Sonic 3/Michael Jackson and The Jetzons and Brad Buxer. (Hard Times)

Sonic 3/Michael Jackson and The Jetzons and Brad Buxer.

So, does that melody sound familiar? Does the baseline sound familiar? It should. It is clearly the same one used in Sonic the Hedgehog 3's Ice Cap Zone. Take a listen...

Or how about Act 2's version?

So, who are The Jetzons? They formed from the disbandment of a punk band that was around earlier. Their leader died from a drug overdose from what Wiki claims. Here's the major Michael Jackson connection, Brad Buxer was a member of this band. He was on keyboard. Buxer worked extensively with MJ on many projects including Sonic 3's music. Due to internal conflicts, the band stopped playing around 83.

Buxer must have pulled this unreleased track out and recomposed it for Sonic 3.

Fervor Records re-released their album and added more unreleased tracks from their archives. One such track was Hard Times.

When I first heard this track earlier this year, my jaw literally dropped. Holy, crap it is almost exactly like the Tracks Ice Cap Zones 1 and 2. The melody is the same, but there are some differences in the beats. So, yeah Buxer, who admits he worked with MJ on Sonic, had even more involvement in the music than we were led to believe.

From Fervor Records.com, ((The label uncovered several unreleased tracks in the archives and re-packaged the cult masterpiece as,The Complete Jetzons. Die hard Hedgehog fans discovered The Jetzons’ 1983 song, Hard Times (from the Fervor release), as the obvious basis for Sonic 3′s Icecap level. This dismisses Jackson’s involvement by directly tying Brad Buxer to the much debated soundtrack. The discovery has spread like wildfire on the internet prompting multiple Hard Times/Sonic mashup re-mixes and audio wave analysis. YouTube, gamer boards and blogs continue to light up. ))

Actually, I disagree. This further supports the theory that most of the music for Sonic was composed by MJ. MJ generally worked closely with many people to produce his music. I think Buxer gave him a helping hand in Sonic and even filled one track with his old band's unreleased track Hard Times. However, I think even MJ's influence is in Ice Cap Zone.

-The grunts in Ice Cap Zone sound like MJ samples to me. Listen to the grunt.

-The reverse “beat” has that MJ feel to it. And, the techno beat kind has a MJ feel, but this might be Buxer adding more the beat. Act 2 certainly feels like MJ remixed it.

-Buxer must have had a major influence on MJ because this baseline is similar to Smooth Criminal.

I find all of this interesting because Ice Cap Zone was and still is a fan favorite of DJs and music lovers.