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Dez Dickerson’s awesome blink-and-you’ll-miss-it song (featuring Prince) in ‘Purple Rain’
06.15.2018
08:51 am
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Prince and Dez
 
Less than 60 seconds of a tune called “Modernaire” is heard in Purple Rain, the 1984 film starring Prince. The group performing the song, led by Prince’s former guitarist, is on screen all of fifteen seconds. For my best friend at that time, those tantalizing bits left him—and others (myself included)—wanting more. My buddy became obsessed with hearing the full track, and hunted high and low for a copy, but to no avail. After a while, we had to wonder: Is it even for sale? This was the pre-web days, when finding answers to questions like this wasn’t so easy. Turns out, it wasn’t obtainable, and decades would go by before “Modernaire” was released.

Dez Dickerson was the lead guitarist in Prince’s band from 1978 until 1983. During this period, Prince usually performed all of the instruments on his records, but that’s Dez playing the guitar solo on “Little Red Corvette.”
 
UK picture sleeve
 
Dickerson departed the Prince organization after the 1999 campaign ended in the spring of 1983. Though Dez was leaving to pursue a solo career, Prince still wanted the guitarist to be involved in the Purple Rain project. Dez was offered screen time in the film, which would highlight his new group and one of Dickerson’s songs.
 
Dirty Mind tour
Prince and Dez during the ‘Dirty Mind’ tour, c. 1980.

It’s believed that “Modernaire” was recorded in May 1983 at Prince’s home studio. At the time, Dickerson was in Minneapolis for a performance at the Minnesota Music Awards on May 16, which would be his last gig with Prince. The recording of “Modernaire” was very much a collaboration between Dez and Prince, who co-produced the sessions. Prince played all of the instruments and sang back-up vocals. Jill Jones, who was part of the Prince camp, recited a couple of lines from Romeo and Juliet, which are heard in reverse on the finished track.
 

 
In the fall of 1983, Warner Bros. expressed their interest in releasing “Modernaire” as a single. Prince even arranged for his managers to represent Dez, but a deal couldn’t be worked out with the label or any other. There was also talk of including it on the Purple Rain soundtrack album, but in the end, only Prince’s material was included. During the subsequent Purple Rain mania, Dez received a call from the Warner Bros. requesting a B-side and artwork, as they planned to put it out. But, ultimately, a “Modernaire” 45 never materialized.

Though the song was shaped to fit with the other music in Purple Rain, and wasn’t really reflective of his style, Dez grew to like the tune. Dickerson has said “Modernaire” is about “someone who is not just ahead of the curve, but around it already.”
 
More after the jump…

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Posted by Bart Bealmear
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06.15.2018
08:51 am
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‘The Minneapolis Sound,’ local TV report from 1988 on Prince, Hüsker Dü and the Replacements


 
The second half of this local TV report on “The Minneapolis Sound,” broadcast on KTCA in 1988, has been on YouTube for some time, but earlier this year, one “Prince Rogers Nelson” uploaded an intact copy of the full program to Dailymotion.

I’ve grown so used to encountering music in the imaginary, racialized categories of marketers, radio programmers and record store owners, which still present punk and R&B as if they came from different planets. It’s refreshing to see Hüsker Dü and the Replacements presented as just two bands from Minneapolis, less popular than Prince and better-known than the Jets.

The Purple One declined to be interviewed for the special. Instead, there are glimpses of how he was perceived in his hometown, some sweet—three hockey players trying to sing “Purple Rain”—and some enraging, like the the smirking Twin Cities policeman at 4:50 who can’t control his laughter at the idea of listening to Prince: “I think he’s a fag.” The ‘Mats also refused to talk to KTCA, but Morris Day, Alexander O’Neal, the Hüskers and the Jets all appeared on camera, along with the Wallets and Ipso Facto. This was the very end of the road for Hüsker Dü; their segment ends abruptly with a one-sided phone conversation. “What? Hüsker Dü broke up? Why?
 

 
Early in the show, the critic John Rockwell talks about discrete black and white music scenes going on in the city simultaneously, but it looks to me like the membrane separating them was exceedingly porous. Describing this period in his memoir, Mould writes:

Minneapolis was the “it” city, and the buzz was deafening. South side, you had Hüsker Dü, the Replacements, and Soul Asylum. North side, there was Prince, Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis, Alexander O’Neal, and Morris Day.

More after the jump…

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Posted by Oliver Hall
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12.12.2017
09:43 am
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Kids dressed up for Halloween like Prince, Adam Ant, KISS, & even a baby Björk
10.16.2017
11:32 am
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A kid version of Adam Ant in his “Prince Charming” getup. Awww.
 
Halloween is nearly upon us, and that means that it is also the only time of year that you get a pass for letting your toddler hold a bottle of Jack Daniels because it happens to be part of their “costume.” If your kid is still a baby, they, of course, have no real say in the Halloween costume decision-making process, mostly because they can’t yet express themselves verbally, which leaves you to dress your said baby like Björk when she made her famous red-carpet appearance at the 2001 Academy Awards in a dress made to look like a swan (created by designer Marjan Pejoski). You wouldn’t be the first parent to do so—and I’ve got photographic proof of that.

This post was inspired by my discovery of one of Glasgow’s coolest inhabitants, photographer, and lecturer Simon Murphy who delights in helping dress up his two daughters as various musical icons such as Janis Joplin, or the alcohol-swilling vocalist for The Pogues, Shane MacGowan. To achieve an authentic look based on MacGowan’s notorious dental problems, Murphy used cake icing that had been colored black to mimic his infamous mouth-full-of-decaying-teeth “smile.”  As a child of the 80s, I spent a lot of time dressing up like Ace Frehley from KISS along with every other kid that liked to rock and roll all night—so I had to include some choice, vintage images of the youngest members of the KISS Army all dressed up to trick or treat. Now, in honor of our Lord and savior The Great Pumpkin, check out the photos of kids looking cooler than we ever did dressed up as rock stars ranging from Angus Young, to our dearly departed Ziggy Stardust, David Bowie, that I’ve posted below.
 

Baby Björk FTW!
 

A mini-version of Prince.
 
More after the jump…

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Posted by Cherrybomb
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10.16.2017
11:32 am
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Prince gets freaky in S&M-themed music video for ‘Automatic’
07.22.2017
02:56 pm
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1999 inner sleeve photo
 
“Automatic” is one of the eleven songs that appear on Prince’s fifth record—and first double album—1999 (1982). The track was released as a single in edited form, though only for the Australian market. The album version includes a steamy interlude that was acted out for the accompanying video, which hasn’t been easy to see—until now.

The “Automatic” music video was shot in Minneapolis during November 1982, as Prince and his band were rehearsing for the 1999 tour. You’ll probably notice it resembles other Prince clips from the era, due to the fact that videos for “1999” and “Let’s Pretend We’re Married” were also shot at this time, with the same director at the helm, Bruce Gowers (“Little Red Corvette” came later, and was directed by Bryan Greenberg). The album version of “Automatic” is nearly nine-and-a-half minutes long, and was chopped by a minute for the video. It’s a standard Prince performance clip from this period, until about halfway through, when a bed is rolled out onto the stage. From here, it starts to gets pretty damn kinky.
 
Automatic 45
 
The video was issued as a promo-only VHS to establishments that had video screens—like bars and dance clubs—as well as outlets willing to play more racy content, like the Playboy Channel. The unedited version of “Automatic” was certainly too risqué for MTV (an edited clip was also made available). 

Prince’s official YouTube channel was recently reactivated, delighting his fan base with uploads of his official music videos in pristine quality. “Automatic” is one of the latest to appear. Assuming many of you haven’t seen this rare clip, we won’t give much more away, other than that it includes a segment in which Prince is tied up and whipped—!
 
More after the jump…

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Posted by Bart Bealmear
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07.22.2017
02:56 pm
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The good, the bad & the ugly: Adult onesies featuring Prince, Dr. Steve Brule, Satan & more!
07.14.2017
10:09 am
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A black and white portrait of Prince covering an adult-sized onesie from Rage On.
 
If there is one thing I can’t stand more than white shoes, it is seeing someone out in public wearing pajama pants. I mean, I get it. Life is hard. And most days can flat out suck all the brain cells that make you care about things right out of your head. But you can still get dressed. Come on, man. How hard is it really to exchange an actual pair of pants for the stupid flannel ones you wore to bed last night before you leave the house? As someone who sometimes works in their pajamas (one of the many perks of my “job” here at DM), if I ever left the house wearing my PJs, it had better be because I was fucking dead. But as I often do, I’ve digressed away from the subject of this post which features another one of my triggers, the adult onesie. Because almost nothing says “I give up” like reverting to wearing clothing you wore when you were a baby. Ug.

Not all of the grown-up onesies I’ve culled for this post make me want to get on the next shuttle to the Moon. In fact, a few of them are pretty damn cool like the black and white one featuring a photo of our dearly departed Prince pictured at the top post. But I did include some that are truly terrible too, and I’m just going to leave you to ponder that thinly veiled warning while you scroll through the images below. Each onesie will run you a cool $109 over at Rage On. The company also takes custom orders so if you don’t see the onesie of your dreams (and my nightmares) below, just have one made especially for you… baby. I’m going to ease into the “bad” ones so you can prepare yourself for the moment you audibly say “fuck no.” Some of the images below are NSFW.
 

Actor Max Schreck in character as the vampire Nosferatu.
 

Old-school horror film VHS covers.
 

Satan/Baphomet mashup. I’ll take it!
 
More after the jump…

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Posted by Cherrybomb
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07.14.2017
10:09 am
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Fascinating early Prince side projects that never got off the ground
06.05.2017
08:03 am
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Prince 1979 publicity photo
 
It was the summer of 1978, and though his first album, For You, had just been released, Prince was already pursuing other endeavors. Acting on a tip concerning a local talent, Prince went to a performance by a sixteen-year-old singer named Sue Ann Carwell. After the show, he asked her if she’d be interested in a project. Carwell was into the idea, so Prince went about writing and recording for her at his home studio.
 
Sue Ann Carwell
Sue Ann Carwell.

In his 2004 biography, Possessed: The Rise and Fall of Prince, author Alex Hahn wrote about the Carwell undertaking, which was the first time Prince played the role of Svengali:

From the start, Prince conceived of Carwell as a solo artist whom he would guide from behind the scenes. As he wrote for her, he consciously sought to adopt a female perspective, both in terms of the lyrics and the sound. The coy and bouncy “Wouldn’t You Love To Love Me,” for example, was written from the viewpoint of a woman being pursued by a male suitor. Prince became excited about the potential of a Carwell side project and planned to take a demo of the material to Warner Bros. He began concocting an image for her and proposed that she adopt the name Susie Stone. She balked at the whole enterprise, however, not wanting to have her career co-opted.

It’s also been speculated that the plan was aborted once it was determined that the songs Prince composed for Carwell sounded too similar to his own tunes. Prince’s demos for the two tracks that have been leaked bear this out, as they would’ve been right at home on For You.
 
Much more after the jump…

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Posted by Bart Bealmear
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06.05.2017
08:03 am
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Kitchy vintage dishware with images of Prince, David Bowie, Robert Smith, Lemmy, Moz & more!


A vintage plate with an image of Robert Smith of The Cure and a kitty by Miss Scarlett of Dirty Lola. Get it here.
 
Today’s “take my money please” post features beguiling, vintage dishware that has been reworked to include images of David Bowie, Robert Smith of The Cure, Lemmy Kilmister, Morrissey, Prince and a few other famous faces.

Miss Scarlet is a professional illustrator who has also honed her artistic craft in the mediums of watercolor, digital illustration, and graphic design and she has really done a fantastic job of selecting ornate vintage dishes to use as the base of her clever designer “for display only” dishware. Which makes sense as the talented artist has also spent time working as a designer for the fashion houses of John Galliano, Dior, and Christian Lacroix. There are over fifty different designer plates avaliable at Miss Scarlett’s Etsy store, Dirty Lola that come in various sizes and run anywhere between $29.99 to $75 bucks. I’ve posted a few of the most covetable ones below.
 

 

 

 
More after the jump…

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Posted by Cherrybomb
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04.07.2017
06:21 am
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Corporate sales video for Prince’s Paisley Park Studio from the early 1990s
10.31.2016
03:04 pm
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As with any creative superstar, Prince’s career had several distinct phases—the video that makes up the subject of this post comes from an ill-defined stretch that is bracketed by his astounding successes of the early and mid-1980s (ending around Sign o’ the Times, perhaps) and his feud with Warners, which started in 1993. That period is marked by The Black Album, Lovesexy, the Batman soundtrack, his work on Madonna’s album Like a Prayer, and the Graffiti Bridge movie and album, among many other things. It is also the period in which Paisley Park Studios was constructed and launched as an ambitious hub for music production—which is not the identity it had for Prince’s fans in the years to follow.

This corporate sales video touting the virtues of Paisley Park as a location for a wide variety of audio and video production uses probably dates from 1991. It can’t be much earlier, as it incorporates footage from Prince’s 1990 appearance at the American Music Award and features plentiful shots of Paula Abdul and MC Hammer, both of whom were topping the pop charts around that time. And it can’t be much later, because it wouldn’t be long before Prince became obsessed with his grievances with Warners.

Paisley Park was completed in the town of Chanhassen, Minnesota, in 1988. Today we think of Paisley Park as somehting almost analogous to Charles Foster Kane’s Xanadu in Citizen Kane, a thoroughly private and whimsical domain overseen by a single eccentric genius, but for those of you who think of Paisley Park in those terms, this video is startling indeed—as it comes from a time when Prince wanted to fashion the music production complex as an authentic commercial rival to Nashville and Los Angeles.
 

Prince in 1991
 
The video, which lasts seven minutes, is as bland as any other corporate video you’ve ever seen. This is a document intended not to ruffle any feathers, unmistakably designed to appeal to the dollars-and-cents mentality of music production professionals across the nation. Barry Gibb is on hand to murmur a few words about Prince’s extraordinary music production standards, and the video ends with a cheesy shout-out to one of Prince’s most enduring hits: “Paisley Park Enterprises, the model for the next century—or at least ‘1999’! It can be in your hands today!”

The ambition implied by the video would founder just a couple years later on his feud with Warners, which had a distribution deal with Prince’s Paisley Park label. Prince would change his name to an unpronounceable glyph and take to scrawling the word “SLAVE” on his cheek. While Prince’s tactics may have won him some autonomy from his corporate overlords, they also exacted a cost on his ambitions to create a new hub for music production. As Stan Hawkins and ‎Sarah Niblock write in Prince: The Making of a Pop Music Phenomenon, “In 1994, Warner Bros. ended its distribution deal with Paisley Park, effectively closing it down.”

More after the jump…

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Posted by Martin Schneider
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10.31.2016
03:04 pm
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Prince’s fantastic, groovetastic ‘Sign o’ the Times’ tour rehearsals
07.06.2016
12:48 pm
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The career of Prince, whose life was sadly cut short at the age of 57 earlier this year in April, increasingly appears to be simply a series of breathtaking highlights. His 1987 album Sign o’ the Times, however, deserves to be singled out as something special—it’s arguably the most ambitious, diverse, coherent, and funkalicous statement of his entire career. Sign o’ the Times won best album in the 1987 Village Voice Pazz & Jop critics’ poll—the only time Prince ever won that particular honor—and the title track from the album also won best single in the same poll.

The album was released on March 31, 1987, and a few weeks later Prince embarked on a 34-date tour of Europe with a largely retooled lineup. Sign o’ the Times wasn’t an album by Prince and the Revolution—it was credited to Prince only—and veterans of Prince’s live and studio experience such as Bobby Z., Brown Mark, Lisa Coleman, and Wendy Melvoin weren’t on the tour. The resultant combo is especially cherished by Prince diehards as the “Lovesexy Band,” including Miko Weaver, Eric Leeds, Atlanta Bliss, and long-time keyboardist Doctor Fink. This was the first Prince tour to feature Sheila E. on the drums (the previous two tours, Sheila E.‘s band had served as opener).

The new live concept gives these incredible rehearsal tapes all the more meaning. Almost every song on Sign o’ the Times is represented, and the groovetastic recordings last more than 2 hours. In a way it’s probably the best possible bootleg imaginable from that tour.

More after the jump…

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Posted by Martin Schneider
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07.06.2016
12:48 pm
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Eye-popping latex masks of Lemmy, Prince and David Bowie
05.20.2016
09:03 am
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Lemmy Kilmister latex mask with black “rocker” hair by Ireland-based company, Rubber Johnnies.
 
The masks featured in this post are made by an Ireland-based company called “Rubber Johnnies.” The first one I came across was the one of a rather surprised looking David Bowie as his glam-rock alter-ego Aladdin Sane (which you can see below) complete with Bowie’s distinctive eyes as well as some false eyelashes. Of course, after finding the Bowie mask, I was hoping that a quick look through Rubber Johnnies’ online store would produce more latex oddities (here is probably as good a place as any to inform you that “Rubber Johnny” is British slang for condoms)—and I wasn’t disappointed. They’ve got Obama, the Queen, a mean hillbilly mask and of course, Donald Trump (no Hillary mask, though).
 

Prince latex mask.
 
In addition to the slightly insane looking Aladdin Sane mask, there is also a mask in the image of Lemmy Kilmister (pictured at the top of this post) that is adorned with Lem’s ever-present moles and long black hair for that “realistic rocker effect.” But neither one of these fantastically strange creations can compare with Rubber Johnnies’ latex homage to the late, great king of all things purple, Prince (above). The face of the Prince mask (that has realistic looking black hair that I’d say is modeled after Prince’s 1996 “Emancipation” era do), is frozen in a smirky half-smile with a shot of come hither side-eye—a look that Prince perfected. In addition to the Lemmy, Bowie and Prince masks, there is also one of Michael Jackson where he looks like he’s wearing Marilyn Manson’s make-up (It’s very “The Child Catcher” from Chitty Chitty Bang Bang. And that’s all I’m going to say about that. See for yourself, below.)

The masks retail for about $30 - $40 bucks plus shipping and Rubber Johnnies also appears to do custom orders. More images follow. Happy nightmares!
 

The forever ‘surprised’ looking Aladdin Sane latex mask.

More, including that frightening Michael Jackson mask, after the jump…

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Posted by Cherrybomb
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05.20.2016
09:03 am
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Sexy M*therf*cker: Amazing lifelike Prince doll with custom-made clothing from ‘Purple Rain’ & more!
05.06.2016
09:58 am
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Le Petit Prince at
Le Petit Prince at ‘Lake Minnetonka’ with his customized Honda CB400A.
 
Tuesday, May 3rd marked the sadly poignant moment when it became “seven hours and thirteen days” since Prince left this world. And I for one have still not (and probably never will) come to terms with his passing. His loss is a truly immeasurable one that has left his fans (including myself and my colleagues here at DM), dumbfounded. 
 
Let Petite Prince in his
Le Petit Prince in his ‘Dirty Mind’ outfit.
 
If you’re a Prince fan (and I wouldn’t trust anyone who said they weren’t, it’s one of my rules), you know that he was an incredibly private person—and was quick to put the kibosh on video footage of his mind-bogglingly epic live performances that somehow made their way to the Internet. In the past when DM has posted footage of Prince blowing-minds live, it’s always come with a warning to watch it before it gets taken down. Such was the case with Prince and his request to Seattle artist Troy Gua, who created a lifelike figure of Prince called “Le Petit Prince” (or “LPP”) sometime in 2012, and was swiftly served with a “cease and desist” notice by The Purple One himself. Gua, a huge Prince fan, was devastated. Figuring out a way around the order, he continued to take photos of his “LPP,” only now it had a sculpted head in Gua’s own image. In 2015, Gua started to once again publish images of Le Petit Prince and one of his most recent posts on his Instagram featured the realistic looking figure beginning his ascent to heaven by way of a ladder. Sigh.

Gua (who also makes all of Le Petit Prince’s painstakingly detailed clothes) says he doesn’t want to profit from Prince’s death, so you can’t actually purchase a small version of Prince dressed in era-specific attire (although Gua didn’t rule out this possibility in the future or selling prints of Le Petit Prince in action). When I say that the images in this post are almost as beguiling as Prince himself (almost), I’m not exaggerating. From Le Petit Prince riding a tiny replica of his customized 1981 Honda CB400A from the film Purple Rain, to the open trenchcoat and tiny black thong Prince wore on the cover of his 1980 album, Dirty Mind, Gua (who might be the greatest person ever) has created so many perfect Princes that I couldn’t possibly post them all here.
 

Prince as seen in the video for ‘Automatic’ from the 1982 album, ‘1999.’
 
More after the jump…

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Posted by Cherrybomb
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05.06.2016
09:58 am
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‘When Doves Scream’: Hear Prince do a ‘punk’ version of his hit during 1985 rehearsal
04.26.2016
10:56 am
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One of the only benefits of Prince’s untimely passing has been an easing up on the policing of “unauthorized” uploads to YouTube of the Purple One’s music. We’ve seen the floodgates open up and so much amazing work has already poured forth, showing us the true genius of the man. He could really do anything.

Case in point, this 1985 rehearsal tape with his band The Revolution where he busts out an impromptu piss-take of what “When Doves Cry” might sound like in a “punk” style. Prince monotones the vocals and changes to chorus to “When Doves SCREAM.”

There has been some discussion of this track on the fan-site Prince.org about whether or not it’s actually Prince, and it appears the track comes from a widely bootlegged 1985 rehearsal tape. The full rehearsal including “When Doves Scream” is available on the 4CD bootleg Purple Rush 4: The Final Seduction. If it’s a hoax, well, they laid the fuse a long time ago.

I’m not going to say this is necessarily good, but it’s fascinating to say the least:
 

Posted by Christopher Bickel
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04.26.2016
10:56 am
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Want to party like it’s 1999? Then you’ll need Prince’s personal party mix playlist!
04.25.2016
11:11 am
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I’m cribbing this from a smart friend: How do you explain to a child born in a year like 2008 what the sentiment “we’re gonna party like it’s 1999” was supposed to mean when that song was released way back in 1982? (Later he pointed out the sobering fact that 2016 is as far removed from 1999 as 1982 is.)

For those who were there in the early 1980s, the midnight throwdown on December 31, 1999, was absolutely going to be the apocalyptic bash for the ages—even if it didn’t necessarily work out that way in practice. If that song solidified “1999” as a supreme signifier for a Sixteen Candles level blowout celebration, it also cemented Prince’s status as the number-one muthafucka when it comes to how to party.

But doesn’t that make you wonder what songs Prince would play if he were to throw a party? Strangely enough, we actually have the data on that particular topic.

In 2013 the FOX show New Girl starring Zooey Deschanel aired a post-Super Bowl episode in which the characters Jess and Cece are invited to a party thrown by Prince. A gentleman named Steve Welch, employed by the show as an editor, took to Twitter late last week to explain that Prince actually sent the staff of the FOX show a list of his typical party jams so that the program’s representation of Prince in party mode would at least be halfway accurate.

It’s a reeeeallly good list. Here’s a look at it:
 

 
Bootsy Collins, the Soul Children, Ohio Players. Prince did not mess around. But then we knew that already.

For your convenience, here’s a Spotify playlist containing these tracks:
 

 
Here’s the playlist written out:
 

“City in the Sky,” The Staple Singers
“Country John,” Allen Toussaint
“Fire,” Ohio Players
“Happy House,” Shuggie Otis
“Higher Ground,” Stevie Wonder
“I Was Made to Love Him,” Chaka Khan
“Listen to the Music,” The Isley Brothers
“The Lord is Back,” Eugene McDaniels
“Lost in Music,” Sister Sledge
“The Pinocchio Theory,” Bootsy Collins
“Rubber Duckie,” Bootsy Collins
“Rumpofsteelskin,” Parliament
“Skin Tight,” Ohio Players
“We’re Gettin’ Too Close,” The Soul Children
“Wild and Free,” Curtis Mayfield
“After The Love Has Gone,” Earth, Wind & Fire
“Back in Baby’s Arms,” Allen Toussaint
“Don’t Let Me Be Lonely Tonight,” The Isley Brothers
“Don’t Take My Sunshine,” The Soul Children
“How Could I Let You Get Away,” The Spinners
“I’ll Be Around,” The Spinners
“Push Me Away,” The Jacksons
“Stay With Me,” Shirley Brown
“The Thrill Is Gone,” Aretha Franklin

 
via Exile on Moan Street

Previously on Dangerous Minds:
‘Starfish and Coffee’: Prince jams with The Muppets, 1997
Prince meets The Joffrey Ballet

Posted by Martin Schneider
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04.25.2016
11:11 am
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In LACMA’s ‘Rain Room’ there’s purple rain falling for Prince
04.22.2016
03:52 pm
Topics:
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nothing more to say. #ripprince #rainroom @lacma #mylaexperience #purplerain #hollywood

A photo posted by valentinaschwanden (@valentin_aschwanden) on

 
Art collective Random International asked LACMA last night that their art installation “Rain Room” rain purple in honor of Prince. LACMA was was more than happy to oblige. The result is beautiful.

If you live in Los Angeles or are just visiting, I’d head on over to LACMA to visit the “Rain Room.” It looks they’re only doing it for one day.

 

#purple #rain #rainroom

A photo posted by Ghislaine Salabert-Mougin (@apiamphotos) on

 
via LA Curbed

Posted by Tara McGinley
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04.22.2016
03:52 pm
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Lewd guitarist: Watch a young Prince on ‘American Bandstand’ and live in New York City, 1980/81
04.21.2016
06:47 pm
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On January 26, 1980 Prince appeared on American Bandstand lip-synching “I Wanna Be Your Lover” and “Why You Wanna Treat Me So Bad?” After Prince’s performance, Dick Clark made a game attempt at interviewing his Purple Majesty but Prince, even then, was tight-lipped.

“They wouldn’t let me produce myself,” Prince explains why he waited so long to release his first record.

“Do you think they didn’t know what you were doing?” Clark asks.

“Don’t know.”

Clark asks Prince how many instruments he played. Prince responds “thousands.”

When asked how many years he’d been playing, Prince raised four fingers.

From the very beginning, Prince knew how to create an aura of mystery around himself. Even in a semi-autobiographical film like Purple Rain, he managed to blur the line between reality and mythos. It is part of what made him one of the most compelling artists in the history of music.

Here’s Prince on American Bandstand. The clip unfortunately does not include the interview.

I advise you to watch it now. Even from beyond the grave, Prince is likely controlling what the ‘net gives and what the ‘net taketh away.

Update: Okay the ‘net tooketh away. Can we please have a week long grace period in which Prince’s videos can be enjoyed in an International visual love fest? Huh? How about that?

Anyway, here’s a consolation prize: Prince’s first TV appearance on Midnight Special in January 1980. Let’s see how long this one lasts. Enjoy.
 


 
I first saw Prince at New York City’s Ritz in 1980. He wasn’t a superstar yet and hadn’t been embraced by New York’s post-punk or new wave scene (he would appear on the cover of New York Rocker year later) so it was a relatively small audience. I had shown up to attend an Interview magazine party earlier and stayed for Prince. I wasn’t that familiar with his music but it was free. Staying was a smart move.The show was astoundingly good and ultrasexy. His carnal relationship with his guitar, as documented in this clip, is nothing short of jaw-dropping.
 

Posted by Marc Campbell
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04.21.2016
06:47 pm
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