Tag: bobby z

Dirty Mind, 1980 Podcast

Podcast: 40 Years of Dirty Mind

Post author By Zach
Post date September 11, 2020
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Way back in February of 2020, I asked Darling Nisi and Harold Pride to record a third episode in our series of in-depth retrospectives on Prince’s albums, this one for the 40th anniversary of 1980’s Dirty Mind. The podcast was intended to predate De Angela Duff’s DM40GB30 symposium, which in those simpler times was still scheduled to be held in-person at New York University.

Well, you know what happened next: DM40GB30 was delayed, then went virtual, while I slipped into a pandemic-related depression fog that only lifted, appropriately enough, after I participated in the virtual symposium back in June. Meanwhile, the podcast continued to lavish in the D / M / S / R Vault (a.k.a. the “Documents” folder on my computer) until the end of last month, when I was promptly reminded of just how laborious a task editing a three-hour podcast recording can be.

Now, the wait is finally over: the D / M / S / R podcast is back, in all its wildly self-indulgent glory. I want to thank everyone for their patience, and assure you that there won’t be a two-year wait before the next episode; in fact, I’d recommend you go ahead and use one of the links above to subscribe on your podcast service of choice using one of the links above, because I’m aiming to put out one of these bad boys (i.e., podcasts, not necessarily review episodes) per month. As always, let me know what you think, and feel free to leave a review on your podcast provider if you’re so inclined.

Tags 1979, 1980, 1981, 1983, 1984, 1985, 1988, 1993, 1999, 2003, 2016, adore, allen beaulieu, american bandstand, andre cymone, andrea swensson, atlanta, august darnell, baby i'm a star, bambi, beatles, beautiful ones book, beauty school dropout, bernie worrell, bobby z, brother marquis, cc club, chanhassen, contort yourself, controversy tour, cynthia horner, darling nisi, david bowie, de angela duff, detroit, devo, dez dickerson, different world, dirty mind, dirty mind tour, dm40gb30 symposium, dmsr, do it all night, do me baby, dortmund, dr fink, elvis costello, enterprize, fire it up tour, first avenue, freddie mercury, funkytown, game of thrones, got to be something here book, gotta broken heart again, grand funk railroad, grease, harold pride, have a heart, head, how come u don't call me anymore, i feel for you, i wanna be your lover, i'm yours, ice-t, international male, james chance, joe jackson, john lennon, joni mitchell, jurgen reisch, let's pretend we're married, let's go crazy grammy salute to prince, lipps inc, little red corvette, lovesexy 30, lovesexy tour, madonna, mary tyler moore show, michael dean, michael jackson, minneapolis, morning papers, morris day, motown records, mtv, musician magazine, musician magazione, neil young, new york city, nwa, oar folk, on time, one nite alone tour, parade tour, paris, parliament, partyup, press rewind, prince, prince from minneapolis, prince from minneapolis conference, prince podcast, prince tour, public enemy, purple rain, purple rain film, purple rain tour, purple reign conference, rebels, revolution, rick james, right on magazine, ritz, sharon nelson, sheila e, sister, sister sledge, so blue, sometimes it snows in april, still waiting, super freak, tim curry, time, twin tone records, tyka nelson, university of salford, uptown, uptown neighborhood, uptown theatre, warner bros records, wembley arena, when we're dancing close and slow, when you were mine, worcester centrum, you, ze records

Purple Rain, 1984

Baby I’m a Star

1999 tour, circa 1983; photo stolen from Prince Off the Record.

“The MUSIC segues into a fierce BEAT.
The CROWD lets out a ROAR! Prince
strips off his guitar, streaks center-
stage. The Band launches into ‘Baby,
I’m A Star.’
“…And the CROWD laughing, dancing,
shouting and loving. The CLUB is ALIVE!
“And the MUSIC continues…forever…”
Draft screenplay for Purple Rain by Albert Magnoli, 1983

In the spring of 1983, Prince’s contract with managers Cavallo, Ruffalo, and Fargnoli was up for renewal. They had, on the face of it, little reason to worry: the 1999 tour was selling out arenas, “Little Red Corvette” was in the Top 10 of the pop charts, and 1999 was well on its way to Platinum certification by the RIAA. By the end of April, Prince would make the cover of Rolling Stone: a coveted opportunity for which his managers had netted a Richard Avedon photo shoot without granting an interview. “I thought we did an incredible job, we had a creative relationship, I’m sure he’s gonna sign another contract,” Bob Cavallo later told music journalist Alan Light. But Prince sent his main handler, Steve Fargnoli, back to Cavallo with a surprising ultimatum: “he won’t sign with us again unless we get him a movie” (Light 51).

Tags 1981, 1982, 1983, 1984, 1985, 1986, 1999 tour, 2004, 2016, 2020, alan leeds, albert magnoli, apollonia 6, baby i'm a star, beautiful ones book, beyonce, bird, bloomington, bob cavallo, bobby z, bodyheat, brown mark, bruce springsteen, can't stop this feeling i got, capital centre, cary grant, cbs, chanhassen, chocolate, chuck statler, clarence williams iii, controversy, dan piepenbring, dance electric, david coleman, david lynch, david z, dez dickerson, dirty mind tour, don batts, dr fink, duane tudahl, elvis presley, eraserhead, eric leeds, fame tv series, first avenue, forum, francis ford coppola, free, gary l coleman, grammy awards, greg brooks, highway 7, i just wanna be rich, i wanna be your lover, i would die 4 u, inglewood, james brown, jerome benton, jill jones, joe ruffalo, john l nelson, jonathan melvoin, jungle love, keith murphy, kiowa trail, kurt loder, lake minnetonka, landover, let's go crazy, linn lm-1, lisa coleman, little red corvette, los angeles, louis b mayer, love me tender film, lovin spoonful, madonna, mattie shaw, met center, mia bocca, miami, mike melvoin, minneapolis, minnesota dance theatre, modernaire, moonbeam levels, morris day, motown records, new power generation, piano & a microphone tour, prince, promise to be true, purple rain, purple rain film, purple rain tour, radio city music hall, revolution, richard avedon, rolling stone, roots tv series, second coming film, sexuality, sheila e, simmons sds-v, soft and wet, st louis park, starr company, starwood, steve fargnoli, stevie wonder, sunset sound, susan rogers, susannah melvoin, swept away, teena marie, texas chainsaw massacre, time, too tough, under the cherry moon film, uptown, vanity, waldorf salad, wally safford, warehouse, warner bros records, we can work it out, wendy melvoin, west hollywood, william blinn, woody allen, wouldn't you love to love me, wrecking crew

1999, 1982

1999

Post author By Zach
Post date March 16, 2020
2 Comments on 1999

By mid-July of 1982, Prince had completed work on the album that would become 1999, with just one significant exception: “1999,” the song, was nowhere to be seen. When Prince played a rough mix of the album for his manager Bob Cavallo that month, he got a cooler reception than he anticipated.

“‘This is a great album, but we don’t have a first single,’” Cavallo recalled telling Prince. “‘We have singles that’ll be hits, but we don’t have a thematic, important thing that can be embraced by everybody, different countries, et cetera.’” In response, Prince “cursed me, and he went away–but he didn’t force me to put it out. Two weeks later, he came back and he played ‘1999,’ and that became the title of the album” (Light 43).

Tags 1981, 1982, 1983, 1984, 1999, 1999 new master, 1999 song, 1999 tour, alan leeds, all the critics love u in new york, allen beaulieu, andrea swensson, annie christian, armory, arp omni 2, atlanta, automatic, blade runner, bloomington, bob cavallo, bobby z, brown mark, bruce gowers, chattanooga, controversy, controversy tour, dance to the music, dc armory, delirious, dez dickerson, dmsr, do me baby, dr fink, dr funkenberry, feel u up, fixx, free, head, houston, how come u don't call me anymore, irresistible bitch, jill jones, jimmy jam, joe ruffalo, john lennon, ken tucker, lady cab driver, let's pretend we're married, let's work, lisa coleman, little red corvette, lust u always, man who saw tomorrow, marylou badeaux, met center, michael jackson, minneapolis, murielle hamilton, nostradamus, nothing to fear, npg, orson welles, per nilsen, plastic ono band, prince, purple rain, purple rain film, queen, red skies, revolution, rock with you, roy bennett, san antonio, second coming, seventh-day adventist church, sexuality, sly and the family stone, steve fargnoli, summit, susan moonsie, terry lewis, toure, turn it up, vangelis, vanity, vanity 6, warner bros records, washington dc, with you, yoko ono

1999, 1982

D.M.S.R.

Post author By Zach
Post date July 12, 2019
2 Comments on D.M.S.R.

DJ Steve Holbrook in the booth at the Taste Show Lounge in Minneapolis, circa 1983. Note the Time poster on the right. Photo by Charles Chamblis, stolen from the Minnesota Historical Society.

Beginning with his third album in 1980, Prince had been steadily building up a mythology–occasionally bordering on a philosophy–for himself. Dirty Mind had “Uptown,” a clarion call for hedonism that eradicated all racial and sexual boundaries. 1981’s Controversy, of course, had its epic title track, a declaration of selfhood through the negation of fixed identities; as well as “Sexuality,” a return to the themes of “Uptown” with a new quasi-religious fervor. For his fifth album in 1982, he offered something even more blunt and to the point: a musical manifesto based around the four words, “Dance, Music, Sex, Romance.”

Though it was never released as a single–and was, in fact, left off 1999’s original CD release due to space constraints–“D.M.S.R.” holds a privileged position in Prince’s discography. Dance Music Sex Romance was of course the title of Per Nilsen’s 1999 biography and session chronicle, long considered definitive by fans of Prince’s mid-’80s imperial phase. It’s also, obviously, the title of this very blog, because I figured if Per’s not going to use it anymore, somebody’s got to. Its attraction to writers on Prince is self-evident: as Dave Lifton writes in his post on the song for Diffuser’s 365 Prince Songs in a Year series, “Dance. Music. Sex. Romance. Add God into the mixture and you’ve more or less got the formula for every song Prince released in his life” (Lifton 2017). Way back when I first started d / m / s / r in 2016, I posited that it would make a great title for a career-spanning collection like Johnny Cash’s Love, God, Murder, with a disc devoted to each theme.

1999, 1982

Let’s Pretend We’re Married

Post author By Zach
Post date June 5, 2019
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Having completed the majority of the Vanity 6 album over a few weeks at his home studio, Prince was back at Sunset Sound by the end of March 1982. The first song recorded during this block of sessions was intended for his own fifth album–though its salacious lyrics and heavy electronic sound kept it stylistically aligned with his latest side project.

“Let’s Pretend We’re Married” opens with one of the treated Linn LM-1 beats that had already become a sonic trademark for Prince, just seven months after his introduction to the machine. A driving kick and snare lays the foundation, with rimshots punctuating every other measure. On the tenth measure, a hiccuping conga hit creeps in, and the rimshots, now swathed in reverb, grow more insistent. Finally, a pair of churning bass synths enter the mix: one four on the floor, one double-time. Once again, Prince’s interest in the emergent electronic music that would soon be dubbed techno is evident in the song’s indefatigable pulse; music critic and biographer Dave Hill would describe it as “a long, agitated throb from start to finish” (Hill 130). But where the previous year’s “Sexuality,” for example, was all pulverizing rhythms, “Let’s Pretend” sprinkles on a heaping spoonful of pop sugar, with a tinkling keyboard line that precisely mirrors Prince’s vocal melody.