No New Jacko Soon

Star's label say there's no rush to put out unreleased tracks

09 July 2009 - Unreleased Michael Jackson music is likely to be made public, but the president of his record label Epic says they're in no rush to release it.

"We just want to pay our respects to Michael," Amanda Ghost told 6 Music. "We don't want to be seen to be jumping on any bandwagon associated with his death."

Jackson was reportedly working on new material as early as 2006, and since then the likes of Will.I.Am, Ne-Yo and Akon have said they've worked with the star.

Bruce Swedien, a producer and engineer who worked on Off The Wall and Thriller, said that he believed Jackson was working on instrumental classic music as well as a pop album. 

"The appetite is definitely there" for new material, Ghost said. "If we do release anything of unreleased material it has to be fantastic and it can't damage in any way his legacy or his legend and I won't let that happen at Epic."

"We haven't made any decisions because we just want to be respectful for his memory and not be seen in any way as trying to cash in."
Amanda Ghost

US music sales tracker Nielsen SoundScan has revealed that 800,000 copies of Michael Jackson albums were bought last week - almost double sales for the previous week.

Compilation Number Ones was the best-selling album followed by 1982 album Thriller.

The release of new music by Jackson is also likely to be delayed as legal negotiations over his estate continue.

Earlier this week a Los Angeles judge gave control to his longtime attorney and a family friend, rejecting a claim by Jackson's mother Katherine.

"I have no idea when it's coming out, but it will come out on Sony/Epic. We haven't made any decisions because we just want to be respectful for his memory and not be seen in any way as trying to cash in."

Ghost, best known for her work as a producer and writer with the likes of Beyonce, Shakira and James Blunt is the first recording artist to be appointed head of a major label - a fact that she said didn't escape Michael Jackson.

She first met Jackson in February this year when presenting him with an award for being the label's biggest selling artist, as she explained.

"I walked up to him and said 'Hi, I'm the president of Epic,' and he said 'Wow, things have changed since I was there,'" Ghost said. "He knew my work and he thought it was fantastic that a creative had been put in charge."

Rodrigo Davies