could've chosen to focus more on the live singing aspect of his career, but then he would've had to dial back some of the more ambitious vocal songs on his albums to realistically be able to perform his music live. And I don't know about you, but I would rather have the world class vocal performances on songs that I can enjoy for the rest of my life, than MJ have been less demanding of his voice, and produced material that was easier to sing just so that he could pull it off live.