Recently, I was made aware that multitracks for Michael Jackson's P.Y.T. and Scream had leaked, along with Madonna's Borderline and Lucky Star. This, of course, is the kind of thing I dream of! I'm not an engineer and have no formal studio education, but anyone can download Reaper and play around with the unmixed channels and get an idea of the hidden bits and pieces of your favorite songs. That said, I thought it would be interesting to make some very basic mixes of these songs, along with Queen's Bohemian Rhapsody, to share with anyone else interested in hearing the raw tracks. I have done a little work in places which I will explain below, but each track is basically all channels live and unmixed. Let me know what you think.
Rough Multitrack Mixdowns
Madonna - Borderline
The multitrack includes a "scratch" or rough vocal which sounds almost as good as the final, so I muted the final lead vocal and used the scratch. Apart from that, I increased the volume on the scratch and background vocals, but everything else, apart from the extra silence at the beginning and the end, remains unmixed and intact.
Madonna - Lucky Star
I increased the volume of the lead vocals as they were very low in the mix, but everything else remains unmixed.
Michael & Janet Jackson - Scream
The multitrack for Scream doesn't appear to be complete, or if it is, another version was later created with the synth and guitar solos from the break added. Regardless, this is clearly an almost complete multitrack and I've included two versions, one with Michael's vocals slightly edited with his and Janet's vocals raised a bit, and another completely unmixed version but without the lead Korg synthesizers present throughout the track. By removing those synths, it almost sounds like the sequel to Rhythm Nation.
Michael Jackson - P.Y.T. (Pretty Young Thing)
A second lead vocal track was included with the multitrack, though it was clearly another "scratch" vocal and didn't cover the complete song, so I edited the final lead vocal so the scratch appeared in it's place for the opening verse and increased the overall volume of Michael's vocals. Otherwise, everything else is unmixed.
Queen - Bohemian Rhapsody
There isn't anything terribly different about this from the final version, other than you can hear some of the instruments a bit clearer, there is a count-off, and a scrap of Brian May noodling made it onto tape. This, in my opinion, is a lot less interesting than the other tracks, but it's still interesting to hear the vocals and instruments at different levels. Honestly, this is a song you need to mess with the multitracks yourself to appreciate how much went into it. The amount of vocal work is incredible! Apart from that, this is completely unmixed.
So, how long until Sony pulls this down?
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