Quincy Jones Disses T-Pain’s “P.Y.T.” Cover, T-Pain Responds

During his controversial interview with Vulture, in which he discussed a slew of topics, including Michael Jackson and The Beatles, Quincy Jones also mentioned T-Pain and his remake of “P.Y.T. (Pretty Young Thing).”

The Auto-Tune hitmaker, along with Robin Thicke, covered the Michael Jackson classic for Jones’ 2010 tribute album Q: Soul Bossa Nostra, but the iconic producer was not a fan of his remake.

“I was not in favor of doing [2010’s Q: Soul Bossa Nostra], but the rappers wanted to record something as a tribute to me, where they’d do versions of songs that I’d done over my career,” said Jones. “I said to them, ‘Look, you got to make the music better than we did on the originals.’ That didn’t happen. T-Pain, man, he didn’t pay attention to the details.”

Hours after the interview was published, T-Pain responded with his own version of events, revealing that he was opposed to the remake. “For the record I told my managers (at the time) and I told @QuincyDJones in his face ‘I don’t want to remake any of your past records because I know I’m gonna fuck it up. I’ll never be able to reach the greatest of MJ,’” he wrote. “It took them hours to pump me up to even go in the booth.”

“And I still hated it when I came out of the booth,” he added. “Then the song came out and it was even worse than it sounded in the studio. This is legit one of the reasons I don’t work with the managers I had anymore because if I said I was uncomfortable doing something they didn’t care.”

According to T-Pain, Jones did not offer any guidance on the day of the recording. “But also to be real. It just seems like @QuincyDJones is pissed off at the whole world,” he continued. “I have nothing but respect for the guy so I don’t know why we didn’t hold the song or tell me exactly what he wanted when I kept taking the headphones off beggin for direction from the God.”