Following the tragic passing of musical genius Quincy Jones, we’re learning new things about his life and some of the classic songs he helped create.
As we all know, Jones worked with several incredible artists, including Aretha Franklin, Donny Hathaway, Frank Sinatra, George Benson, and many others. But he may be most famous for his work with Michael Jackson.
Jones produced many of Michael’s most popular and revered albums to date, including “Off the Wall,” “Thriller” and “Bad.” Each of those albums is littered with hit records that captivated the ears of music fans everywhere. Among those is “Beat It,” the third single from “Thriller.”
While that song is now considered one of the greatest pop songs of all time, it almost did not turn out that way.
Speaking to The Guardian, guitarist Steve Lukather said, “’Beat It,’ we did it backward: Michael’s lead vocal and the Eddie Van Halen guitar solo were done with a couple of small overdubs but no click track.”
He continued, “Jeff [Porcaro] made a click track and then a drum part, and I played a bunch of really wild guitar parts, because I knew Eddie’s solo was on it – I was doing real hard rock, a quadruple-track riff. Quincy wasn’t even there, he was at Westlake doing overdubs on Billie Jean while we were fixing Beat It – so we’d be on the phone and he goes: ‘It’s too metal, you gotta calm down. I gotta get it on pop radio! Use the small amp, not so much distortion.’”
Before working on “Beat It,” Lukather also assisted in the creation of “The Girl Is Mine.”
Lukather later explained that even without writing or playing any instruments, Jones had an uncanny ability to put his sound into any song he was working on. “He was a director,” he said.
If you just listen to “Beat It” without the vocals, it’s not hard to imagine that the record could’ve worked for a heavy metal artist. But Michael’s voice and Jones’ production had a unique way of making something different sound palatable to a larger audience.