Prince RIP

Something in the water does not compute.

xps thank you! I never knew that lyric was so well disguised

man oh man this is a tough one

The greatest thing about Prince was that he was such an enigma, but at the same time you might see him at the grocery store buying kale. Also I love that all the best Prince stories are basically him being kind of a dick, but he comes off as totally endearing anyway.

was gonna do manic monday at karaoke tonight but now i feel mildly weird about it. not that this particular friend group is even likely to make the connection.

something about the rhythmic flexibility and eclecticism of "hissing of summer lawns" really does recall prince, doesn't it.

those swooping multitracked Joni harmonies too

where's tuomas?

He posted this morning

one thing that's kinda funny re: min-80s mpls is that the guy in panties, high heels and fishnets ended up being a jehovah's witness with some problematic conservative sexual views and the everydude flannel & jeans hamms guzzling rockers in husker du were gay

― rockpalast '82 (upper mississippi sh@kedown), Friday, April 22, 2016 10:17 AM (33 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

love this

is Fox News wall to wall Lonnie Mack and Chyna coverage today? or are they wrestling with their purple demons.

well, here's NRO's obit: http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/434418/prince-rip

Damn, I hadn't even heard about Lonnie Mack. 2016 seems like it's gonna be a long, sad year.

percocets. prescribed for his hip pain.

feel like in all of this mourning stuff one thing I'm not seeing mentioned much is how *funny* Prince was. This was in evidence more in person (ie, live, onstage, on film, in interviews etc.) than on record but watching a bunch of random clips last night I was laughing my ass off - so much mugging, smirking, knowing glances, tossed off jokes, almost slapstick physical comedy. At one point during the release party show for Parade he does an elaborate mime routine of brushing his teeth, for no apparent reason. or the animated gifs of him rolling his eyes in the videos for Black Sweat or Kiss. He would do this kind James Brown/70s pimp patter and amp up the silliness of it (an approach borrowed from George Clinton maybe?).

yeah, totally -- didn't miles davis compare him to chaplin?

ha – I just watched that clip

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1BxRYIoKMJU

from 1995:

What's your take on Prince?

JAGGER; It's fashionable to knock Prince now because he seems to have gone off on a tangent [laughs].

You mean the way he has no name?

JAGGER: That's become a bit of a joke. No, I think Prince is a great artist, very traditional in some ways. Prince has been overlooked. But he's so incredibly in the mold of the James Brown sort of performer. He broke a lot of musical modes and invented a lot of styles and couldn't keep up with himself. Very prolific, which is rare. Mostly people write three songs and repeat themselves. Prince has a lot of talent as a writer, and I've seen great performances by Prince. He's outperformed almost everyone. I'd rate him at the top. I don't think there's a lot of competition from new artists.

I like that quote that Miles said about Prince — something about how Prince has "a really raunchy thing, almost like a pimp and a bitch rolled into one."

Always makes me chuckle.

was also talking w my wife about his general cultural status - as a transgressive, envelope-pushing enfant terrible - and whether or not there are similar figures around today. the media landscape has changed so much that it's hard to make direct comparisons (you kind of just can't be as big a star as MJ or Prince or Madonna anymore, there just aren't that many people that are all tuning into the same media sources) but I did bring up Kanye. He's controversial, he's kind of at the same status of critically and commercially - but Kanye is not fun, he isn't inclusive (by which I mean he doesn't really create a world that his fans want to live in the way Prince did), and he's certainly not even close to the level of technical musical virtuosity, plus his politics are largely loathsome and regressive rather than open and forward-thinking. People might hail Kanye as a genius when he dies but I suspect he'll get more the "tortured artiste" treatment.

Anyway, my other thought was that in terms of cultural roles Bowie and Prince both occupied a similar space that was safe and inviting for freaks and weirdos. If you felt like an outcast for whatever reason - because of your race, sexuality, or just general interests - these were successful, huge artists that created a cultural space that welcomed you. Nowadays everyone is a "freak" - Miley Cyrus performs as a horny tree or whatever - and the straight-laced monoculture is less and less of a thing, so I'm not sure there's anyone playing a similar role today, the social climate is just different.

xp

these flowers magically bloomed in the front yard this morning. thank u, prince...

https://scontent-ord1-1.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-xap1/v/t1.0-9/13062106_10154726630477137_7404331384942006430_n.jpg?oh=6b7047f6de4e0f542ef273d22a82abf4&oe=57AD5106

Οὖτις—

Good points. I think what it boils down to is that Prince was one of the last of the truly individual big pop stars. Anymore, people just take their cues from precedents established by people like Prince.

whether or not there are similar figures around today

there weren't "similar figures" around in the 1980s or 1990s -- prince was sui generis.

Social media and YouTube mitigate the need for Prince- and Madonna-level pop stars

yes def

He's controversial, he's kind of at the same status of critically and commercially - but Kanye is not fun, he isn't inclusive (by which I mean he doesn't really create a world that his fans want to live in the way Prince did), and he's certainly not even close to the level of technical musical virtuosity, plus his politics are largely loathsome and regressive rather than open and forward-thinking.

OTM. This is why, no matter what people will dig up about things Prince said about marriage equality in recent years, such bullshit will never be part of Prince's legacy. I'm honestly waiting for someone to challenge me on Prince's religious stance so I can respond by showing them Frank Ocean's beautiful Tumblr tribute as a rebuttal. The ways in which he inspired and comforted his fans--us queer fans among them--is more powerful than any JW nonsense that he may have once tweeted or w/e.

http://www.slate.com/articles/arts/metropolis/2016/04/prince_s_sound_taste_and_drive_were_forged_by_minneapolis.html?curator=MusicREDEF

this helps me understand his context…don't think it's been linked, and for all i know one of you wrote it…

I don't think Prince was sui generis, per se, but he was a virtuoso and a genius, which allowed him to do so much more than merely mimic, say, Sly Stone, or or Stevie Wonder, or James Brown. He was one savvy operator, and the way he put it all together was yet another mark of said genius. He saw all the pieces but was smart enough to make them fit.

but Kanye is not fun, he isn't inclusive (by which I mean he doesn't really create a world that his fans want to live in the way Prince did)

I was thinking about that "create a world that his fans want to live in" thing while listening to 'We All Wanna Be Prince' by Felix da Housecat, hard to imagine someone releasing 'We All Wanna Be Kayne West'

yeah i mean the stuff was worth calling him out for when it happened, but i viewed any of that as the fact that prince was also sort of old fashioned, maybe the last pop star that *really* struggled with being so religious in an old fashoined way so carnal and so gifted at creating "the devil's music", and here i'm thinking that when prince converted to JW or said things like that it was like those times when, say, little richard swore off making rock n' roll for a while to only do gospel then to be tempted back to rock n' roll or the very real wickedness and excess that elvis and jerry lee lewis struggled to balance with their old, southern old testament christian upbringings....

i think prince was just old enough to be the last who would really struggle with that. there were perhaps parts of him that were *less* modern than bowie (even though bowie came first and was older) in that respect

(xpost to cryptosicko)

(even madonna's catholic stuff felt more like she was playing around with it as imagery than it was deeply felt)

i'm enjoying wandering again through the stockpile of prince i put together when i was in my obsessive hoarding phase... this duet with Stevie Wonder on "Maybe Your Baby" from The Undertaker really starts cooking right around the 5 minute mark.

The Muppets Tonight clip, before he goes into Starfish & Coffee, shows him
doing some Hee Haw schtick in a country-fried voice that is so funny, and he's obv having a ball

Xpost but what was so radical about prince prior to his JW conversion was that there WASN'T necessarily a struggle - God and sex were not in conflict at all!

eh idk about that

Teeeeemptation....

'Temptation' from Around the World in a Day.

Xpost but what was so radical about prince prior to his JW conversion was that there WASN'T necessarily a struggle - God and sex were not in conflict at all!

― scarcity festival (Jon not Jon), Friday, April 22, 2016 12:00 PM (4 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

the Lovesexy tour was a big grand sin vs. salvation thing where he came out and did erotic city type stuff in the first half then the second half was the salvation part with more spiritual/positive type stuff, i think he drove a cadillac into heaven too

the very real wickedness and excess that elvis and jerry lee lewis struggled to balance with their old, southern old testament christian upbringings....

Yeah, and I feel like the struggle might have been even greater for Prince considering how deep he travelled down the road to sin in his songs. I mean, Dirty Mind and Controversy (and maybe all his albums?) had thanks to God on the sleeve, and it's hard to see how that squares up with the, shall we say, "fruity" lyrical content. And that's before you even get to things like Vanity 6.

doesn't the voice of god at the beginning of 1999 say "i only want u 2 have some fun"?

thinking about the percocet and the overdose and him dying in an elevator and it all seems so tragic and preventable. anyone seen the van jones interview on cnn?

(even madonna's catholic stuff felt more like she was playing around with it as imagery than it was deeply felt)

― rockpalast '82 (upper mississippi sh@kedown), Friday, 22 April 2016 16:

not on Like a Prayer

I'm not saying his moral conflicts weren't deeply felt in some way, but he always wore them lightly. Everything always had that sly little grin behind it. He had too much fun to ever seem really burdened, at least in performance.

xposts well ok i guess i was overreaching a bit there.

feel like in all of this mourning stuff one thing I'm not seeing mentioned much is how *funny* Prince was. This was in evidence more in person (ie, live, onstage, on film, in interviews etc.) than on record but watching a bunch of random clips last night I was laughing my ass off - so much mugging, smirking, knowing glances, tossed off jokes, almost slapstick physical comedy.

― Οὖτις, Friday, April 22, 2016 5:14 PM (58 minutes ago)

Yes, that was one thing that really stood out when I was marathoning videos last night. Obviously he took himself seriously as an artist, overly so in many ways, but being able to do that while simultaneously not taking it seriously at all is so awesome. I find myself very drawn to that style of artist - there's hella pomp in there, but it's fun pomp.

Re: his later in life religious stuff, does anyone know the timing of his rebirth or embrace of JW, especially surrounding the death of his child and brief marriage to Mayte?

I recall that Larry Graham is to blame, but it was post-emancipation I think. Wasn't it around the time of Rave un2 the Joy Fantastic?

Anyway, my other thought was that in terms of cultural roles Bowie and Prince both occupied a similar space that was safe and inviting for freaks and weirdos. If you felt like an outcast for whatever reason - because of your race, sexuality, or just general interests - these were successful, huge artists that created a cultural space that welcomed you. Nowadays everyone is a "freak" - Miley Cyrus performs as a horny tree or whatever - and the straight-laced monoculture is less and less of a thing, so I'm not sure there's anyone playing a similar role today, the social climate is just different.

This morning's shuttle ride I considered the most incongruous fictional cover versions of Prince songs: Pearl Jam doing "Delirious," Eric Clapton's "Alphabet City," Jason Derulo's "Controversy."

Many xposts:

I don't think you really need to look any further than the Black Album versus Lovesexy for the perfect example of Prince's struggles between morality and hedonism.