Most people know Michael Jackson as the performer. The moonwalk. The glove. The voice. What gets buried every single time is the songwriter sitting behind all of it, quietly writing hits for other people while the world watched him dance.
Here are ten songs that carried his fingerprints and never got the credit.
We Are The World — He co-wrote it with Lionel Richie almost overnight in 1985. Forty-five artists in one room, one night, one song that raised $63 million for famine relief. The performance was so overwhelming that people forgot to ask who wrote it.
Muscles — Diana Ross — He wrote and produced it in 1982, naming it after his pet boa constrictor. Diana didn’t know the song was named after a snake until after it charted.
Eaten Alive — Diana Ross — Michael co-wrote and co-produced this alongside Barry Gibb. Two of the most powerful pop minds of the century quietly collaborating for someone else. Almost nobody knows this collaboration exists.
Can You Feel It — The Jacksons — Michael wrote it with Jackie Jackson in 1980. The music video cost over $1 million to make. Michael wanted it to feel like a message to humanity.
Watch the full breakdown of all 10 songs
State of Shock — The Jacksons featuring Mick Jagger — Michael wrote it. What most people don’t know is that before Jagger recorded it, Michael and Freddie Mercury had already been in the studio together recording an early version. Those recordings still exist. The world has never fully heard them.
Centipede — Rebbie Jackson — He wrote it, produced it from scratch, and handed his eldest sister a genuine Billboard top five R&B hit during the height of the Thriller era. He could have put it on his own album. He chose not to.
Why — 3T featuring Michael Jackson — His nephews. His voice. His production. He had enough star power to dominate the entire record and instead made space for three young men to stand at the centre of it.
You Were There — Sammy Davis Jr. — Written for Sammy’s 60th anniversary gala in 1989. Never chased radio. Never released commercially. Just a love letter from one performer to another, delivered in front of a room that understood what it was witnessing.
Someone Put Your Hand Out — A fully original song written and recorded exclusively for a Pepsi promotional campaign in 1992. Never released on any album. Never issued as a proper single. He brought the same level of craft to a soft drink sponsorship that most artists bring to their greatest work.
Elizabeth, I Love You — Written entirely from scratch as a birthday gift for Elizabeth Taylor in 1997. No album, radio plan, or commercial strategy. Just a song written for one person because he loved her.
The songwriter the world forgot to notice
Ten songs. Ten moments where Michael Jackson poured himself into someone else’s career, someone else’s celebration, someone else’s name on the label, without ever taking any credit.
He never asked for recognition for any of these songs, and that is exactly why most people never knew he was behind them