Uploaded February 2026 | Updated September 2026, 2 hours ago

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Following Brad Sundberg's new "Vinyl Battle" series on YouTube, I've been inspired to fast-track a restoration for this 1st portion of Michael Jackson's HIStory album, as a sort of companion piece 😃

At the time of writing, Brad (one of Michael's former engineers) has compared vinyl releases for two tracks - 'The Way You Make Me Feel' and 'Man In The Mirror'. On both occasions, the original HIStory vinyl has been his winner, with the original Bad vinyl coming in 2nd place. That's mammoth praise 🤯

I must admit, until a week or two ago, I'd never given 'HIStory Begins' a fair shot in terms of sound quality. This is because compression and limiting handcuffs the digital releases, making it harder for me to appreciate it in that aspect. But as the story usually goes, the original vinyl release wasn't a victim of the same hinderances. If you own that LP, huge congrats 🎉 That's a very rare piece! But for most of us who don't, this is where the restoration project comes into play 👀

Fortunately, thanks to the MoFi releases of Off The Wall, Thriller and Dangerous, we now have perfect, dynamic digital sources for ALL versions of the tracks featured on 'HIStory Begins'! For Bad, the initial CD releases from the late 80s/early 90s were already unhindered to start with, so no need for a MoFi release 🙌

With the correct versions chosen, the work was more straight-forward than any other MJ album I've tackled to this point! A teeny bit of volume fluctuations needed to be addressed during a few tracks, but other than that, all I needed to do was EQ the left and right channels of each track to mirror Bruce Swedien & Bernie Grundman's remastering for HIStory.

For this initial stage, I matched the EQ with the tracks from the CD, and waited 'til the very end to implement the EQ curve from the vinyl release across the whole album. I tend to trust this method more (depending on where I can source my vinyl rips). Inner groove distortion can occasionally affect the EQ curve for tracks near the end of a side. Referencing the CD first will ensure a 100% authentic result across every track 🙂

Track-spacing is also an important step I often forget to mention on these restorations. I made sure the gap between each track was as close to the actual release as possible 👍 On this occasion, my source for the vinyl rip is the same as our Invincible, Dangerous and Blood On The Dance Floor restorations, so I'd already undergone all the steps to ensuring we've landed on an accurate (flat) EQ curve 👌

Can happily report this 2026 Restoration has a healthy DR value of 13, vs the original CD which sits at a 9 🔥

I must say, with the installment completed, I couldn't agree any more with Brad's assessments 😱 This is one of VERY few remastered releases I've ever encountered where the tracks actually benefit (IMO). As Brad recalls in his episodes regarding those two 'Bad' tracks, he and the team were 7-8 years older and more experienced by the time they reached HIStory, and mastering preferences can change in that time. Every track has a super deliberate balance between the lows, mids and highs 👏👏

According to Brad, the initial remastering was done in-house by Bruce, before sending it off to Bernie. Let's not forget, these two guys had been on every MJ project from Off The Wall onwards! It could not have been in better hands 🙏 This is without a doubt the most carefully-curated MJ hit collection there'll ever be. Michael and his team were apart of every single step, from the track-selection to the very end...

If these restorations are your cup of tea, you'll likely be into Brad's series too! He breaks everything down thoroughly, from both the listener's point of view, and the actual process he and Bruce underwent during the making of said releases, such as the original mastering stages and critically approving/rejecting test pressings. Intriguing stuff! Here's his page: @inthestudiowithmj

Check out the full album playlist here ⬇
youtube.com/playlist?list=PLOvYtqeUuiLtNCg8ybZJL2gkIkjkzHKTa