POLL-demonium: The Prince Protégés

Sheila E. now and 4 EVA

You'd have to rank their songs. Some of my favorites:

"The Belle of St Mark"
almost anything by The Time
"Nasty Girl"
"Round & Round"
"Love...Thy Will Be Done"

Should we vote based on their Prince-related work (Sheila E wins this for me) or their whole career (Dale Bozzio is a contender)?

I think you just have to do what makes you feel most like a nasty girl.

I thought Dale was a Zappa protege.

kind of unfair putting The Time in here as they're pretty unfuggwithable so I voted Jill Jones. Her album is classic.

yeah The Time are going to flatten the competition

which one is the guy or band in purple rain thats sings the song about wanting to be a mountaineer? because that's the one i want to vote for.

if you include jimmy jam and terry lewis' post-time work, i don't see how anyone else can measure up at all. i wanna vote sheila e. for sentimental reasons, and because she's a terrific drummer on top of the pop glamour, but the time collectively were obviously kings of the heap.

Wanna rep for Wendy & Lisa here -- debut has some great stuff and I like Eroica. After, like, 5 years of looking for Fruit on the Bottom, I passed on it a few years back for $2.50. Still not forgiving myself for that one.

Jill Jones's self-titled album is the best record by a Prince protege I've heard, and she's a better singer than most of the people on the list (except maybe Rosie Gaines), so I'm gonna vote for her. Too bad that she never really made it big, and nowadays you have to pay big bucks even to get a used copy of the album.

Speaking of which, a lot of the albums by these acts are pretty hard to find these days... Isn't anyone interested in reissuing them?

Just realized Lady Ga Ga gives off major Dale Bozzio vibes. I was wondering why her shtick was seeming oddly familiar.

Meh on Sheena Easton since, despite the eternal awesomeness of "U Got The Look," she was a Grammy-winning artist long before she ever met Prince.

And, as it turned out, nobody needed Cat to rap.

Therefore, I vote The Time.

Like I've said before "Strut" >>> "Sugar Walls" anyway.

Martika "Love.. Thy Will Be Done" was great (as was also "Toy Soldiers", but that was pre-Prince of course)

i voted for vanity 6.

i think i have that madhouse album at the store but i've never listened to it. maybe i will.

S A X U A L I T Y

Never heard the Madhouse album. Should I? anyone?

First Madhouse album is pretty dated sounding. Kind of cool because Prince plays keys throughout but definitely a product of its time.

The Family but no St. Paul?

Not that anyone would vote for St. Paul or even The Family.

Voted Sheila E. I like the Time but as stupid as they can get, I always go back to the Vanity 6, Appolonia 6, and The Family albums. "Happy Birthday Mr. Christian" and the orig "Nothing Compares 2 U" are great.

I love how DAF the Susan songs are!

"they" = the latter albums, not The Time. Antecedents antecedents.

WHeRE'S ANDRÉ CYMONE

http://ickmusic.com/pics/ac.jpg

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

Extra bonus points for Jill Jones: covering a Sister Lovers track. Kinda unexpected, I think.

i need to hear a full wendy and lisa album one day. lolly lolly and waterfalls were pretty great though. out of these, there were some real duds i got duped into buying. but the quality of the protege work basically parallels his own stuff. so the 80s>>>90s proteges.

who was it that turned KISS down?

mazarati did it first. prince did his version after.

I think the story is that "Kiss" was originally a rough, acoustic demo Prince had written. He didn't think he was gonna record it himself, so he gave it to Mazarati. Then Mazarati and David Z worked it into a minimalist funk piece. When Prince heard this version of "Kiss", he realized it was so good he wanted to release it himself, so he took the song back from Mazarati, remixed the backing track they'd done and recorded his vocals and guitar on top of it. Mazarati got an arranging credit on Prince's version, but I've read some interview where David Z complains about not getting a production credit on the song, even though he feels he was responsible for turning the demo into the sort of stripped-down funk piece it became. Which I think is a fair enough point: the minimalist sound is what makes "Kiss" so great, as a composition it's not that remarkable.

I noticed the extensive credits for everything on "Parade" where Prince is credited for every singular thing he did, and somewhere in the middle the "Kiss" credits are swamped (but realistic)...

Hmm, seems I misremembered the credit on Parade, it actually says "'Kiss' arranged by David Z, background voices by Mazarati". But I don't think it's "swamped" in the middle, it's the third credit after "Prince and the Revolution" and "Clare Fischer".

I think Prince's relationship with credits has always been kinda weird. On one hand, on many of his proteges' albums they're given credit for songs Prince actually wrote himself, and on The Revolution and The New Power Generation albums the band is always given credit for the full album, even though some of the songs on them were written and performed by Prince alone. But on the other hand, there are also several stories of Prince claiming sole credit for tunes other contributed to. The "Kiss" story is the best known of these, but I think Andre Cymone too has claimed that he never got full credit for his contributions to the music they did while he was part of Prince's band.

I had (have) the Cassette version.

"the minimalist sound is what makes "Kiss" so great, as a composition it's not that remarkable."

also why it never sounds that great live.

best version i think ive heard is the lovesexy one. but even then something gets lost cos the song is all about the production.

This poll needs more Andre Cymone.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KER_tfyVehY

Jesse Johnson anyone?

Jesse Johnson got Sly Stone to sing on a track during a time when nobody could get Sly to sing on anything

that has to count for something

"Crazay"! Not a bad song.

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

is there a thread on the time? what is their best album?

Paging EZ Snappin to thread who is by far the go to Time expert afaik

Ice Cream Castles is the best one

Crazy talk. The first two are the best.

They both have that lean basement funk production that was part of all Prince's late '70s/early '80s productions. By comparison ICC is a bit more produced and a lot of the charm is gone.

Yeah i prefer the broadened sonic palette

I have been told that the answer is "what time is it?"

no, that is the question.

Madhouse ROBBED in this poll. Both albums are great.

Would have voted for The Time without hesitation!

oh wee oh wee oh

Mazerati was robbed:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vA4tiO6YpbA