I’ve been in this business 60 years and success is an amazing animal. It’s a very complex animal. It’s a lot to eat. There were a lot of things that were bothering Michael  cuz I felt the tension. It was subliminal, but I could feel it  a lot, you know. You can’t I’d say he was a happy-go-lucky person, you know, all through his career.

Michael Jackson and Quincy Jones, one of the most decorated and commercially successful collaborations in pop music history. But their road to riches and superstardom was characterized just as much by tension and power struggles as it was by unprecedented  success and critical acclaim. Having first worked together on the set of 1978’s The Wiz, >>  >> the duo would go on to forge Jackson’s iconic 1980s sound, a decade he would ultimately conquer with the release of Off the Wall, Thriller,  and Bad.

Yet after 10 years of dominating the global charts, they abruptly stopped working together. In the years that followed,  they publicly distanced themselves from one another. So what caused the sudden and seemingly permanent split? Was it rivalry, betrayal,  creative sabotage, or all of the above? Here’s the detail.

Michael Jackson and Quincy Jones first crossed paths in 1978 on the set of the film adaptation of the all-black Broadway production of The Wizard of Oz, >>  >> The Wiz. By this point, Quincy was already a legend in both music and film scoring. He had worked with the greats, Louis Armstrong, Ray Charles, Aretha Franklin, Sammy Davis Jr.

, and Frank Sinatra to  name just a few and was responsible for the movie’s musical direction. Michael, meanwhile,  was there as a performer and first-time actor playing the Scarecrow. The two bonded while working on the film’s music. First on Ease On Down the Road with co-star Diana Ross, >>  >> and then on You Can’t Win, Michael’s only solo performance in the film.

Michael came over to my house. I’d met him when he was 12 at Sammy’s house. Well, I was about 12 years old. And I remember at the Academy Awards seeing Michael when he was little sing Ben, the love story about the rat, you know. When Michael was 19, we first worked together. He was co-starring him and I was a musical director.

 I was assisting him for the score of the movie version of The Wiz. We worked on The  Wiz first. It was terrific. It’s something I always wanted to do. And uh it was a lot of fun working with all the greats, Sidney Lumet,  Quincy Jones. And then I started to watch him how intuitive he was. He knew everybody’s  dialogue.

 He’d get makeup for 5 hours and you know, all of their songs and all of their dance steps.  Michael was one very, very special talent. I mean, really special in every way and observation, influences,  and dancing, and singing, everything. He’s a mystical thing, you know. Uh because he was so smart and intuitive, you know.

 He just soaked up everything and he watched everybody.  James Brown, Fred Astaire, Sammy Davis. Unbeknownst to Quincy,  Michael would later reflect on his time filming The Wiz as an overwhelmingly positive and liberating experience. At just 19 years old, it was the first time he had been allowed to spend extended time away from his family.

 And crucially, from the ever critical eye of his father. For the first time, he felt creatively inspired and free to experiment, to express himself openly. Working on the set of a real movie musical, the kind he had been obsessed with as a child, felt like  a dream realized. It was a period of his life Michael didn’t want to end.

And before filming had even wrapped, he approached Quincy with a proposition. Would he produce his first true solo record as an adult artist. And uh he said, “I’m going to go up beyond Epic and I’d like you to help me find  a producer.” I said, “Michael, I don’t want to talk about that.

 You don’t even have a song in the picture yet.” And I started to see a maturity in him  that I respected in a lot in the Motown records and all of uh all of his stuff, ABC, you know, Dance Machine, all the great things  they did and great producers. Uh I thought I’d like to take a shot at producing your your your new record cuz I felt something else in him.

Their bond had deepened during production. The former child star held immense respect for Quincy’s vast experience and was in awe of the caliber of careers he had shaped. Michael was preparing to break away from the Jackson sound and reintroduce  himself not as a prodigy, not as a group member, but as a fully formed solo artist, a grown  man.

He needed the right producer to execute that transformation. >>  >> Someone with sophistication, someone with authority, someone who could position him not as a relic of childhood fame, but as the defining pop star of a new generation. However, when Michael returned to Epic Records  with the suggestion that Quincy produce his next album, the label hesitated.

 Executives reportedly believed Quincy was too rooted in jazz, not contemporary enough to appeal to Michael’s core pop and R&B audience. But Michael was determined. He returned to Epic and argued his case and eventually the label  relented. Once that decision was made, it wasn’t simply the start of a new collaboration. It was the beginning of a new Michael Jackson.

We finished the movie.  Michael came back all teary-eyed one day and said the people at Epic don’t want to use you. They said you’re too jazzy, you know. I said, “Michael,  we will be fine. Just fine.” And I he Thank God he went back and they fought and they said, “He’s doing it,  you know.

” Everybody at Epic, black and white, said, “No way. It’s not going to work.” And I love that. I know. All you got to do is get me going is underestimate me. When I first started working with him, >>  >> his father and everybody else says you can’t make him any bigger. I said, “We’ll see.” And uh one thing led to another.

  During the recording of Off the Wall, Quincy and Michael formed a close creative bond. >>  >> Jones took control of the sessions using cutting-edge studio technology and his meticulous production and discipline to build an entirely new sound around  Jackson’s distinctive vocals. What resulted was an undeniable new direction for the artist.

 The record embodied Michael’s new superstar persona filled with optimism and infectious electric energy. Off the Wall produced  four top 10 hits. Don’t Stop ‘Til You Get Enough, Rock with You, Off the Wall, and She’s Out of My Life, and earned Jackson his first solo Grammy Award, winning Best Male R&B Vocal Performance for its lead  single.

I felt a lot of things inside that nobody had heard before. I had top-drawer equipment that could take him even much further. >>  >> You know, one gift that you hope you have is being able to see something before it happens, you know, and then work backwards in the detail to see how to figure out how to get there.

 You can tell that they’ve  got it if you know exactly who they are in the first 20 seconds of their record. If you have to call them and say, “Who was that singing?” then you know, you have a rough time. So, uh we hit the first one and uh the first album Michael was on the road most of the time with the with the brothers, and so he did two songs in there, and I got one track I did with the Brothers Johnson on Get  on the Floor.

That’s my boy who does not use any profanity, ever. Right, right, Smelly? No, no, no, no. And and so when it got good, we said, “That’s not good.” He said, “Don’t say that. It’s smelly jelly.” And up to that point, Michael’s most emotional moment was Ben. >>  >> He was singing about a love affair with a rat.

 So, I steered him to a lot of songs like, you know, She’s Out of My Life, which I was saving for Sinatra. >>  >> And he cried at the end of it every time, and so I just left it on the record, the crying, cuz it was a very real emotion, you know. And the result was Off the Wall, an album  that featured rock with you, she’s out of my she’s out of my life, and don’t stop till you get enough.

 And it was the biggest black album in the history of that time. All the guys who would >>  >> badmouth me and this this and me, it saved their jobs. It really did,  you know, so they That’s God’s way of evening things out. If you shoot your vision high enough, you know, and you only get 50% you’re doing pretty good.

You know, so you keep it real  high, like like no no boundaries at all. By 1982, the album had sold over 8 million copies, becoming the best-selling album ever released by a black artist at that point. Beyond his early Motown child stardom, Jackson had now proven himself as a vibrant solo artist with his disco-defying breakout.

 However, despite these achievements, Jackson was surprisingly disappointed by the record’s outcome, both critically and commercially. He expressed how upset he was about the perceived underperformance of Off the Wall, feeling it deserved the Grammy award for record of the year. From Michael’s standpoint, he and Quincy Jones had produced one hell of an album, and all he received in return was what felt like a token gesture from Grammy voters, who still saw him as that cute little kid with the great moves on the Ed Sullivan Show.

Therefore, Michael Jackson approached recording his next LP with fierce competitive determination, motivated by the bitter disappointment he felt in his refusal to be overlooked again. With laser focus, Michael was intent on studying, practicing, and creating something so incredible it would be impossible for anyone to ignore.

In general, Michael Jackson was frustrated by albums that had one good song and the rest were like B-sides. The singer said, quote, “Ever since I was a little boy, I would study composition, and it was Tchaikovsky that influenced me the most. If you take an album like Nutcracker Suite, every song is a killer. Every one.

 So, I said to myself, “Why can’t there be a pop album where every song is a killer?” With his next record, Jackson wanted to push his creative capabilities further than ever before. With this in both their minds, during the recording of Thriller in 1982, Quincy and Michael’s creative collaboration expanded. Michael grew more confident in his songwriting abilities and began standing his ground on how the record should be produced.

Their creative differences weren’t destructive. They were productive. Both strong-willed perfectionists, recording sessions were defined by a constant push and pull. Michael later said he was always pushing for more modern sounds, while Quincy, with his deep musical pedigree, often pulled things back toward tradition.

Somewhere within that tension, >>  >> they met in the middle and created music that remains timeless. He just has a great quality uh for excellence, for perfection, and anybody who’s worked on the notices this. He will make you do a thing until it’s perfect. Over and over again? Yes. Is he difficult to work with? No, I like to be grinded a lot.

  Uh no, he’s not difficult at all. He’s He’s He’s beautiful. We have a take. Then he say, “Well, can you give us one more?” But their collaboration during this period wasn’t always harmonious. While recording Billie Jean, Michael Jackson and his producer Quincy Jones frequently clashed over the track’s direction.

 Some reports claim Jones initially felt the song was too weak to be included on the album, a claim he has since denied. However, Jones did dislike the demo and took issue with the baseline’s now iconic 29-second introduction, wanting to shorten it significantly. >>  >> Jackson refused. According to Jones, quote, “The intro to Billie Jean was so long you could shave during it.

 I said we had to get to the melody sooner, but Michael said that was what made him want to dance.  And when Michael Jackson says something makes him want to dance, you don’t argue.  So, he won.” Jones was also uncomfortable with the track’s title, proposing it be changed to Not My Lover, >>  >> fearing listeners might associate the song with tennis star Billie Jean King.

Once again, Jackson refused to compromise. >>  >> He also requested co-producing credit, believing the final version closely resembled his original demo, and sought additional royalties. Jones granted him neither, and the disagreement reportedly  caused the two to stop speaking for several days.

 Jones would later claim that Jackson had drawn inspiration for the song’s instantly recognizable groove from State of Independence, a Donna Summer track Jones had produced, and on which Jackson had sung  backing vocals. Songwriter John Anderson recalled, “Quote, they took the riff >>  >> and made it funky for Billie Jean.

That’s the cross-pollination of music.” >>  >> Meanwhile, Daryl Hall of Hall & Oates said Jackson once told him the groove was influenced by their 1981 hit I Can’t Go For That No Can Do, to which Hall responded, “Quote, oh Michael, what do I care? You did it very differently.” Both claims, however, remain unconfirmed.

And that’s that this whole fallacy about me not liking Billie Jean  is a lie. It is it’s a some some lie that started somewhere cuz it’s a Anybody could hear that that that the record  just nice. And also, I know where it came from. He claims Michael Jackson was a thief, claiming he stole songs from all kinds of artists.

 And he talked about Donna Summer’s State of Independence and Billie Jean. The notes don’t lie. He was as Machiavellian as they come. >> Well, I think when he’s saying stole, he’s not saying  he actually stole songs from them. He’s saying he got a lot of inspiration from it. Despite the tension, Billie Jean became a global phenomenon alongside other hit singles from the album including Beat It, Wanna Be Startin’ Somethin’, Human Nature, P.Y.T.

>>  >> Pretty Young Thing, and the title track, Thriller. Their wildest ambitions were realized and by early 1984, Thriller had become the best-selling album of all time. Almost overnight, Michael Jackson and Quincy Jones transformed from respected industry figures into the most powerful creative partnership in music.

 Their collaborative magic reshaping the landscape of pop forever. Everybody goes into a studio to make the biggest record in the world. >> Sure. And everybody’s always surprised when it isn’t the biggest record in the world. >> I’m surprised when it’s not. It’s supposed to be a lot of hard work. We spent a lot of time laying down on the ground at midnight. Yeah.

Sleeping. 18 hours a day like you’re doing to James. Oh, yeah. We’re sleeping out on the couch. Wake up, mix it, go back to sleep. They were carrying the second engineers out on stretchers and and and musicians too. They were tired, you know. But we were just all wired up and stoked up and just into it, you know.

 It’s a question of doing something over and over and over and over again until you get it right and you figure out what it’s about. One thing that I think worked for us is we didn’t have time for paralysis from analysis. We made Thriller in eight weeks and everything was just right. Again, you know, if you just get out of your own way and let that that force go to work, that’s what happened.

 What we do is once I get those nine songs on their feet, in the nine songs relatively, what are the four weakest? You take those four out, which we substituted with a Human Nature, and we added Lady In My Life, wrote P.Y.T., and added Beat It, and Human Nature. And that together with with  Billie Jean had them starting something that Thriller is over, you know, cuz you got the you got that magic in him.

 And then on top of that, MTV and Michael rode each other to glory, cuz this was the beginning of that. This was when MTV wasn’t playing black records. Remember? Yeah. And Rick James was demonstrating Motown about Super Super Freak and all that. And so we were down in Acapulco recording Ross. So what’s coming up with Michael next? It’s the Billie Jean song. It goes on.

At first the they didn’t know what Thriller was about, the tune. They didn’t have a clue. And the song didn’t make sense to anybody until until the video was made,  because you know, we did some lot of weird stuff on there, you know, Vincent Price, the king of of terror, you know, doing the Edgar Allan Poe type rap in the middle of a pop record like that.

 People said, “What?” 14-minute video. And it was received like a like a feature film,  you know, it’s all around the world. Michael, I think this is going to be the Citizen Kane of the videos. I really do. It’s going to be the most revolutionary thing in the history of the videos, you know. Well, the videos are getting to be I mean, it’s a new art form now, but I think this is leading the way.

 Beat It, this one is leading the way. MTV changed the music business, and Michael and MTV would not have been able to do what they did without each other. They  rode each other to glory. The video’s standard has not changed since then. Britney Spears does the same thing. Madonna does the same thing. It’s the the the foundation, the template was laid back then.

 The album, after being out 13 or 14 months, went up to a million and a half copies a week in sales for 4 months. Which was number one for 37 weeks. Thriller, how many uh record albums did this thing end up selling? Uh uh, 38. 38 >> million 38 million. 45 million 56 million 110 albums, million albums. And it became the biggest selling album in the history of music.

Selling anywhere between We’re still on those 67 to 104 million albums. We still can’t find out if this was pre-RIAA. So, when you did the playback for Billie Jean or for any of the songs on there, was there a moment where you said to yourself, “We’ve done something different, special.” >> No, but that was the whole plan in the beginning, man.

 But, you go through 800 songs to get nine? That’s not casual. But, with that level of success came new tensions, ones that extended beyond the studio. During the album’s award season, Jackson became increasingly determined to receive full recognition for his achievement. After earning a record-breaking 12 Grammy nominations, he reportedly became fixated on breaking the record for the most awards won in a single night.

According to his former spokesman Bob Jones, Jackson allegedly lobbied Grammy officials to ensure any producer award would go directly to him, rather than Quincy. Quincy, however, was officially credited as the album’s producer  alongside Jackson. Bob Jones later wrote, {quote} The King lobbied hard against Quincy getting that Grammy.

 He didn’t want to share the spotlight at all. A Jackson family source echoed the sentiment, claiming {quote} Michael did all of the work. It’s his music, and everyone knows Michael’s sound. But, Quincy was a proud and unrelenting figure. He stood his ground, and ultimately received the award alongside Jackson.

 Despite their smiling faces on the night, some believe this moment marked the beginning of a permanent fracture between the two. The point at which Quincy realized that, despite their shared history, Michael was ultimately looking out for himself. Yet business is business and with the unstoppable momentum of Thriller, walking away would have been unthinkable.

 So instead, they reunited once more for another album. Anyone who says they figured out how to make records that sell more than 50 million records is lying  and smoking Kool-Aid. It don’t work like that. You just find a a group of songs to touch you and give you goosebumps. That’s why I go by my goosebumps.

 I only survey groups or anything like that and let the rest take care of itself. Quincy Jones is a wonderful personality. He’s an incredible producer. He is a wonderful man. He’s such a family person and I love him and we have made history together and I’m thankful. I mean it freaked me out because I was worried about about Michael because in June ’84,  People magazine did a cover on him with no interviews. He didn’t do interviews.

The next week they did another cover on him with no interviews. And the third week, they’re interviewing a whole issue about him and no interviews. And I I think Michael kind of snapped him there a little bit, you know. And it can because if you’re not spiritually grounded, you know, brains, animals, you got to be ready for success why but it’s um you think you deserve it, all that adulation, all that money, or you think you don’t deserve it and you’re fooling everybody.

Following Thriller was an impossible task and its weight was constantly felt during the production of Bad. With Michael Jackson feeling pressured to sustain the pop idol hysteria unleashed by the album and prove its success  was no fluke. CBS and the wider industry were watching closely. The pressure of fame and success was immense both externally and internally.

He reportedly wrote a goal on his bathroom mirror. 100 million. He wanted his next album to sell 100 million copies far out pacing what he had achieved with his previous thriller juggernaut. However, despite Quincy Jones’ determined and ambitious nature, even he knew you couldn’t produce a record with such a lofty goal in mind and actually expect to achieve it.

Music came more organically than that. Quincy’s strengths, song selection, sequencing, and cohesion were crucial. But by now, their dynamic was shifting. They were increasingly disjointed, and Michael was increasingly doubting Quincy’s direction. In 1987, Quincy arranged for Prince to duet with Michael on the title track, Bad.

According to a family source, quote, Michael kind of looked up to Quincy, almost like he looked at Motown founder Berry Gordy. So, when Quincy got Prince to agree to the song, Michael felt that it would be good only because that’s what Quincy promised. But he didn’t know that Quincy had agreed to give Prince top billing on Michael’s own song.

The duet collapsed.  It remains unclear who ultimately canceled it. But when Prince publicly discussed the failed collaboration, Michael reportedly absolutely lost it  and blamed Quincy for the entire situation. It was clear that Jackson and Jones were having ongoing disagreements >>  >> about how Michael should proceed musically.

 As Jackson stated in his autobiography Moonwalk, published in 1988, quote, We fight. We disagree on some things. If we struggle at all, it’s about new stuff, the latest technology. I’ll say, Quincy, you know, music changes all the time. Sure, the two had conquered the industry with Off the Wall and Thriller, >>  >> but during the recording of Bad, Jackson wanted greater creative control and grew increasingly concerned that Jones wasn’t in tune with emerging trends in the fast moving music  landscape.

 Quincy Jones, meanwhile, wanted Michael to incorporate hip hop into his sound for the Bad record. Quote, “I remember when we were doing Bad, I had Run DMC in the studio because I could see what was coming with hip hop.” He said, “and Michael was telling Michael’s manager, Frank DiLeo, ‘I think Quincy’s losing it and doesn’t understand the market anymore.

He doesn’t know that rap is dead.'” This was just  before N.W.A. and It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back, suggesting that Jones, at 54 years old, may have been more aware of where music was heading than Jackson, who was 28 at the time. There was a time when Michael saw Quincy as a pseudo father figure, someone who could guide and support him in ways his own father never had.

But now, having pulled himself away from the constraints of his family dynamics, Jackson was actively rebelling against the lingering authority of figures from his past. >>  >> Instead, Michael began surrounding himself with a circle of yes men who would validate his boldest decisions and reinforce his growing ambitions, no matter how out of touch.

Quincy Jones, however, was not one of them. He questioned Michael’s decision-making during this period,  including confronting him about his lightening skin and expressing concern over his increasingly dramatic physical transformation, planting seeds of doubt at a time when Michael was determined to assert complete control over his identity and his future.

Their relationship was very close. I think there was that, you know, father-son thing. I think that was the natural thing to happen. Well, uh the relationship with a producer and an artist is really special. And there’s no room for BS at all. It’s it’s got to be pure, it’s got to be love and respect.

 Well, you can’t be an effective producer unless there’s love. You have to love them enough to uh give them a thorough examination  silently. Was he comfortable in his own skin? I’m not sure. At times I didn’t think so. Well, I don’t think he would have gone through the the surgical things he went through. Well, something was wrong >>  >> because uh somehow I think with just what was happening with his face and I used to give him a hard time about the chemical peels and everything else and he always would tell me things of

like I have a blister on my lungs and all those kinds of things and uh I I I swear I’ve got this disease and so forth. He used to get the chemical peels and everything. And I don’t know in a way it was in denial it was in denial. He wanted to look different. Filled with anxiety and expectation, what had taken 6 months to produce Thriller ultimately took 2 and 1/2 years to produce Bad.

The album was incredibly successful and groundbreaking  in its own way, but it didn’t eclipse the trailblazing success of Thriller and was by comparison >>  >> a commercial and critical disappointment for Jackson. Jones was also unfairly blamed for Bad’s inability to surpass Thriller’s sales and accolades, particularly after Jackson left the 1988 Grammys empty-handed.

Quote, he thought I was getting too old for the business because Bad didn’t sell 100 million. I said, “Michael, you can’t get used to 50, 60 million albums. Come on, man. You can’t tell me that 30 million is a bomb.” Weren’t the two of you  kind of disappointed creatively and sales-wise on the Bad LP? Disappointed? With 22 million albums? No.

Not at all. I mean, if you look at it relationship to uh uh Thriller, which is 40 million, but that’s uh that’s insanity to think you’re going to do that again. 22 million albums is a lot  of records. I’m not I wasn’t disappointed. I’ve been in the in the business too long to be disappointed with 22 million.

There’s stories about him. You’ve talked about  it before that it was it wasn’t easy your relationship together working on these records. It was challenging at times. Was that a hindrance or did that actually help create the >> what am I going to learn from Michael, man? I don’t want to be a singer and a dancer, but everything else he doesn’t have we had, you know? So, I didn’t ask him about anything.

 We told him what songs he was going to sing. A producer has to do that, you know? You don’t ask him what songs you’re going  to sing. After Bad peaked, David Geffen began advising Jackson in preparation  for upcoming contract negotiations with Sony. Geffen reportedly engineered the departure  of Jackson’s attorney, John Branca, his manager, Frank Dileo, and ultimately Jones himself.

According to Jones, {quote} “Key members of Michael’s entourage, including his attorney, were whispering in his ear that I’d been getting too much credit.” While Quincy’s production had yielded enormous success  across three albums, it is difficult to argue that Bad was more musically groundbreaking than releases  produced by Jam and Lewis, LA Reid and Babyface, or Teddy Riley.

Jackson knew a change was imminent, and at the dawn of the 1990s,  he moved in a different direction, one without Quincy Jones. After spending the 1980s  towering over any preconceived notion of a crossover star, Jackson was seeking to get back to the cutting edge. He needed another reinvention, and he wasn’t going to find it with his longtime producer.

In any case, Jones himself had no desire to spend another 3 years  working on a single album. Quote, “I ain’t going to sit around in the studio 3 years to make an album with Michael.” He told the Chicago Tribune in 1995.  Quote, “Too long. Too long.” “Bad was too long for me.” Well, I I I think at one point he probably felt that I wasn’t in touch with the market anymore because I remember when we were doing Bad, I had DMC in  the studio because I could see what was coming with with with hip-hop. 

He was telling Frank DeLio that I think Quincy’s losing it, you know, and doesn’t understand the market anymore. He doesn’t know rap is dead. This is 1987. Rap hadn’t even started. And by the time we did  Back on the Block, you know, 1992, it was all rap. And at that that time Michael’s playing was was going after all of the big rappers.

Whether it was Teddy Riley or whatever, all the rap producers to just spend five times what they were paying me, you know, to produce his records and so forth. I’m kind of curious, why did Michael Jackson sing on the album? He said the president of his company didn’t want him to sing on my record. None of Jackson’s post-Jones albums would exceed the success the two created together.

While much of this can be attributed to the controversies that enveloped Michael Jackson up until his death in 2009, those later albums arguably lack the discipline and cohesion of Off the Wall, Thriller, and Bad. Jones downplayed his integral role in those records saying, quote, “That’s nothing to do with any one person.

That’s the combination of the two of us.” However, Dangerous History, Blood on the Dance Floor, and Invincible featured multiple producers, which may have contributed to their less unified sound. After Michael Jackson’s death in 2009 and in the years since, Quincy Jones has battled Sony Music over royalties he believes he’s still owed for the work he and Michael produced >>  >> and from which Sony has profited handsomely.

When was the last time you saw Michael? Uh, in London. He was trying to get us back to do another album and he wanted to bring the kids over, you know. Something else was going on and he said he said let’s do it in LA and  I was coming back from China. I got to Luxembourg and the Duke and Duchess had a band there and welcome us and everything else in the car on the way home they said, “By the way, Farrah Fawcett and Michael Jackson just died.

” I mean I was freaked out. I couldn’t believe it, you know. Now that there several days have passed by, have you had a chance to  really process this? Absolutely not. It’s almost a surrealistic and I have no way of processing it. In my wildest dreams >>  >> or nightmares I never thought that he’d leave before me. It’s very hard to accept.

I know I’m in a big state of denial there because I can’t believe it, you know. I’m 76  years old and he’s 50 and he’s he’s not with me anymore. And cuz our souls  had to be connected to do what we did in the ’80s, you know. It had to be. It was a divinity involved there. I miss my little brother.

 I really  do and I just still cannot process the fact that he’s no longer with  us. And I love him. Is all this stuff after bad? What do you think of it? What do you think of that? Huh? What do you think of the Michael stuff after  you? >> they have they have tried to make money, you know, and I understand it. But it’s about the money.

 The state, the  lawyers, you know. About money. Do you like it? Does it bother you they’re still putting out music? >> Yeah. Yeah, but it’s not  it’s not my business anymore. Quincy Jones is taking Sony Music and the estate of Michael Jackson to court. The music producer says he is owed millions in royalties generated from some of the King of Pop’s biggest hits after  his death.

Quincy Jones has been awarded $9.4 million in the Michael Jackson royalty trial. Now, Michael Jackson’s estate is saying  that judgment is too much and it’s unfair to Michael Jackson’s heir. So, they are trying to say that is not proper, not correct. >> have all of that if it wasn’t for Quincy Jones.

 Quincy Jones laid that foundation with Off the Wall and Thriller. Following the court’s decision, Jones said in an official statement, “This lawsuit was never about Michael. It was about protecting  the integrity of the work we all did in the recording studio and the legacy of what we created.” The legendary producer >>  >> has also become more candid when speaking about Jackson.

In a 2018 interview with Vulture, Jones claimed the King of Pop stole a lot of stuff. Jones also said that Jackson was  greedy and should have given partial writing credit to keyboardist Greg Phillinganes for Don’t Stop ‘Til You Get Enough. Quote, “Michael should have given him 10% of the song.

 Wouldn’t do it.” In the same Vulture interview, Quincy was equally revealing about Jackson’s personal struggles, saying he had raised concerns about his plastic surgery. Quote, “I used to kill him about the plastic surgery, man. He’d always justify it and say it was because of some disease he had. Bull.” According to the music producer, Jackson had a problem with his looks.

 Quote, “Because his father told him he was ugly and abused him.” They have these amazing collaborations on these three albums, these kind of culture-changing albums, and then to subsequently see what happened to Michael. Did that Did that break your heart? >> Well, yes, it does, but you know, I’ve been in this business 60 years and success is an amazing animal.

 It’s a very complex animal and nobody can I’m not a psychiatrist, so I shouldn’t I’m not going to try to get philosophical about it. It’s It’s a lot to eat. There were a lot of things that were bothering Michael cuz I I felt the tension. It was subliminal, but I could feel it a lot, you know.

 You can’t I said he was a happy-go-lucky person, you know, all through his career.  When it comes to the allegations that have been made against Michael over the years, Quincy Jones has not only refused to publicly  discuss or defend Jackson against them, but has also made attempts to distance  himself from the artist during those periods.

In 2019, during the immediate aftermath of Dan Reed’s Leaving Neverland  documentary, all mentions of Michael Jackson were removed from marketing material associated with Quincy Jones’s show at London’s Royal Albert Hall. The concert was originally announced as a night celebrating three of Michael  Jackson’s most iconic albums, with promotional material stating that Off the Wall, Thriller, and Bad would be performed  with a live symphony orchestra.

However, the event was later renamed Quincy Jones Presents Soundtrack of the ’80s: Defining Albums and Iconic Songs. Michael Jackson’s music was still performed on the night, but the revised marketing focused on the songs themselves, >>  >> rather than Quincy Jones’s enduring association with the pop icon.

In the end, what Michael Jackson and Quincy Jones created together was greater than either of them alone. Three albums, 10 years, >>  >> and a sound that didn’t just define a decade, it defined modern pop music itself. Michael spent the rest  of his life chasing reinvention. Quincy spent the rest of his life defending the legacy they built together.

But neither could ever escape it. When Quincy Jones died in 2024,  he left behind one of the most influential musical legacies in history. Yet among all the artists he worked with, it was his work with Michael Jackson  that reshaped the cultural landscape forever. Together, they didn’t just make hits, they made history and even in silence their work still  speaks.