the OP was meaning that after purple rain, instead of creating a follow up album that kept to the same succesful formula, he released an album that sounded completely different, it had no lead single (raspberry beret was released as the first single after the album was out), and had hardly any advertising. it just seemed to end up in the stores the year after purple rain came out. the follow up to that was again completly different, and likewise the next few albums kept changing styles. it served to alienate the type of fairweather fans he collected from purple rain.

it seemed like it was all planned, he had 5 albums out, getting a bit more succesful at he time, then he planned the movie and album purple rain, and bam he shot into superstardom and got attention, then when the world knew who he was he went back to making the music he wanted to make, and it was up to the fans if they wanted to follow his new music or not, and i think that was part of the attraction of prince, he made music for himself, rather than try and pander to other peoples expectations, so the music was better as a result. sometimes it worked better than other times though. that's what it seemed like to me anyway. he had a load of other material in similar sound to purple rain, really great songs too, but he either stuck it on b sides, gave the songs to other artists, or shelved them in the vaults. perhaps after all the fuss over purple rain, and the tour, he wanted a change. he seems to keep changing all the time, like bowie in the 70s, i don't think he could keep doing the same thing for a long time

the graffiti bridge movie came 6 years after purple rain, long after anyone had expected a sequel, and it was a very different movie, shot in his studio with fake looking sets, rather than on location. a fantasty style movie instead of the realistic semi autobiographical purple rain. i think that prince wanted to experiment by trying to create a movie that was even worse than moonwalker, which is no mean feat, but i think he acheived it. i know several fans who poked thier eyes out after watching the movie, as they didn't want to suffer sitting through it again. apparently it's stevie wonders favourite movie, as he feels so blessed not to be able to see what's happening

I'm not saying he needed the help making records just that he had it, even if it was just a couple of engineers, and he certainly had help in becoming a star. You can't distribute your music on your own and you can't make a feature film on your own.True signing him up at 18 was probably a no brainer after his early demos.

He was always very good at taking all the credit and bringing everything under the banner of "Prince". This has occasionally put peoples noses out of joint.

My bad, it was late and I was rambling. I'm pretty sure Matt Fink played the solo on "Head" though. I'm not sure where I heard or read that but it came from him. Also Wendy's guitar part is just that, she came up with that part, the 9th chord, again from the horses mouth. I know these are small things.

Also, I've never heard Prince play the horn. Do you have any inside info on that? It used to be listed that by age 18 he had mastered over 20 instruments. So what were they?

purple rain was prince's 6th album. he struck a deal with warners who let him produce his own albums. he turned down other deals as other labels weren't confident that he could produce himself. obviously other people such as managers etc had an involvement, but musically what you hear on a prince album is either 100% or close to 100% prince, depending on the album. the movie of purple rain was also his idea. whilst the movie shot him into superstardom in a similar way to the thriller video to MJ, prince didn't rely on the videos or movies to keep his popularity up, he used HIS music, his work

there are people who have been upset about prince taking all the credit, but in most cases it's been because prince hasn't given them the chance, rather than prince stealing the credit. whilst there is a reference to this in purple rain (a song he wrote, not wendy & lisa), it was a little bit later that it started to ring true, with him ignoring band members input in favour of his own. in rehearsals the band used to try and come up with chord progressions to outdo each other, and each time prince would come up with something to beat them, so his part was used

prince doesn't play any wind instruments. whilst he lists about 21 instruments on his first album they are all pretty much drums, guitars, bass, keyboards, percussion. in the 70s when the first album came out artists used to list evey type of keyboard under the sun as a different instrument. he also knocked a couple of years off his age! warners were just trying to promote him as a young musical genius, comparing him to stevie wonder. from what i understand, prince can and has played wind instruments when he was young, but has never played any in the studio or in concert. considering how well he can play other instruments he would just show himself up if he couldn't play sax like a virtuouso. hiring james brown's sax player maceo parker made up for it though (prince being a huge james brown fan). the first live horns on his music weren't until the purple rain tour or the around the world in a day album, he used mainly keyboards and guitars on his earlier albums

Not sure if that last statement holds up entirely. 4 movies in 7 years (not including Batman)? Plus a string of awesome music videos in the 80s. Part of the reason Prince became such a huge influence on me was because, just like MJ, there was so much available footage. In the early 90s his films were often on TV along with some great documentaries.

I know he wrote the song but on the 20th anniversary DVD Wendy states that she came up with the guitar part.

Sounds like having other musicians around brings out the best in him.

That's kind of what I thought. So it's really a marketing ploy because 21 instruments sounds better then 3: guitars, keyboards and drums. That's the same number as Paul McCartney, Stevie Wonder or David Bowie!

Thanks for all the info. It's funny how this thread has completely turned into a Prince thread!

what i mean is that after launching himself into superstardom with purple rain, he didn't need to use his movies to forward his music career. in the 7 years you mention he released 7 albums under his own name, including 2 double albums, plus albums for the time, sheila e, jill jones, madhouse, the family, etc, plus gave away other hits to the bangles, sheena easton, etc. he made two "proper" movies after purple rain, under the cheery moon released in 1986 and graffiti bridge in 1990, at the time as he was releasing so much stuff it seemed like a long time between movies. the sign o the times movie was a live concert movie released in cinemas as the european leg of the tour was cut short due to bad weather. he reshot most of the footage in the studio as the footage turned out too dark, he used the original live music and mimed back to it, in a bit of a mirror of MJ's performances

he certainly didn't create expensive and fancy videos, they were mostly done on the cheap in his own studio, mostly performance videos of him and band playing to the song, or prince dancing. prince isn't really in the batman movie (although apparently he is in the background in one scene, but no-one has ever spotted him, he can be seen in one of the documentaries on the 2 disc dvd), he just did the music, and put most of it together in a week

he created a lot of videos, but he created a lot more music, and he let the music lead, rather than the video. when you think of prince you think of the music first and foremost, but when you think of MJ you think of moonwalking or videos, the music comes third. a prince show would still be great if he stood behind the curtain playing (i've seen him do that for a bit) and there was nothing to see but black, but an MJ concert wouldn't be the same under the same setting, in fact it would be pretty pointless as you would be hearing prerecorded vocals to a live band. there would be no point in him being there if you couldn't see him

well, he hardly relied on under the cherry moon (although much underrated IMO) or graffiti bridge for continued fame.

i think the point was that in that period, he was putting out great album after great album. and so he was relying far more on the great albums, than the poorly received films.

Iain

thank you for talkin' to me Africa, Indig02, Aug 28.

would have been incredible to see Maceo do a turn, and the nights with Beverely Knight sounded awesome, but i think we could have done worse.

although we did see Maceo when he came to our town last year - absolute legend.

Iain

I once saw macro play for literally about six hours from midnite to dawn at Paisley park. There were only 20 people left at the end and half were literally lying on the floor. They just stayed in case prince came back to jam. Prince himself went home. That was enough maceo to last a lifetime. For the last 3 hours we clapped as we thought it was the last track but he kept going. Every bloody tune sounded the same!

There were a few nite with mike p and the Npg and maceo guested with some of that.

Beverly knight is a massive prince fan. I met her about 10 years ago at a tv show that she and prince were at and I was at anther tv show with prince the nite before so we spent ages chatting about it. She wasn't as famous then but my mate liked her and knew she was a fan so we told her about the nite before. I had also bumped into prince backstage earlier in the day and had a but of a chat with him and the warm up guy mentioned it in his routine as all the staff were told not to talk to him or look at him and I was only in the place less than 5 minutes and I was chatting to him in the corridor.

Didn't they just? Out of the 3 nights she did, I have 2 of them on record and they're brilliant.! Prince, Maceo Parker, Beverley Knight, NPG and some of the best session musicians Britain has to offer all jamming away on stage for hours on end!!

X-Factor eat your heart out! ''I turn up, play backing track, sing verse/chorus/keychange/chorus, only perform once a week for 2 minutes at a time but after week two complain of tonsilitis or that my voice is under such stress, I become famous after winning the public sympathy'' ...

You do know that Kanye West is an absolute genius according to some?

It has to be MJ. How many young fans know Prince? Not as many as MJ. MJ could do anything and without him we wouldnt of had,Usher, Chris Brown, Ne-Yo, Ciara etc... they all said that MJ made them want to do music. Can't say the same fro Prince though. Prince is a good a musician but i can't really imagine myself wanting to go and watch a concert with him. Plus MJ has sold 750 million albums. Can't beat that can you?

Prince.

so we can blame MJ for all that crap? that's another point against him

it's interesting when you see the RNRHOF videos with people like miles davis, joni mitchel, eric clapton, george clinton etc talking highly of prince's musical contribution, yet when it comes to MJ it's all the dross pop acts who have just copied their act from others

high sales don't mean a thing when it comes to talent. britney spears sells millions, and i have more talent in my farts

Personally, I think Michael Jackson is more talented, but they are both VERY talented.