№ 25 · COLLABORATION
The Girl Is Mine — Beatle Duet
Recorded April 14, 1982 — released October 18, 1982
MICHAEL JACKSON
The King of Pop
★ RARE
← MICHAEL JACKSON
CARD N° 25 · COLLABORATION · ★ RARE
The Girl Is Mine — Beatle Duet
Recorded April 14, 1982 — released October 18, 1982
№ 25 COLLABORATION
The Girl Is Mine — Beatle Duet
Thriller's first single was a duet with Paul McCartney where two grown men playfully bicker over a girl. It was the worst-reviewed song on Thriller — and the strategic launch single Michael chose deliberately because, in his words, 'if a Beatle helps you walk through the door, everyone else has to follow you through it'.
▶ THE MOMENT
Michael Jackson & Paul McCartney — The Girl Is Mine (1982)
www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZkX-PVCWokQ
MICHAEL JACKSON · B·SIDE · VOL.I
HOVER TO FLIP
THE FACT
Thriller's first single was a duet with Paul McCartney where two grown men playfully bicker over a girl. It was the worst-reviewed song on Thriller — and the strategic launch single Michael chose deliberately because, in his words, 'if a Beatle helps you walk through the door, everyone else has to follow you through it'.
WHAT MOST DON'T KNOW
Michael had been a McCartney fan since age six. The two met at a 1976 party at the Harold Lloyd estate; by 1981 they had recorded two duets together — The Girl Is Mine for Michael's album and Say Say Say for Paul's. The Girl Is Mine was actually recorded first, in a single eight-hour session at Westlake Studios on April 14, 1982. Critics savaged it on release — Rolling Stone called it 'a wimp-out' and Robert Christgau described it as 'preposterously sappy' — but it sold 1.3 million copies and laid the diplomatic groundwork for Beatles airplay programmers to take Beat It seriously three months later. The strategy was Michael's idea, against Quincy Jones's protests. The two men spent so much time in the studio that Paul casually told Michael about the value of song-publishing catalogues; three years later Michael bought the entire Beatles songbook out from under him.
▶
THE MOMENT
Michael Jackson & Paul McCartney — The Girl Is Mine (1982) — Thriller's strategic launch single — paving the way for Beat It.