Prince: 1958 - 2016 (UPDATED)
Prince: 1958 - 2016
Here's Prince's guitar solo on "While My Guitar Gently Weeps" (George Harrison) @ 3:40. From 2004 Rock Hall of Fame Inductions with Tom Petty, Steve Winwood, Jeff Lynne and others.
While My Guitar Gently Weeps... When Doves Cry ...
UPDATE:
Joel Bernstein, archivist for Neil Young (via The Wrap):
“On the last day of the year, 1987, Prince’s manager called. Prince was threatening to fire his whole band if he couldn’t get a decent guitar sound. He thought his guitar sound was wimpy, and he wanted a rock sound. I was a guitar technician and photographer on a series of Neil Young tours, and I’d been asked before on a day’s notice to join the ‘Purple Rain‘ tour, and I couldn’t do it.
But soon after, Bernstein joined the “Sign O the Times” tour.
“So I started on New Years Day. I thought I was going to be there for a few days and fly home,” Bernstein said. “But when I got him the sound he was looking for, he wanted me to stay on and do the tour with him. It was a world tour and it started in Europe.”
“He was an adamant non-drug user,” Bernstein told me. “He didn’t want people using drugs around him. His energy was so intense that he didn’t need drugs.”
Bernstein recalled that Prince was introduced to Ecstasy by a friend in 1988, and under its influence, wrote an album that he later refused to allow to be released.
“There’s a line in one of his songs: ‘The world is designed to slow you down.’ That’s what life was like for him. He moved at a really fast pace. He was really nimble, really deft, quick thinking. The speed of the world was frustrating for him,” Bernstein said.
“He was the least lazy musician I worked for. He’d sleep for four hours a night and he’d wake up with grooves.
He lived, breathed – it was all about music.
“All the stuff about sex and fashion and performing — he understood all that. But his main thing was as a musician. He was Mozartian. That I would only say about him.”
“He’s interested in spirituality, in the higher ground that Stevie Wonder refers to. He wants to take you there. He yearns spiritually for that.
“But at the same time he’s also erotic and nasty and sexual. The shock of Prince is that he doesn’t see them as exclusive. They should both be accepted as existing simultaneously. He sees the dynamic between the two. He’s working with the sacred and profane at the same time. And often.”
He continued: “He was the best performer I ever worked for, the most talented musician in terms of raw talent. There’s a small number of us who go between these kingdoms. Dropping in on each one of these artist’s world — each one is a galaxy, or a kingdom that you’re visiting.
“At one point I remember being in rehearsal at Paisley Park. Prince was in the middle of a solo and one of his earrings flew off. And the music stops, and everyone looks for his earring. And I thought, ‘I guess you’re on the bus now.'”
Labels: prince
by thrasher@PermaLink: 4/21/2016 07:00:00 PM
7 comments
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7 Comments:
RIP Prince!
So sad when the great one's pass.
How fortunate that Neil is at the top of his game into his 70s ...
Prince was definitely a thoughtful, innovative and brilliant musician and performer. On top of that, it appears he was very caring and charitable as well.
It's terribly sad regardless, but it's starting to look like drugs may have played a role. I really hope that's not the case...
Yes, we are incredibly fortunate that good ole' feisty Neil is still creative and challenging. I'm curious what his upcoming shows will look and sound like, and wonder if that proposed mega-concert will ultimately take place. Quite a collection of talent!
Take my advice
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...... Heaven's house band seems to be growing by leaps & bounds this year
.... Peace Mr. Nelson, nice to have seen you @ Fiddlers Green years back
...... if i see you no more in this world, i'll meet you in the next one ...
Prince Rogers Nelson---One of the great ones, a musical prodigy.He had talent to burn.He pushed music forward and into new directions and that is so greatly admired.He took daring chances and spoke his mind.A creative force of the highest order.Rest In Purple.
Over the last days, I have been wondering how to see Prince from a 'Neil' perspective. Quite a challenge. I have been a huge fan of both artists and was never able to find the interface. From the swirling, classy, highly sexualized funk of Mr Nelson to the stomping, studiously unfashionable countryrock of Mr Young was an unbridgeable distance. They seemed to live in different worlds, musically, characterologically. But the absolute and total surrender to the call of the muse connects them. They just never stopped thinking about and working on their music. Both poured out album after album, at an amazing rate. Both sit on an immense musical archive, the depths and width of which we can only surmise. Both stopped bothering about bad press, or about press at all and just did what they felt they had to do. Both were above all performers, showing how much 'live music are better'. Bad records (but every album always contained more than a few diamonds)? Ok, but live always on top of their game. Both artists have left me gasping after their concerts. They were both amazing guitarists -- but how diametrically different their style! Their versatility is also striking, covering every possible nook of the musical universe. Listening through Prince's albums over the last days, there was one that struck me in particular and may provide another key: The Vault from 1999(!), an almost totally and unjustifiedly neglected album in which Prince returns to jazz and the roots of R&B. If you want to hear it, you feel the same inspirational source as on Neil's This note's for you. It makes you wish Neil had at times explored his funky, jazzy side further. But wishes are for little kids; we should be thankful for every note these artists have given us. Rock it, Mr Nelson. Funk on, Mr Young.
For all of the differences, I think there are many similarities overall:
Eccentric
Private (as much as a star can be)
Multi-faceted (instruments/styles/videos/movies, etc..)
Artistic integrity/vision (at odds with record companies/publishing/streaming)
Made music for himself (if fans liked it, great; if not, perhaps better)
Archives ('nuff said)
Charitable
Those are just a few off the top of my head, and also, Prince released a song called "Cinnamon Girl." I have to believe he was aware there was another song with that title...
Take my advice
Don't listen to me
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