Milli Vanilli-like blind item

[southernbelle]

Interesting article:

The dream of every producer is to walk into a recording studio and hear someone so different, so special that he knows immediately…this is the one!

In late 2000, Jay got a call from a friend at Blue Note asking, "Would you record some demos with a new artist?" Jay replied, "Sure. Let's use Sorcerer Sound." Initially, Jay drove down to Sorcerer Sound with the artist to check it out. Then, he went to Brooklyn to see a rehearsal with her band. Jay recalls, "It was incredible. Surreal. I mean every single song was remarkable."

What Norah Jones knew when she chose to work with Jay was that he worked on some amazing records. Especially Etta James' first Grammy winner, Mystery Lady: The Songs Of Billie Holiday, which in Norah's words, 'influenced her greatly growing up'.

In October of 2000, Jay spent two days recording and mixing 13 songs as demos with Norah and her band. At first, someone else was brought in to produce a finished album. Blue Note rejected the initial version of the record. Norah's manager then asked Blue Note to have Jay re-record the music and mix the album with Arif Mardin as producer. Back to Sorcerer they went, following the same exact blueprint Jay laid down when he made the demos. They tracked a week, overdubbed in 2 to 3 days and mixed at Sear Sound in August 2001.
The Norah Jones debut release came out in February of 2002. Led by Jay's co-production of the breakout radio single, "Don't Know Why," Come Away With Me took six months to sell 500,000 units. Since that date, it sold 20 million-plus copies worldwide. Jay won four Grammys for that album including Engineer of the Year, Record of the Year, Album of the Year and Pop Vocal of the Year. All told Jay has 8 Grammys. Norah's follow up album, Feels Like Home, which was recorded and mixed by Jay, has sold over 1.2 million in its first week alone and 10 million copies worldwide. On this release, Jay worked with members of The Band (Levon Helm and Garth Hudson) as well as Dolly Parton.

Source: http://www.jdmanagement.com/jaynewland/index.html

[LynnieD]

Has Norah had 2 albums though?? Or just the one really big one??

[Icepik]

Wikipedia lists 4 albums

2001 First Sessions
2002 Come Away with Me
2004 Feels like Home
2007 Not Too Late

[Calamity Jane]

Norah Jones is a great guess. The original item says that "S" agreed never to tell what had happened, and that "MV" was on her own for future recordings and tours. Lets see if Norah Jones ever puts out another album!

[GoldDust77]

This Blind Item was pretty interesting to me, and since i'm here sick with a case of Bronchitis and "Mr. GoldDust" has already gone to bed, i've done a bit of "investigating", and i think i've found the answer! MICHELLE BRANCH. The B.I. has some clues in it which led me to my answer (which i'm personally pretty much totally convinced of):

The B.I. talks about how "In late 2000" (the time-frame is of course a big clue) the recordings were started; the record producer/record company used this unknown talented singer to record a bunch of songs--Obviously, they had plans up their sleeve to put out a full album using the songs sung by this "mystery session singer"; they just had to find the right person to pass off as the *singer* of the songs--someone who had what it took to become a popular pop star. Now, 2000 was the height of the huge "teen-pop" craze, so labels were actively searching for TEENAGERS to become *the next big pop star*. Michelle Branch is a talented guitar player, and she is (debatably) pretty--she has a very unique, memorable look about her, and i can see money-hungry record execs seeing something in her, thinking, "She can play the guitar, she is a teenager, she has a 'different' look about her & black hair, pail skin that could appeal to a lot of teens (i.e. different from the other bubbly blonde, tan teen pop stars of the time--Britney, Christina, Jessica, Mandy); the only problem is, she can't sing!"...and thus having this mystery singer do the singing. Michelle Branch's debut album came out in 2001, so it totally fits the time-frame here.

(MV has/had several Top 40 songs and CD's. They could have gone to #1 or languished in the 30's..I really cannot go into much more detail or else it would be too easy to discover) MV was everywhere..on television, radio, awards shows, commercials..EVERYWHERE.

Michelle Branch has indeed been successful; she's had at least "several" top 40 songs, etc. To further fit this B.I., she had 2 or 3 songs off her debut album that did VERY WELL, but her second album that came out in like 2003 didn't do as well & kind of "languished" on the charts. BUT more importantly, the part of the B.I. here that got my attention bigtime is the way they capitalized the word "EVERYWHERE". "Everywhere" is the name of Michelle Branch's first & most popular song! BIG CLUE, IMO.

Another HUGE clue to me: The B.I. keeps referring to the apparently-very-well-known music-producer who's involved in this scam as "the guy". But at two points, the word "Guy" is capitalized--VERY TELLING in my opinion:

...the Guy was very good at what he does/did...

and:

...was easier for Guy to pull off...

This made me think that it is a person NAMED "Guy". ESPECIALLY the second time the word "Guy" is capitalized--It doesn't even bother to say "the Guy"; it just calls him "Guy" like it is his name! I immediately thought of the well-known music producer/executive Guy Oseary, CEO of Maverick Records. So, i then went onto the Maverick Records website to see its roster of recording artists. Sure enough, Michelle Branch is one of them.

...when she described him, I knew who he was and was even more floored than I had been previously..This was just something I had really not heard before..

This indicates that it is a very well-known producer, and i get the impression, a very successful one--thus, since this music-producer is so successful, that could be the reason why the writer of this article would be surprised to the point of being "floored" that this particular producer would be engaged in this risky Milli-Vanilli fraud situation, since he's certainly had enough success to not have to resort to such lame underhanded tactics. Again, Guy Oseary is definitely a highly successful producer--and a very well-known one, easily recognizable by fellow people that are involved in the music industry.

...It took two calls before I got the guy on the phone and he was pissed, scared, angry, threatening, remorseful..everything..It turns out the reason he had stopped making payments was he had been playing some shell games with the money between the record company, MV's earnings and MV's investments and just did not have any additional money..In addition, MV was not sure she wanted to continue on with what had been happening and so our mystery guy might be completely out of the picture..

Again, TOTALLY fits in with what's gone on with Michelle Branch in the last couple years or so, from what i've read. I know that she was very bitter about the music industry, to the point of (i remember reading--maybe on here at GR) flipping out on her own website & shutting down the fan forum on her website & writing a statement on her website discussing how disillusioned with the whole music industry she was, AND she mentioned how she really didn't have much money (the quote: "just did not have any additional money"). Michelle talked openly about how she had enough money to live comfortably, but was far from rich.--And she seemed very bitter about this fact. --Totally fits with how it says "he had been playing some shell games with the money between the record company, MV's earnings and MV's investments and just did not have any additional money."

The quote: "MV was not sure she wanted to continue on with what had been happening and so our mystery guy might be completely out of the picture." TOTALLY fits what's been going on with Michelle Branch's career the past year or two. She has, like i mentioned, expressed MAJOR disillusionment & unhappiness with the music industry & with her pop-music career....I remember when Michelle posted the long letter/explanation to her fans on her website talking about she was going to, or wanted to, quit the music business, she sounded so distraught, i remember blogs were even talking about how she basically "flipped out" on her own fans--she was majorly upset & stressed-out about SOMETHING to the point of wanting to get out of the music business! This scenario in the B.I. would definitely fit. Michelle has even basically ended her career as a solo pop-singer--she's changed music genres and is now part of the country-music duo group "The Wreckers". Thus, makes sense that Guy Oseary (who is not a country-music producer) "might be completely out of the picture".

I actually think the record company to this day has no idea what went on as the Guy was very good at what he does/did and knew how to make sure the record company was always happy..He stayed under budget, toured, made MV available, and made the record company money..

Again, this part of the B.I. could definitely apply to Guy Oseary since he is a very successful record producer/music executive.

So a meeting was arranged in my office and S and MV finally met face to face..they had never done so, even though it was S who made MV a star..MV was rude to say the least when she saw what S looked like and it really upset me although S being her normal classy self could have cared less..

I could definitely see someone who basically "flipped out" on her own fans on her own website like Michelle did--obviously could be considered "rude" behavior toward her own fans--could be rude to this mystery singer as well.

What we agreed to do that day was to provide S with one lump sum rather than a monthly income which was easier for Guy to pull off and S also agreed to never disclose her role in this drama and MV was on her own for future recordings and tours..

Makes perfect sense, since Michelle Branch has, like i already mentioned, totally changed music genres & has a whole new direction in her music career. In fact, Michelle Branch has talked in interviews about how great it is that she & her friend/band partner Jessica-somebody are "on their own" & free to do whatever they want, in their new country music duo band.

OK, there's my (long-assed) take on this Blind Item! In my humble opinion, the pieces all fit; i definitely think it points toward Michelle Branch. I just can't imagine there being another popular singer, who came onto the music scene at just the right time, and to have all those other clues fit. (But then again, i could of course be way off!)

[darksithbunny]

Bravo, GoldDust, Bravo!

[Icepik]

I just never thought Michella Branch was that big or great a singer.

[moomies]

Great analysis GoldDust!

And hope you get better soon.

[Tater Tot]

Wow Gold Dust! I definitely thought it could be her, but now I'm convinced. Right time frame, right level of success, the word clues, and yes, she did change genres and now she has a singing partner. I always did think that was a weird move for someone so young with so much success.

Bravo Indeed!

[vballchica134]

But with the new duo, she doesn't sing? The other girl allows someone else to sing for her?

I don't see her as being shocking either.

Btw, she (or her group) is still with Maverick. And this is her singing live: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fB4UFnHg_AA It's not amazing, obviously really her singing. I mean it sounds live, not perfect or recorded.

[Lobelia]

Holy cow, I'm convinced. Thanks Golddust!

[bite me spidey]

I'm just going to throw out a couple quick things here:

The person who wrote this just updated recently and said that he changed the year and the amount of albums sold to safe-guard his client. So basically, it could be any year and any number of albums.

With that said, someone mentioned Norah Jones; her second album did worse than her first, I believe, even though it was still successful. So she would not fit the original description because of that.

I also do not think it is Michelle Branch because I think her singing voice sounds very much l like her speaking voice. From this description I assumed that this "singer" had an amazing voice and was well known for her voice. I think Michelle is known as a song-writer more than anything. Also, I've seen Michelle collaborate with other artists and she has also done some "unplugged" type of concerts, and you could definitely tell she was singing.

This "blind item" really fits no one, so I'm going to go with it being bullshit, still.

[sputnik]

i think they changed the dates and i'm leaning more toward shania cause she's the ultimate 'product', created and packaged by her pygmalion/producer/husband... she never just sings spontaneously anywhere and controls all her appearances and tours and lives outside the public eye for years in between records. she's the perfect fake.

[LynnieD]

Goldust--you rock sista! Sorry to hear you are sick, but good work!! Can you go and analyze the 'Legend of Toothy Tile' thread now?? haha

[southernbelle]

If they are claiming to have changed the dates now I think that they may have just made it up, because if it didn't happen in 2000 there was no reason to give a date in the first place.

And I agree with the Michelle Branch thing... while the clues like EVERYWHERE and "Guy" do seem to point to her, she was never promoted or known for her good voice, but for her guitar skills. In fact, I think she has a pretty mediocre voice. The backup singer was supposedly approached because she had an outstanding voice but not the looks.