Below is a cool interactive music toy created to promote one of the poorest timed record announcement in recent memory.
Michael Jackson: The Stripped Mixes is an interesting collection of remixed early tunes. It’s worth a listen if you are into Michael or early Motown. Unfortunately, Universal chose to do the press announcement less than an hour after the Jackson memorial service at the Staples Center. Perhaps some Universal executive thought this would be somehow be greeted as a tribute, but fans read it as a morbid cash-in. Once again the music industry shoots itself in the foot.
Cooler than the album itself is the little remix machine below. Click on the “Play With It” button, then the “Mix It” button. This takes you to a sweet interface where you can isolate the various tracks. Check out Michael vocals with only a bass backing on “I Want You Back”. Or the percussion and piano on “ABC”. The combinations aren’t endless, but the nostalgic fun is.
It’s great to see pieces like this becoming available to the public. Sure it’s a way to sell the public music they’ve already bought. But as both Stephen Sondheim and Peter Gabriel have said “All they really like is what they know.” And I know I like this.
In the same vein, there is an iPhone app that was recently released allowing fans to remix David Bowie’s “Space Oddity.” Kudos to Virgin/EMI for better timing on this one. It was released to commemorate the 40th anniversary of the moon landing.
