Sega Legends: Michael Jackson & Sonic 3

By: Ken Horowitz | May 19, 2009

 

Among the many myths and urban legends surrounding gaming, few are as notorious as those which surround the soundtrack to Sonic The Hedgehog 3. Rumors have abounded for years that Michael Jackson (yes, that Michael Jackson) was contracted by Sega to compose the music for the third installment of Sega's flagship series. The extent of his involvement - if he was even involved at all - has been a bone of contention with Sonic fans for well over a decade now, and there is now much evidence that suggests he was actually working on... something.

Granted, most of what's out there is circumstantial and riddled with speculation. There is a dearth of hard proof that Jackson was ever actually contracted to work with Sega, but people still cling to the hope that the King of Pop was writing music for the Blue Blur. Sega-16 has been investigating the issue for the past year, and what we've turned up heavily suggests that Jackson did indeed have some sort of communication with Sega, but nothing concrete ever came from the discussions.

According to several sources - which include a myriad of emails, forum conversations, this YouTube video, and a Sept. 2005 interview with former Sega Technical Institute head Roger Hector over at the website Sonic Retro - Sega contracted Jackson to compose the music for Sonic 3. Still favored by the company since his mega hit Moonwalker, Jackson had come to Sega's American headquarters on several occasions since that game shipped. However, when Jackson was accused in November, 1993 of sexually molesting thirteen-year-old Jordan Chandler, Sega dropped him from the project. Supposedly, Jackson had by then finished the entire score to the game, and Hector himself turned over the only audio cassette copy of it to Sega of Japan, which promptly forwarded it to its legal department.

Truth...?

Sonic 3/MJ theorists point to many factors that tie him to Sega, particularly citing statements made by Hector and STI composer Howard Drossin in interviews as proof of Jackson's role in the game's development. Drossin told Sonic Retro that Jackson was originally involved but had departed by the end of development. Hector, on the other hand, was quite direct in his comments, mentioning that "Sonic 3 was a lot of fun, but it was also very difficult. Michael Jackson was originally brought in to compose all the music for the game, but at the very end, his work was dropped after his scandals became public. This caused a lot of problems and required a lot of reworking. But the game turned out great in the end."

Whether he has meant to or not, Hector has fanned the flames of this rumor more consistently throughout the years than anyone else. For example, in an August 2005 interview with the website Secrets of Sonic Team, he mentioned that whenever a problem arose, such as "the whole Michael Jackson thing," it fell to him to set things right. Perhaps Hector's most compelling insights come from GamesTM magazine, where he went into great detail about Jackson's involvement. "Michael Jackson was a very big fan of Sonic," he revealed, "and he wanted to record a soundtrack for the game. He came to STI and met with the team to discuss the design theme, story and and feel of the game. He then went away and recorded an entire soundtrack that covered all of the worlds. It was fantastic." Hector's revelations don't stop there, and he continued to explain what happened. "the music fitted [sic] perfectly for the game, and they had a distinctive Michael Jackson sound. We had it all ready and integrated into the game when the first news stories came out accusing him of child molestation, and Sega had to back away from this collaboration." As most theorists mention, Hector went on to say that the music was shelved and Howard Drossin was brought in to write the soundtrack.

It is thought that though Jackson's soundtrack was removed, STI was so fond of it that it had the new score composed to sound very much like something he would write. Theorists address this issue by pointing to the incredible similarities between songs in the game and music in Jackson's own albums HIStory and Dangerous. Here's a sample of the comparison:

- Sonic 3 Staff Roll (MP3 format, 2.3 megs) - "Stranger in Moscow," instrumental (MP3 format, 7.05 megs)

Notice the similarities? Many cite this as a definite indication of Jackson's participation, or at least of that of a team seeking to emulate his particular sound.

So, when played side-by-side or even overlayed (as some have done on YouTube), the tracks are shockingly alike. In fact, the similarities found between Sonic 3 and MJ's music number more than just a single song. For instance, some people note the similarity between a section of the theme to Carnival Night Zone's acts and Jackson's "Jam." But for most, it seems that the comparison clincher is the remarkable resemblance between Sonic 3's end credit theme and "Stranger in Moscow."

Add to this the fact that several themes (Carnival Night Zone, Ice Cap Zone, Launch Base Zone, Knuckles' theme, and the credits music) were later removed from the PC version Sonic & Knuckles Collection, and one begins to suspect some some legal maneuvering on Sega's part. Much discussion continues to this day as to why these tracks were removed, especially when they are still present in later compilations, such as Sonic Jam on the Saturn. Many fans speculate that the removal owed itself to problems with converting the pieces to MIDI format.

Another detail that seemingly brings the two together is the list of musicians that appear in Sonic 3's ending credits - musicians who all (save for Drossin) worked with Jackson for years. Both Geoff Grace and Brad Buxor arranged music for Jackson, and Bobby Brooks sequenced synthesizers and drums on Blood on the Dance Floor and mixed HIStory. The most heavily-mentioned one of all is a producer called Cirocco, who even goes so far as to list the collaboration with Jackson on a Sonic The Hedgehog game on his web page. Adding to the fire, James Hansen (alias Qjimbo) of Sonic Stuff Research Group claims that Cirocco told him in an email that he still has possession of presumably a demo version of fabled soundtrack. "I actually have "ALL" of the tracks...," he writes, "from the original humming of Michael calling in the middle of the night leaving messages, to his ideas at Record One with Matt and Bruce. - BUT, I don't think I can let any of that out to the public without permission."

Jackson himself is not credited anywhere at all in the game, but this isn't surprising. Supposedly, several other people involved with Sonic 3 weren't credited, and even if he were to be mentioned, it is unlikely that his actual name would have been used. There is already an established precedent for this, as seen in episode 7F24 of The Simpsons, where he provided the voice for an insane asylum inmate who believed himself to be the pop star. Due to contractual problems, MJ was credited as "John Jay Smith" - a pseudonym. His name is reportedly divulged by Lisa Simpson in a later episode (9F09) in reference to the new Itchy & Scratchy movie, when she states "it was the greatest movie I've ever seen in my life! And you wouldn't believe the celebrities who did cameos. Dustin Hoffman, Michael Jackson... of course they didn't use their real names, but you could tell it was them."

Admittedly, when one considers the statement of these former Sega employees, the actual songs themselves, and the situation surrounding the musicians, it can be quite easy to make a determination about Michael Jackson potentially having a role in the development of Sonic 3. The reports of his departure after the 1993 child molestation case became news make perfect sense, and the fallout definitely hurt his career, beyond its possible effect on the music for Sonic's third outing. For instance, songs Jackson composed for the Addam's Family Values soundtrack were dropped, and plans for a perfume line were cancelled. Even Pepsi severed ties with him (Campbell, 1995).

... or Urban Legend?

At first glance, this seems like a slam dunk case, and there appears to be little room for doubt about Jackson's part in the development of Sonic 3. It's incredible then, that given the sheer amount of evidence present which suggests he was indeed hired to compose its music, there are almost as many details that seem to directly contradict it all. Questions are quickly raised in regards to the statements made by former STI members, how much was ever actually put into writing, who actually composed the songs used in the actual game, and the similarities between the songs themselves and the ones Jackson used for later albums. As one sifts through the mountain of information on the subject, a singular fact becomes abundantly clear: nothing is ever actually confirmed by anyone outside of the game's development team, an information void centered squarely around the higher ups who had the power to approve or deny everything that went into it.

The first bone of contention deals with the interviews with Hector and Drossin. After granting several interviews where he spoke openly on the subject, Hector changed direction when we asked him about it in March of 2008. "I have recently been asked to not comment on this subject as promises of confidentiality were made (I had nothing to do with it and only recently found out about this). It was the case that Michael Jackson was a big fan of the Sonic games, and he did make a visit to STI once to say hi to the team, but I guess the rest will remain unconfirmed rumors..."

That's pretty cryptic for someone who openly talked about the subject for so long. Who made those promises of confidentiality? Could Hector have been asked to keep quiet for legal reasons? Possibly, but how vital would it be for Sega to keep mum on events that happened fourteen years ago? Virtually no one from the Genesis era remains at SOA today, and others have already spoken on the issue, so why the need to keep silent? Then again, Hector isn't alone in his silence. Yuji Naka also went the "no comment" route in a recent interview with Kikizo. Between bouts of laughter, his answer to questions about the MJ/Sonic 3 connection was the following: "It's a mystery. This information is on a need-to-know basis! One day, when the time comes, I will give you the information!"

For his part, Drossin's comment to Sonic Retro on Jackson was followed by another that partially confirms Hector's claim about the Gloved One's work not making it into the final product. "I did not do all of the music for the game. However, I know that SEGA wanted to distance themselves from him after the sex scandal. If MJ's tracks influenced some of the music, it is a coincidence as far as I know." In essence, Drossin confirms that no songs written by Jackson were used, and instead only talks about a possible influence. Interestingly enough, Drossin never mentions the size of Jackson's role in scoring the game. He only mentions that he was involved at first but later wasn't. That's not very specific information about someone who supposedly composed themes for the entire project, and it lends credence to the theory that Jackson's participation never really left the STI offices.

Additionally, Drossin's own involvement has to come under scrutiny. Roger Hector stated that he was brought in to do the score for Sonic 3 after Jackson was dropped, but it's been confirmed that this is not the case. Drossin is credited as a music composer in Sonic & Knuckles, along with the team identified with Jackson, but he is only given a special thanks in Sonic 3, and he isn't the only one to receive such accolades. This flies in the face of what Hector revealed in the Games TM interview, where he explained that after Jackson departed, STI had to compose an entirely new soundtrack in a short time. Hector specifically mentioned to GamesTM that Drossin came in and finished the job. "Howard Drossin, STI's music guy, stepped in and did a great job, working around the clock to get it done."

However, in his own interview with Sonic Retro, Drossin clearly states that while he composed many themes for both games (he worked on them simultaneously), he didn't write all the music, and some of the songs he did write weren't used. "There were a lot of composers on Sonic 3," Drossin explained, "I was one. I don't want to take credit for anyone else's music." Thus we have contradictory statements about what happened. Given that Hector and Drossin's comments represent the bulk of proof that Jackson was a part of Sonic 3's development, this represents a serious problem. Taking both interviews at face value, Drossin's sounds more plausible, as he would perhaps have a better recollection of which games he did and did not score. It's quite possible that the music was done by a collection of artists, many of whom did work with Jackson, and they may in fact be responsible for the songs attributed to him. Bringing the artist in may have actually meant hiring his team, which used its familiarity with his style to create the soundtrack. If MJ did indeed compose anything for the game, his team would have been tasked with transforming the music into something legally usable, which would explain Hector's comment about the songs needing "reworking."

Perhaps the most substantial proof that there was nothing contractual between the two parties comes directly from those working at Sega itself. When contacted about the subject, former Sega senior producer and then-head of testing Mike Latham explained that Jackson arrived at SOA with junk bond king Michael Miken for a meeting to pitch a partnership for a children's charity. Latham, who was present at that meeting, said that some ideas - none relating to Sonic - were tossed around but nothing more. "Nothing ever became of it," Latham told Sega-16. "I remember the meeting for two big reasons. One was Michael Jackson was on crutches, having just had an injury. The other was there was a contest to get a signed CD from him for his favorite game presentation, which was Joe Miller's idea. Having Eternal Champions to present, I was the long shot, but I happened to mention that as part of our character creation we used many different ages of kids, who were in to test other products for feedback on which archetypes they liked. We used that to create the EC characters."

Latham also stated that nothing was ever negotiated with Jackson after Moonwalker, a sentiment somewhat shared by another Sega alumni, former director of marketing Al Nilsen. In our interview with him, Nilsen told Sega-16 that Sega wasn't interested in pursuing any other endeavors with Jackson for the Genesis. "I know the Sega arcade group was looking into developing other potential arcade games with Michael," he said, "but on the Genesis side we weren't. In the end Sega never pursued another arcade game with him."

Not enough Sega executive recollections to convince you? How about those of the man in charge at SOA at the time, former head Tom Kalinske, who recently spoke exclusively to us on the subject thanks to IGN freelancer and Sega-16 contributor Travis Fahs? "He [Michael Jackson] hung around Sega quite a bit in those days," Kalinske detailed. "We did Moonwalker on Genesis, and it was reasonably successful, and he used to come up to Redwood Shores and wander around, and he was always very interested in what was going on, and because he was the celebrity that he was, he would sit and talk with the R&D guys. But I don't recall him having any deep involvement with that product. I know he loved it; he loved all the Sonic products. He was particularly close to Al Nilsen, who was the marketing director, so he was around the project, but I don't think he had any real involvement in it."

Jackson spending time at Sega during the period between Moonwalker and the release of Sonic 3 is pretty well documented, and if the man could help design an entire game, he would undoubtedly be interested in writing music for one his favorite characters. In addition to Hector and Kalinske having seen him, there are pictures of him playing Sonic 2 (such as the one in this very article). Other Sega executives interacted with him as well, and they noted his famous eccentric behavior. Former technical director Scott Bayless, who many of you may know as the fellow casually holding the Sega CD in the famous nighttime beach ad, once gave him a tour of the company offices. "He'd already signed the Moonwalker deal with Sega," Bayless recently told Retro Gamer magazine, "and they were touring him around the Redwood City studio. I spent about a half hour showing him all kinds of techie stuff we were doing, and not once did he ever comment or make eye contact; he just kind of stood there with about fifteen of his minions around him." Bayless then recalls how Jackson's demeanor suddenly changed completely when they arrived at where Sega recorded its game music. "When we finished there we walked him over to the sound studio, which was just down the hall. Suddenly there was this new person in the room; it was uncanny. Jackson came to life like someone had flipped a switch. It was obvious that the only thing he was excited about was the music."

But what about Hector's interview with GamesTM, where he specifically recalls meeting with MJ and how the latter worked up a complete soundtrack? It's possible that while there was indeed some collaboration between Jackson and the STI, none of it had the approval of SOA or SOJ management. Neither Hector nor Drossin ever mention the higher ups at Sega approving anything, and Sonic 3's own marketing director, Pam Kelly, has no recollection of any negotiations between the two parties. Even the very president of the U.S. branch doesn't recall negotiations of any kind, and if you've read our interview with Tom Kalinske or IGN's recent article on the history of Sega, you'll know that the man has a pretty good memory. Mike Latham also comments about this. "So there was never any product discussed with him after Moonwalker," he says, "and after the MC Hammer debacle and some nearly avoided others, the company tended to shy away from the music business for licensing sources. Also the Sega Music label really soured the company on the music business."

Thus, one has to wonder why Roger Hector would remain silent about such star power being added to such a major release's development. He didn't tell Latham, who was heading game testing at the time and had been present at the meetings about the game. He didn't tell Pam Kelly, who was in charge of the game's marketing or Bill White, Sega's VP of marketing at the time, and he didn't tell Tom Kalinske, president of the company's American branch. Who then, did he tell? Surely someone at the company, outside of STI, was aware that Michael Jackson, perhaps the most popular entertainer in the world at the time, was working on Sega's flagship franchise. How does one keep such a thing a secret?

Another item that requires review is that of the similarities between certain themes in Sonic 3 and MJ's later work, such as "Stranger in Moscow." Most of the Sonic 3 pieces that are said to resemble Jackson's songs are only comparable when heavily altered, such as being transposed up or down or having their tempo increased or decreased. People have also noted that the chord progression in some of the compared songs don't match up or that some of them don't even have the same number of chords.

Something else that doesn't really add up is the belief by many people that musicians who worked with Jackson being involved with Sonic 3 equates to Jackson's own work being included in the game. It's more than likely that Cirocco and the others were influenced, as Drossin mentioned, by Jackson's own work and wrote songs in the same vein. As they had direct access to his music, the team would have easily been able to sample and emulate songs not yet released commercially. Such "inspiration" is quite common in the game industry, as evidenced by several other YouTube videos, such as this one which shows a clear comparison between REM's "All the Right Friends" and Elecman's theme from Mega Man. But wait! That song also sounds a lot like Journey's "Faithfully!" Did Capcom plagiarize, or was it merely "inspired?" SNK was apparently inspired as well, when it composed "Spread the Wings" for Garou: Mark of the Wolves. The tune bears a striking resemblance (fifty-eight seconds in) to Robert Miles' "Children." I guess ID Software did the same then with the Doom soundtrack as well, right? Doom composer Robert Prince even admits to his taking a cue from established commercial music: "I did not think that this type of music would be appropriate throughout the game, but I roughed out several original songs and also created MIDI sequences of some cover material."

What's most notable about these comparisons is that no changes in pitch or tempo were required to see the similarities.

Jackson also wrote most of his biggest hits, like "Billie Jean, "Beat It," and "Smooth Criminal" himself, and it's doubtful that he would have to resort to sampling his own work from Sonic 3 for future albums, as he was more than creative enough to come up with new material on his own. All of the songs involved in this issue were written either before or during the time of Sonic 3's development, which works against the argument that MJ sampled his own work from the game for later use. Remarkably, some even contend that "Smooth Criminal," recorded in 1987, bears resemblance to "Ice Cap Zone, Act 1." This suggests that Jackson sampled his own music, specifically a song written a full three years before the character Sonic The Hedgehog was even conceived, and one already used in a Michael Jackson game by Sega!

Here is the entire sound credit list for Sonic 3. Notice that neither Jackson nor a "John Jay Smith" of any type are present, and notice that Howard Drossin receives only a "sound special thanks."

Click for a larger image!

What does this all mean? Most likely, that none of the music attributed to Jackson in Sonic 3 was actually done by him, but rather by others who tried to write music that sounded like his. Mike Latham told us about how widespread the practice of musical "inspiration" among game composers is, and even admitted to being a little inspired himself back during his development days. "I remember when I did Ghostbusters 2, I had no rights to the music and made near sound-alikes to all the songs. If you heard that title you would be sure I had the rights for the soundtrack songs, but I just did them in a slight style change."

Mull It Over A Bit...

Given everything we've seen so far, let's put this all in perspective, shall we? No matter how much people will favor or disfavor the contention, there are some pretty obvious items that go beyond the emails and forum posts. When one looks past all the quotes and sound bites, there are a few things that simply appeal to common sense and have to be mentioned. There seems to be more than ample evidence that the pop star was in some way involved with Sonic 3, but Sega-16 highly doubts that there was ever a contract signed or that anyone in management had ever even heard a presentation pitching the idea. Had any of that happened, there would have been severe ramifications upon Sega's severing ties with Jackson, in both a collaborative and legal sense. Here are a few of the most prominent questions that would have been raised:

• Can you imagine Sega "firing" Michael Jackson? Moreover, can you imagine someone as popular as Jackson working with the leader in 16-bit hardware of the time, and not a smidgen of advertising emerging from such a tandem? Sonic 3 was released in 1993. Sega had released several versions of Moonwalker only three years before, and it hyped the hell out of all of them. Jackson's scandals hadn't occurred when Sonic 3 began development, so don't one might think it odd that the most popular entertainer in the world is scoring the soundtrack of Sega's flagship franchise, and there isn't a mention of it ANYWHERE in any of the advertising. The Chandler scandal didn't make the news until three months before Sonic 3 shipped. How would Sega have missed the boat on promoting Jackson's involvement with such an important game, when it had absolutely no reason to do so at the time?
• Sega didn't want Jackson but wanted his music? Confirming his involvement would mean that Sega canned the entirely original score he was working on because it was terrified of the bad publicity, but for some reason it decided to leave in songs that sounded very much like music Jackson was releasing commercially. Kill the original score and leave in the imitations? Moreover, after being terminated by Sega, does anyone think Jackson would let it include songs that sound just like his in the very game from which he was just fired? Additionally, the lack of a formalized contract would have presented serious legal issues for Sega had it used his work without written permission.
• Jackson would have been recycling music from a video game. If it's true, then Jackson went on and took music he originally scored for a Sonic game and reworked them for future albums, where they eventually became "Stranger in Moscow" and "Blood on the Dance Floor." He basically got fired from Sega, but he used music that was for its game for himself? Jackson is more creative than that.
• There was no reason for Sega of Japan or Europe to change Sonic 3's music. The Chandler scandal had little international effect, and Jackson's possible sexual exploits with a child wouldn't have been news to a country such as Japan, which didn't outlaw such activities until 1999. What motive would SOJ and SOE have had to rescore the entire game only five months before its release date, especially when doing so could have delayed it in those territories? The Mega Drive in Japan was in need a major titles, and none was larger for Sega than Sonic. The thought of a game in the series with Jackson's name attached would have produced major publicity for the slow-selling console there, and SOJ would have had no reason at all not to push the tandem.
• If the score was altered, why cherry pick which songs would be used? Assuming that Jackson was taken off development, why use his songs at all? Roger Hector mentions that "his work was dropped" but people believe several of his songs were remixed by others, and that these were then reworked by Jackson himself into pieces for later albums. Why would Sega do that? If you're going to fire the guy, why keep any part of his work? And if you're going to keep songs, why not just use the actual, finished score?
• Sega's own management debunks the rumor. We have a senior producer, SOA's marketing director, and its president all mentioning that nothing was ever written up between the company and MJ. This doesn't mean he never worked on anything; it just means that it was never put into contract. From a legal standpoint, this means that the possibility of Jackson's compositions making their way into Sonic 3 in any form are quite slim, and in turn it supports the whole "inspiration" theory.

So What's the Verdict?

When all the data is added up, there is no conclusive proof that Jackson had anything to do with Sonic 3 outside of Roger Hector Howard Drossin, and Cirocco's testimony. No documents have surfaced, no actual tracks, no betas with his name in it - nothing. On the other hand, nothing conclusive has surfaced to the contrary either. We have several accounts that nothing was ever made official, but they say nothing about whether or not Jackson actually composed music. Again, none of this truly proves anything, to be sure, but it does bring up some interesting points. For what it's worth though, we can't see someone as prominent as Jackson entering into an agreement with Sega in virtual anonymity or being nice enough to let Sega use his music after he was fired.

We also have to wonder about the utter silence of those involved at the time. Surely, something this big would have been announced with bells and whistles, and management having no idea of it leads us to believe that Jackson's involvement wasn't an official one. Sega-16 has absolutely no reason to doubt Roger Hector's word, as he has contributed to several articles for the site, and his information has always been spot-on. Both he and Kalinske put Jackson at Sega during this period, talking with game designers, which heavily suggests that something was being done, at least informally. Most likely, Hector was going to pitch the idea to his superiors once a complete score had been done and enough of the game was ready to be shown (similar to how Peter Morawiec worked on his Sonic-16 game alone until it was ready to be shown). Hector's own statement that he had the only copy of the finished soundtrack on cassette supports this, as does Cirocco's email about possessing demo versions of the songs. If Jackson had actually been hired by Sega, why would Hector, and not someone like Bill White or Tom Kalinske, have the only copy of his work, unless its existence had yet to be brought to their attention?

Morawiec even mentions in our interview that he had to periodically produce content for management. "We were moved to a fancy SOA campus in Redwood Shores, and suddenly we had to put on presentations in front of a whole slew of executives and marketing people, etc." How then, would Kalinske and the other executives be totally unaware of what was most likely the biggest news surrounding the most important STI project of them all? Is it possible that Jackson's public profile went south just before his work was to be shown, and Hector was forced to shove the whole ordeal under the rug?

Sega itself seems to love hinting about the situation without confirming or denying anything. The most recent example of this comes in the Sonic 3 museum section of Sonic's Ultimate Genesis Collection, released in 2009 for both the Xbox 360 and the Playstation 3. The final trivia note reads "Sonic 3's musical score was originally going to be composed by Michael Jackson." Lamentably, it doesn't mention whether or not this was an idea that was scrapped, an unofficial collaboration, or an actual contractual agreement. Neither does it refer to any music actually being scored by MJ and used or discarded by Sega.

For these reasons, though the evidence seems compelling, we're reluctant to concede that anything official was ever established between Sega and Michael Jackson. That doesn't mean, however, that Jackson never had any involvement at all. Our theory is that whatever work he did was off the books, and any chance of any of it ever been green-lighted by Sega management was killed as soon as the Chandler case broke. The two powerhouses had a history together in both the arcade and on the Genesis, and they would work together again on Space Channel 5 for the Dreamcast. This shows that Sega of America hadn't blacklisted Jackson after his 1993 scandal, but a desire to distance itself from him for a while is not only understandable, it's just plain common sense.

There's no denying that there's something there, something certain people perhaps either cannot or do not want to comment on, but the fact that even Tom Kalinske himself has no knowledge of contract being signed is pretty hard evidence of nothing solid ever coming out of such collaboration. Only time will tell the true story and cement it as fact or dispel it as another urban legend. Our readers will no doubt reach their own conclusions based on the facts presented, and this discussion will continue to go on across the Internet. Should anything come out either way, we'll be here to report it. Until then, play your copy of Sonic The Hedgehog 3 and think of what may be...

 

Sources

• Behind the Scenes: Sonic The Hedgehog 3 and Sonic & Knuckles. GamesTM. September, 2007.
• Campbell, Lisa (1995). Michael Jackson: The King of Pop's Darkest Hour. Branden.
• Doree, Adam. Interview with Yuji Naka. Kikizo. February 4, 2009.
• Fahs, Travis. Interview with Tom Kalinske. IGN. 2009.
• Hector, Roger. "RE: Question about Sonic 3 Soundtrack." Email to Ken Horowitz. March 20, 2008.
• Horowitz, Ken. Interview with Al Nilsen. Sega-16. March 11, 2008.
• -------------. Interview with Peter Morawiec. Sega-16. April 20, 2007.
• Interview with Howard Drossin. Sonic Retro. August, 2008.
• Interview with Roger Hector. Secrets of Sonic Team. August 31, 2005.
• Kelly, Pamela. "Re: Article on Sonic 3 & Michael Jackson." Email to Ken Horowitz. May 12, 2008.
• Latham Mike. "Quick Feedback." Email to Ken Horowitz. March 14, 2008.
• ------------. "RE: Quick Feedback." Email to Ken Horowitz. March 15, 2008.
• McFerran, Damien. Retrospection: Mega CD. Retro Gamer Magazine. April, 2009.
• Sazpaimon. Jackson vs. Sonic 3. Sonic Cult.
• Sonic The Hedgehog 3 Museum Trivia. Sonic's Ultimate Genesis Collection (Xbox 360 version). 2009.

 

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