An all-new Michael Jackson collection featuring 10 unreleased songs will be released this November, a rep for the Jackson estate exclusively tells Rolling Stone. At the time of his death Jackson reportedly left hard drives filled with unheard music, much of it recorded during the King of Pop's '80s peak. Jackson's manager Frank DiLeo told RS that he estimates that Jackson's vaults contain more than 100 completed and unreleased songs, including collaborations with Akon, Will.i.am and Ne-Yo. "There are a couple of songs we recorded for the Bad album that we had to cut that are just sensational," DiLeo said.
"Every time that [Jackson] recorded, he over-recorded. He would record anywhere from 20 to 30 songs for each album," former Sony Music CEO Tommy Mottola told RS last year. Any of them could have been as big a hit as the ones that came out." One of the most noteworthy tracks was a Thriller outtake titled "Don't Be Messin' Around." Other candidates include any of the reported five songs that Jackson recorded with Will.i.am.
Last year, a pair of unreleased Jackson tracks, "Another Day" and "A Place With No Name," leaked, and recently Rodney Jerkins, who co-produced Jackson's 2001 album Invincible, revealed to VladTV that he's currently working on the collection.
As Rolling Stone previously reported, the album of never-before-heard Jackson songs will be the first in a 10-project, seven-year deal the Jackson estate inked with Sony Music in March 2010 — a $250 million pact that will also include reissues of Jackson's classic albums, new greatest hits sets, a DVD collection of all Michael's music videos and possibly a Cirque du Soleil show. The hybrid karaoke and dance simulator Michael Jackson: The Video Game is also expected out by the end of 2010.
