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"Blue Gangsta"

Date range assessed by the fact that “‘Blue Gangsta originates from the same era as ‘Break of Dawn’ and ‘A Place with No Name’, the latter of which was recorded on September 8, 1998.” (Damien Shields, “Xscape Origins”)

Dr. Freeze (Elliot Straite), co-writer and co-producer, “MJFrance” (January 28, 2011) (archived) (English translation) (English translation archived)

Quagmire (MJFrance): Where did you get the inspiration for the [song]... "Blue Gangsta"...? How does your creative process work?

Dr. Freeze: For "Blue Gangsta" I wanted to make a new "Smooth Criminal". Something more modern and rooted in the 2000s. That was the idea.

…Q: Was "Blue Gangsta" remixed by Tempamental as "No Friend Of Mine"?

F: This is not the name of the song, it's just the chorus that contains these few words. The real title is "Blue Gangsta". When I heard this remix, I could not believe it. Many people called me because of that and I do not understand what had happened. The concern is that I do not even know who released the song! It remains a mystery. Why did they do that? Where did this rap originate? How were they taken? In fact, we knew nothing about this story, me nor Michael. We really do not understand where this leak came from...

Q: There are still a few weeks, nobody knew where this track originate, and how Michael Jackson had been involved in this project.

F: Yeah, I know it's crazy. The name of the song was not even good![Dr. Freeze humming the chorus of the song on the phone: "Your no friend of mine, what you put me through, now I'm the blue gangsta nah..."] Was just the chorus. This highlights the ignorance of people who are causing the leaks on the internet: they take the song and put it online without knowing its origin.

Q: For fans, they did not really understand how it could be proposed. It was weird. We suspected that something was amiss, but we did not know exactly what...

F: Yes, the song was not presented to the public as needed. A guy has just stolen the song, added a rap, and swung it on the net. I was not even credited, any more than Michael! She just landed here without any logical explanation...

…F: Actually, I've already done [a “fresh remake”] for "Blue Gangsta". I've updated it a bit, the song is completed, ready to go. It will be completely different from the version leaked on the net. It is perfectly calibrated to enter a nightclub. It sounds very European in style productions Kraftwerk.

Q: Will you keep the base of the song? [Quagmire he sings an excerpt]

F: Absolutely everything is the same, but it sounds more current.

Q: You've stepped up the pace?

F: No, no. Everything is exactly the same.

Q: [Confused] Okay. So to summarize, you've just added a few extra sounds and made some alterations to the "sound"?

F: Exactly. To make an analogy, it's like if you had shot a movie and then you take it out in 3D.

…Q: Returning to "Blue Gangsta", did you get the idea of the accordion and whistles to the Ennio Morricone?

F: Yes. I had the idea of ringing, it comes from the movie "The Good the Bad and the Ugly"[He whistles the melody on the phone]. As I said, I wanted to make a new "Smooth Criminal". It was our objective: "the new Smooth Criminal."

CJ DeVillar, bassist and mix engineer, The MJCast Episode 54 (April 12, 2017)

MJCast: Another song that you worked on was "Blue Gangsta", do you have any stories about that process, or with that song?

DeVillar: No, that was pretty straightforward. I recorded mainly the instruments on that, and some of Michael's scratch vocals, which were amazing. I thought Michael's detail with the vocals was really gorgeous with that. When I heard the finished vocal, I was really--I heard Michael Jackson at forty-something being great. You know what I'm saying? That super-mature, like Jordan, he doesn't need to be fast anymore, but he can still beat you because he knows where to go, because he's forty. You know what I'm saying? So Michael kinda had that super-experienced sound, even though the youthfulness may have been off the edge a little bit. There was a different kind of experience in his magic. So I heard it on "Blue Gangsta". So I really enjoyed hearing that. I think Mike Ging did most of the vocals on that, and I did all the instruments on that, and some of Michael's scratch vocals.

…MJCast: I always felt like, later on down the line, "Blue Gangsta" kinda had that Timbaland-feel to it, like it was supposed to be made by Timbaland or something. [laughs]

DeVillar: Well, I gotta say, man, what he did to that was amazing. I can't believe it, I mean the remix version of it is stunning. So I guess it lent to his--it played into his hand a little bit. I loved what he did. With a lot of people getting mad at the remixes, I'm not mad at the remixes at all. The only one I'm mad at--I shouldn't say "mad" at--but the one I thought they missed a little bit was the "A Place With No Name" one. I thought that was a bit of a miss for me. But that's a very young-sounding track too, and I'm an older guy, so maybe that's an issue... But the other tracks, stellar. I mean, really great, Michael would have loved them.

MJCast: The orchestral introduction to "Blue Gangsta" is really magical.

DeVillar: Oh, wonderful. Yeah. I mean, on "Blue Gangsta", Jerry Hey--he did the horns on it--and he did a wonderful job, and Timbaland kind of mixed them out, and he had to. So poor Jerry Hey, those horns on the original are just absolutely ridiculous, I love horns. But yeah, Timbaland's remix is ridonkulous, so I thought it was great. And the vocals sounded great too. Wonderful.