Michael Jackson Bad Vinyl at 40: 1987 Original, Value and Which Pressing to Buy

Epic released Bad on 31 August 1987, on CD, LP and cassette at the same time. It was the follow-up to Thriller, and it was pressed on the same scale. On Discogs, the European LP is in more than 31,000 collections and the main US pressing in more than 22,000. That scale is the starting point for any question about value.

Interest in Michael Jackson Bad vinyl spiked in May and June 2026. The Michael biopic opened in cinemas on 24 April 2026, and Mobile Fidelity announced an audiophile edition of the album in the summer. We have not verified what drove the spike, so treat those as context, not a cause. As of 12 October 2026 there was no official 40th-anniversary announcement. A Steve Hoffman forum thread opened in March 2026, after a "Bad 40" website name was registered, but it records no official news.

This guide covers how to identify a 1987 original, the "Leave Me Alone" question that confuses many buyers, picture discs and reissues, what a copy is worth, and which pressing to buy. For the album before it, see our Thriller vinyl value guide. For the whole catalogue, see the Michael Jackson vinyl albums guide.

US original, the copy most American readers have:

• Catalogue numbers: E 40600 on the labels, OE 40600 on the spine. The label matrices are AL 40600 / BL 40600.
• Barcode on the back cover: 0 7464-40600-1.
• Package: a gatefold sleeve with a printed lyric inner sleeve. Some copies have a gold promo stamp on the back of the sleeve.
• Mastering: credited to Bernie Grundman.
• Runouts and plants: Discogs documents two US pressing plants. Carrollton, Georgia, has G1, G2 or G3 etched, as in PAL-40600-1E G1. Hub-Servall has HuB etched, as in PAL-40600-2E HuB1. They pressed at the same time; neither is "the" first pressing.

UK and European original: catalogue 450290 1 (Europe: EPC 450290 1), barcode 5 099745 029013, a gatefold with a lyric and credits inner sleeve. UK copies were cut at CBS Studios in London and pressed at Aston Clinton, with hand-etched runouts like 450290-1 A5. A variant has an asterisk after the catalogue number on the label. European copies were pressed by CBS in Haarlem and came with various hype stickers. Some early copies have a red sticker naming "I Just Can't Stop Loving You" and "Bad".

Elsewhere: Canada OE 40600 (Don Mills, with the date code "H 87" on the spine); Japan 28·3P-800, with a picture inner sleeve and a four-page lyric insert; Brazil 231012.

The quickest check of all is the track list. A 1987 LP has ten tracks, ending side two with "Smooth Criminal". Our first pressing identification guide explains how to read the rest.

"Leave Me Alone" was released in 1987 only as a bonus track on the CD. The LP and the cassette had ten tracks. Wikipedia lists the song as a CD, digital and 2001-cassette bonus track. MoFi's 2026 press release says it "was left off original vinyl editions".

So searches for "Bad vinyl with Leave Me Alone" are really an identification question. Here is the answer as a table:

If your LP has "Leave Me Alone", it is one of the three "yes" editions above, all from 2009 or later. If you want the song on vinyl, those are your three choices.

Discogs lists 116 vinyl versions of Bad. The table below shows the originals by country, the 1987 picture discs and the reissues worth telling apart, with the side A runout.

The editions explained:

• 1987 picture discs. US 9E9-44043, sold in a plastic cover, and UK/Europe 450290 0. The UK copies were pressed by Orlake; the European copies, by CBS Haarlem, have PAL-40600-HOL etched in the runout. Picture discs are display pieces and generally sound worse than black vinyl.
• Music On Vinyl, 2009 (MOVLP057), 180g, pressed by Record Industry in the Netherlands, with "Leave Me Alone".
• Bad 25, 2012. Three 180g LPs in a triple gatefold. LP1 is the remastered album with "Leave Me Alone"; LPs 2 and 3 hold 13 rare and previously unreleased tracks. It was cut by Ray Janos at Sterling, so RJ STERLING appears in the runouts.
• Epic reissue 88875143741, from 2015/2016 and repressed many times since, most recently in 2026. Bernie Grundman is credited for mastering, the lacquers were cut at SST and it was pressed by MPO. It is ten tracks in a gatefold with a card lyric sleeve.
• 2018 picture disc 19075866431, pressed by GZ and Memphis Record Pressing.
• MoFi UltraDisc One-Step UD1S 2-062 (2026). See below.

Market cards for two of the most-viewed versions: Bad on VinylAI Market and another Bad pressing.

In 2026 Mobile Fidelity issued Bad as an UltraDisc One-Step, catalogue UD1S 2-062. It is two 180g discs at 45 rpm, limited to 6,000 numbered copies, mastered by Krieg Wunderlich and pressed at Fidelity Record Pressing. MoFi's page lists it at $125. Dates differ between sources: MoFi's press release said 21 August 2026, Discogs and Wikipedia give 18 September, and one shop's pre-order page says 11 December. Treat availability as "late 2026".

Two things to know before buying it:

• The source is digital, and so is the album. Bad was recorded and mixed digitally on Mitsubishi machines, and MoFi lists its source as the "Mitsubishi X-80 16-bit/48kHz digital master". Every vinyl Bad, the 1987 original included, starts from a digital master. The One-Step's case rests on the cutting and pressing, not on an analogue tape that nobody else used.
• Five songs use the 1994 mixes. Discogs notes that "Bad", "The Way You Make Me Feel", "I Just Can't Stop Loving You", "Dirty Diana" and "Smooth Criminal" appear in the 1994 revised mixes approved by Michael Jackson, not the 1987 mixes. If you want the album exactly as it sounded in 1987, this is not that record.

It does include "Leave Me Alone". For what an audiophile pressing actually changes, see audiophile vinyl pressings explained.

Most 1987 copies of Bad are common records. More than 31,000 Discogs users own the European pressing and more than 22,000 the US Carrollton pressing, and those are only the catalogued copies. As a rule of thumb, a played original sells for about what a new reissue costs, or less. The official US store sold a Bad LP for $22.98 on 12 October 2026, and an old copy competes with that.

What lifts a copy:

• Condition. Gatefolds from 1987 often have ring wear and seam splits, and a clean, complete copy is the exception. Use our vinyl grading guide.
• A genuinely sealed first pressing. Sealed copies reach the big auction houses: an AMG-certified sealed first pressing went through Heritage Auctions in October 2026 (the price is not public). Check for reseals before paying a premium.
• Signed copies and promotional items. A dealer guide to Jackson records (June 2026) puts signed, sealed or withdrawn-promo items at "$300–$15,000+", depending on what exactly they are. A gold promo stamp on a 1987 US sleeve makes a copy interesting, not automatically valuable.
• Completeness. The lyric inner sleeve should be there.

What does not add value: the plant (Carrollton versus Hub-Servall), the picture disc for its own sake, or "1987" on its own. A record is rare when few were made. Bad was made by the million.

Decide what you want the record for.

Because every version comes from a digital master, the differences between pressings are mostly cutting, vinyl quality and mix choice. A quiet original is a perfectly good way to hear the record.

To check a copy quickly, photograph the label with the VinylAI app. It identifies the pressing, from E 40600 to the One-Step, and adds it to your collection. You can then compare the offers on our market cards.