Prince RIP

I think electronic sounds started getting a lot more popular right around 81-82 or 83, and by '84, nobody wanted to sound like a 70s funk/disco band anymore. Hip hop and electro overhauled R&B (and soon, everything else) as far as production. Aesthetic became a lot more minimal and mechanical, and if you're looking at vocal styles, absolutely people like MJ and Prince helped usher in an era of androgyny -- heck, soon Prince was having hits where there wasn't even a bass guitar in the track. Madonna's early, cutesy style did have an immediate impact in pop (but not R&B really)

...not really sure what her long term impact is tho. I tend to agree w the notion what she "stood for" has mattered more than her music (which isn't to say that will matter less over time)

Aesthetic became a lot more minimal and mechanical

^^^ this obviously, but things got audibly *thinner* as well, booming low end became an anomaly instead of the norm

Could be, I'd be curious to survey a few pop hit tracks to compare bass db. The onset of digital recording had a lot to do w how things sounded back then too, where all of sudden, an unimagined crispness and hi-fidelity might have influenced tracks to be finely detailed and clean, where analog recording was a lot more about achieving a big, fat, well-balanced (and essentially "live") sound.

madonna was massively influential just not on the kind of stuff that gets overdiscussed on ILM

...if you listened to top 40 radio in the 1980s/early 1990s....

surely there are some Suzie Q fans here

Stacey Q?

ha yes

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O2hxhCRNoxA

thank you, Brad.

the youtube of stacey q singing the star spangled banner is the greatest thing.

he was already making jazz odysseys

Let us not forget Nocera while we're at it.

Come on - what's Madonna doing here?

i thought this was a good tribute -
http://pitchfork.com/news/65644-watch-neon-indian-and-friends-cover-princes-pop-life/
but im a NI fan, so...

also, im not sure why madonna is getting all the shit. stevie sounded awful too!

Yeah but he had to sing with Madge

stevie will seemingly show up to any event to sing w/ anyone

(not endorsing the madonna hate)

prince with miles davis

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7UoLkFQlmMI

I have to say, while I love both musicians deeply, I never thought Prince and Miles as being suited for each other musically.

i like to whom miles compared prince:

"James Brown—his father took him when he was young, he got on the stage and danced with him. He has that, he has Jimi Hendrix, and Marvin Gaye. He combines all that, all the time. That’s what he is. And his stage persona, that’s Charlie Chaplin."

though i have the impression that his guitar play was more inspired by carlos santana than by jimi hendrix.

another occasion to repost this wonderful live version of purple rain. the build-up is incredible and really sends me shivers down the spine.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sqBrvT3ShkY

the miles quote has basically become a way for prince fans to use as a defence whenever anyone says anything negative about him. 'well miles, a JAZZ musician, liked him so he must have been good'. but miles was obsessed with who/whatever was hot, so its no wonder he liked prince. but yeah, not sure they really meshed all that well. prince wasnt always that good at meeting other artists half way, esp not established artists. all that said, i dont mind can i play with you (though hearing it slower, and cleaner than my old bootleg makes it sound weirder). and i like hearing miles solo a bit with prince like in that youtube clip (it could almost be something from his 70s period, once the band quietens down and lets miles take over). the best thing you could have gotten from the two would prob be miles playing a solo on a prince song like above. or prince doing some rhythm work for a miles song. never heard the song that didnt make tutu (i think it was tutu that he submitted a song for).

the best thing you could have gotten from the two would prob be miles playing a solo on a prince song like above.

yeah I can envision Miles soloing over a Prince ballad. their respective versions of funk don't seem too complimentary though.

so speaking of high art signifiers, have y'all heard Prince's ballet, Kamasutra?
i bought the cassette off his website iirc
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xmfg3t3h9lI

i only know the plan from emancipation. is the whole thing any good? or is it something out of his grasp?

the title tune is okay, i honestly barely remember the rest. flipped through the songs and it seems sorta sub madhouse.

Kamasutra was also a bonus disc on some editions of crystal ball

Oh no, I have an (admittedly resistable) urge to buy Prince's "Emancipation" set!

i.e. Emancipation is essential

Which is ironic, because there is so much about it that is not.

Like the artwork?

https://youtu.be/rDFXlYfEHuI

the SHOCK of the NEW

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

Also, even though it is nowhere to be found on the internet I am quite sure that decades ago I read an interview with Randy Newman in which he told the interviewer "Springsteen couldn't shine Prince's shoes as a songwriter."

could it from old billboard quoting playboy

under nelson george's rhythm and blues column

Thanks!

This was around the time Newman was mocking Springsteen in "My Life Is Good" (well, a couple years after)

that was very sweet of burt to say that, unprompted. but did he really say prince was a better dancer than MJ?

Not sure. I got lost at a few points about what he was trying to say and that was one of them.

I feel like he was trying to say something to the effect that "his only real competition was Michael Jackson who, by almost any reckoning was the better dancer but even in that area Prince could more than hold his own, etc." but he was overcome by emotion and time restraints so he couldn't quite produce the necessary elegant formulation.

That was like Simon Cowell last night, he tried to say "You're likeable, I wish people liked me like that" or something, and he ended up saying "You're likeable, I wish you liked me"

Ha, good example.

The one celeb commentary that I found a wee bit annoying was maybe the one from Lionel Ritchie.

semi-related - tom pettys quotes in that NYT piece on the while my guitar gently weeps performance at the RNRHOF ceremony reeked of BS. his face did not look like he was telling prince to keep playing like he was. he looked rankled.

totally. he's like "this is supposed to be a dignified tribute and here comes this showoff"

"keep playing like you are (see what happens)"

Just think of what might have ensued if he HAD gone to the "We Are The World" recording session instead of to the club. "We are the world... Kerrang!" etc.

thought this was a good tribute -
http://pitchfork.com/news/65644-watch-neon-indian-and-friends-cover-princes-pop-life/
but im a NI fan, so...

― StillAdvance, Tuesday, May 24, 2016 6:27 AM

Right. Tom petty is known for his highly expressive face and the pure joy he exudes therefrom. On the rare occasions that famous sunny smile is absent, ohh-wee, he's wall-punching pissed off.

It is a similar fine distinction to that of figuring out when TWU is in a bad mood vs. when he is merely let down once again by the faulty reasoning of his inferiors.

If modern people being dumbasses made me mad, that throbbing vein in my temple would have burst long ago.