Michael Jackson’s Family Furious With Quincy Jones

Michael Jackson’s family is livid with Quincy Jones after Jackson’s former longtime producer dropped a bomb accusing Jackson of plagiarizing “Billie Jean” in a recent Vulture interview.

Few people knew Jackson’s music better than Jones — who worked as a producer with Jackson on hits like “Beat It,” “Don’t Stop Til You Get Enough,” “Billie Jean,” “Thriller,” and countless others — but Jackson’s family says Jones was untruthful when he implied Jackson didn’t make his hits honestly.

“Michael stole a lot of stuff. He stole a lot of songs. [Donna Summer’s] ‘State of Independence’ and ‘Billie Jean.’ The notes don’t lie, man. He was as Machiavellian as they come … Greedy, man. Greedy,” Jones said in the interview published earlier this month.

“He must have the first stages of dementia,” a family member told Page Six of the 84-year-old Jones.

Jackson’s father, Joe Jackson, has a slightly different take, telling the publication that he believed Jones was “quite jealous of Michael because he’s never worked with someone with all that talent.”

Joe added that if a similarity does exist between Michael Jackson and Summer’s songs, Jones himself, who has worked with artists like Frank Sinatra, Miles Davis, Ray Charles, Paul Simon and Aretha Franklin, is to blame.

“He says my son stole it, but he was the producer on both [‘Billie Jean’ and ‘State of Independence’], so if anybody is wrong, it would be Quincy,” Joe said.

A different relative believes Jones “quietly carried a vendetta” against Jackson for years.

“It goes way back, and [Jones] recently got money from Michael’s estate,” the relative said, alluding to the producer’s recent $9.4 million court victory against the late singer’s estate, recovering past unpaid royalties.

But the fallout between the two goes back years before Jackson’s 2009 death, when the pair disagreed on whether Jones deserved a shot at a Grammy award for having produced Jackson’s 1982 hit album Thriller.

“Michael did all of the work. It’s his music and everyone knows Michael’s sound — and ‘Thriller’ was all Michael Jackson,” the family source said.

Bob Jones, Jackson’s late spokesman, wrote in his 2005 memoir that “The King lobbied hard against Quincy getting that Grammy. He didn’t want to share the spotlight at all with Quincy Jones or anyone else.”

Jones ultimately took home the award but he and Jackson “fell out for good” a few years later in 1987 after Jones arranged Prince to duet on Jackson’s “Bad,” according to the family member.

Things weren’t always tense between the two music legends.

“Michael kind of looked up to Quincy almost like he looked at [Motown founder] Berry Gordy,” the family member said of the once-close relationship. “So when Quincy got Prince to agree to the song, Michael felt that it would be good only because that’s what Quincy promised. But he didn’t know that Quincy had agreed to give Prince top billing on Michael’s own song.”

The duet was then killed, although it’s unclear by whom. But the family member said that Jackson “absolutely lost it” when Prince went public about the almost collab.

Asked in an interview why the song didn’t happen, Prince said, “The first line of that song is ‘Your butt is mine.’ I said [to Michael], ‘Who’s gonna sing that to whom? Cause you ain’t singing that to me and I ain’t singing that to you, so right there we’ve got a problem.’”

The incident caused irreparable damage to Jackson and Jones’ relationship. The singer’s 1991 album, “Dangerous,” would be produced by Jackson with help from Teddy Riley and Bill Bottrell.

Jackson’s family member said that Jones’ recent comments were especially brutal thanks to the fact that Jackson isn’t alive to defend himself.

“Michael is not here to defend himself. The world knows that Michael was the number one artist in the world, and he didn’t need to steal from anyone,” they said.