Seventeen years ago tonight, at the stroke of midnight, something landed online that fans had been aching for. A brand new Michael Jackson song.
It was called “This Is It.” Sony premiered it on MichaelJackson.com at midnight on October 12, 2009. By then Michael had been gone about four months, so hearing his voice on a song nobody knew felt almost impossible. People stayed up just to listen.
And it was lovely. Soft and warm, with that gentle tone only he had.
There was a sweet family touch to it too. All five of his brothers, Jackie, Tito, Jermaine, Marlon and Randy, added their voices in the background. They were credited as The Jacksons.
But then something funny happened. Within about a day, sharp-eared listeners started saying the same thing.
I’ve heard this before.
The song itself, Michael’s “This Is It”
Give it a listen and see if any part of the melody sounds familiar to you too.
Here’s what the fans had spotted. A singer named Sa-Fire had recorded almost the same song years earlier, under a different title, “I Never Heard.” Her version came out back in 1991.
How could that be, if this was a lost Michael Jackson track?
The answer came fast. A songwriter named Paul Anka, the man behind giant hits like “My Way,” stepped forward. He said he and Michael had written the song together around 1980. It had simply sat on a shelf for decades.
The very next day, on October 13, Michael’s estate agreed. They credited Paul Anka as co-writer and gave him 50 percent of the song’s publishing. One day. That’s how quickly it was sorted out.
Anka was gracious about the whole thing. He called the mix-up “an honest mistake.”
So the “new” song turned out to be almost 30 years old. It had a co-writer most people never expected, and another singer had already put out her own version of it long before.
None of that takes away how special it felt that night. For fans staying up past midnight, it was one more gift from Michael, even if the real story behind it was a little more tangled than anyone guessed.
Press play above and hear the song that had everyone talking that October, then see if you can catch the melody those fans recognized.