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Podcast Prince, 1979

Podcast: Prince (1979) Revisited

October 19, 2018 marks the 39th anniversary of Prince’s self-titled second album–not the most glamorous occasion, perhaps, but reason enough to reassemble the review panel from our For You podcast for a reappraisal. Once again, Zach is joined by Harold and KaNisa for a track-by-track discussion of this underappreciated album, its resonances throughout Prince’s career, and why it still matters.

00:00:00   Ray “Eye Patch” Sawyer and Dennis Locorriere of Dr. Hook Introduce Prince–and Prince Performs “I Wanna Be Your Lover”–on The Midnight Special, 1980

00:01:08   KaNisa’s Muse 2 the Pharaoh Podcast

00:01:30   Harold’s First Appearance on d / m / s / r

00:01:39   Harold’s Presentation from the Lovesexy 30 Symposium at NYU

00:02:49   Our First Review Podcast of For You

00:08:33   For You’s Album Cover vs. Prince’s

Prince-For_You-Frontal_lhuprk
Photo by Joe Giannetti, © Warner Bros.
prince-lp
Photo by Jurgen Reisch, © Warner Bros.

00:14:15   The Infamous Dick Clark Interview from American Bandstand, 1980

00:20:25   d / m / s / r Post on the Capri Theatre Show

00:23:34   Definitely Nude: The Back Cover of Prince

pegasushumpermustaceous
Photo by Chris Callis, © Warner Bros.

00:23:51 “Sexy Dancer” (Live at Carolina Coliseum, 1980)

00:26:22   Prince Live 1979-1980: The First Tour

00:28:03   “I Wanna Be Your Lover” (from Prince, 1979)

00:34:38   The “I Wanna Be Your Lover” Music Video

00:41:10   “Disco Away” by the Rebels (1979 recording)

00:43:15   “I Wanna Be Your Lover” (Live in Dortmund, 1988)

00:46:25   “I Wanna Be Your Lover” in “Purple Medley,” 1995

00:47:47   The Alternate “Band Version” of the “I Wanna Be Your Lover” Video, with… Remastered Audio

00:49:07   The More Convincing Band Videos for “Dirty Mind,” “Controversy,” and “1999

00:54:20   “Why You Wanna Treat Me So Bad?” (from Prince)

01:00:30   Dez, André, and Prince, 1980

rebels-1980
Photo by Richard E. Aaron

01:01:12   “Why You Wanna Treat Me So Bad?” (Live in Lakeland, Florida, 1980)

01:15:04   “Why You Wanna Treat Me So Bad?” (Live in Vancouver, 2013)

01:17:13   “Sexy Dancer” (from Prince)

01:24:52   “Livin’ on the Nile (Extended Club Re-mix)” by Egyptian Lover (1987 single)

01:30:15   “Sexy Dancer (Long Version)” (1980 single)

01:33:34   “When We’re Dancing Close and Slow” (from Prince)

01:43:55   d / m / s / r Podcast with Erica Thompson

01:45:22   “When We’re Dancing Close and Slow” (Live in Seattle, 2013)

01:52:33   “When We’re Dancing Close and Slow” with Andy Allo (Live at North Sea Jazz, 2011)

01:55:17   “With You” (from Prince)

02:00:41   The Instrumental “With You” Interlude (Live at Denver Auditorium Arena, 1983)

02:03:33   “With You” (Live at Xenophobia Celebration, 2002)

02:08:13   “Bambi” (from Prince)

02:17:16   The Unaired “Bambi” Performance on The Ellen Degeneres Show, 2004

02:19:39   “Still Waiting” (from Prince)

02:24:13   “Still Waiting” (Live at First Avenue, 1982)

02:30:05   “I Feel for You” (from Prince)

02:37:25   “I Feel for You” by Chaka Khan (from I Feel for You, 1984)

02:38:28   “It’s Gonna Be Lonely” (from Prince)

02:44:55   Zach’s Original Ranking of the Songs from Prince

03:04:25   “Bambi (Rap)” by T.C. Ellis (from True Confessions, 1991)

By Zach

Recovering academic. Music writing at Slant, Spectrum Culture, and elsewhere. Arguably best known as the author of Dance / Music / Sex / Romance, a song-by-song chronological blog about the music of Prince.

3 replies on “Podcast: Prince (1979) Revisited”

wow… three hours! 4 times the running time of the album itself 🙂

Interesting to hear the differences of opinion. Of course, it goes without saying that mine is different again. To me, Prince and Controversy are transitional albums, not really working, but showing what was before and what was to come.

As to the standout track… to me it’s Bambi. And mostly the studio version (as with most of his songs, although the metal version of 8 March 1982 is awesome). The lyrics may be awkward at best, but it seems to be an actual opinion he held to the end of his life, if you go with Da Bourgeoisie.

As to the Ellen show, Prince made a point to always play Bambi any time the lesbian of the Klemann sisters (I forget which one, they recorded his songs Qualified and Sex for the album he collaborated on with their band Lois Lane, known as Lois L in the US). He seemed to think it was funny, so I think it definitely was not a coincidence he played it to Ellen.

Yes it’s going to be especially ridiculous when we inevitably spend three hours on Dirty Mind’s 30 minutes… and then god knows how many episodes I’m going to need to split Sign “O” the Times into (or maybe I’ll just be sadistic and put it up as one 7-hour slog)!

Very interesting info on “Bambi”–yes, it certainly seems that Prince’s views on sexual orientation were a lot less progressive than one would assume from a man who spent most of his adult life in eyeliner. Kind of a bummer, but he couldn’t shut the doors his work already opened!

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