Latest / Booked On Rock with Eric Senich / Purple Reign: Prince and The Revolution Uncovered [Episode 315]

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Purple Reign: Prince and The Revolution Uncovered [Episode 315] · Booked On Rock with Eric Senich

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  Speaker 1: Coming up. On this episode of Booked on Rock, we
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  Speaker 1: explore the most revolutionary period of prints with author James Campion.
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  Speaker 1: We're totally rock and roll.
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  Speaker 2: I mean, I'll leave you you're reading. Little Hands says
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  Speaker 2: it's time to rock and roll. Up.
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  Speaker 1: We are totally booked. Welcome back to Booked on Rock,
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  Speaker 1: the podcast for those about to read and rock. I'm
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  Speaker 1: Eric Senich, very excited to welcome back this episode's guest,
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  Speaker 1: a fantastic author, really a friend of the podcast who's
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  Speaker 1: been so supportive of the show, James Campion. His latest
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  Speaker 1: book is titled Revolution Prince the Band the Era. James,
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  Speaker 1: it is great to see you again.
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  Speaker 2: It's so great to see you, Eric, and I said
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  Speaker 2: it before we went to record, but it's true. It's
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  Speaker 2: not really a book for me until I get on Booked.
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  Speaker 1: On Rock, until you get on Booked on Rock. That's
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  Speaker 1: so cool, man, thanks so much. Well, tell us about
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  Speaker 1: this book. I know you were talking to me about
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  Speaker 1: this a while ago. Yeah, and finally here we are.
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  Speaker 1: The book is out. It focuses on Prince's most prolific,
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  Speaker 1: groundbreaking era, right, and it's the era when he had
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  Speaker 1: the Band of Revolution. But interesting that You're right. The
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  Speaker 1: narrative has always been the Prince was a solitary entity,
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  Speaker 1: but that is only half the story of his journey, right.
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  Speaker 2: It's true. I want to thank Andreas Swinson, who's pot
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  Speaker 2: the original official podcasts with the with the Prince of
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  Speaker 2: State for a few years. When she did the Sign
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  Speaker 2: of the Times retrospective, I learned quite a bit. You know.
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  Speaker 2: I grew up in the eighties. I was in rock
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  Speaker 2: bands in the twenties, in my twenties, and I, you know,
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  Speaker 2: Prince was a guy that we all could not wait
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  Speaker 2: for the new Prince album to come out. Always came
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  Speaker 2: out every year, and he was It reminds me of
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  Speaker 2: the way people talk about the Beatles. It was always
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  Speaker 2: something new, a new direction, a new sound, a new genre,
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  Speaker 2: you know, mashing it all up. And I always, again
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  Speaker 2: I felt, you know, that's what it was sold to us,
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  Speaker 2: you know. And it's true to a certain extent that
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  Speaker 2: he recorded all of this stuff, you know, produced arrange,
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  Speaker 2: just you know, the credits recorded and performed by Prince.
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  Speaker 2: But I it's their contributions. And by the by I
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  Speaker 2: say they, I mean the Revolution and the bands prior
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  Speaker 2: to that were so integral and how those songs were woodshedded,
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  Speaker 2: how they were brought up in the first place, how
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  Speaker 2: they were massaged, how they led Prince into different avenues
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  Speaker 2: of musical styles that he never would have thought of,
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  Speaker 2: and maybe he would have got to eventually, but he
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  Speaker 2: got to it a lot quicker. So right off the
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  Speaker 2: bat there, I thought, hmm, that's interesting, because I originally
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  Speaker 2: had thought, I think I'd do another book about one
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  Speaker 2: album like I did with Kiss with Destroyer and do
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  Speaker 2: Around the World in a Day, which is one of
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  Speaker 2: my favorite and a very controversial, no pun intended Prince
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  Speaker 2: album and among fans and critics. But then when I realized,
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  Speaker 2: that's smack in the middle of an incredible still of
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  Speaker 2: really the burgeoning idea of Prince, even as a kid
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  Speaker 2: growing up in North Minneapolis, how much he relied on bands,
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  Speaker 2: And when I went to Minneapolis to visit, and again
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  Speaker 2: thanks to Andrea who took me around, and I want
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  Speaker 2: to also thank Dwayne Toudahl, who's become a friend, who
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  Speaker 2: wrote brilliant books about Prince's output in the studio from
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  Speaker 2: nineteen eighty three to about nineteen eighty six. I put
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  Speaker 2: all those things together and I started to formulate this
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  Speaker 2: incredible narrative that I thought would be best told in
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  Speaker 2: a novel way, in almost like an unfolding story, so
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  Speaker 2: people can follow really the arc of this incredible story
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  Speaker 2: of not only Prince as a brilliant artist, one of
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  Speaker 2: the greats of the twentieth centuries certainly the latter have,
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  Speaker 2: but also the people around him, how he used things
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  Speaker 2: you don't associate with him, compromise, collaboration, interaction, inspiration from
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  Speaker 2: the fellow musicians. So once I dove into that, Eric just,
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  Speaker 2: I mean, it was fascinating. Really, I learned so much
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  Speaker 2: about an artist I thought I knew a lot about.
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  Speaker 1: And it all starts with Prince's quote fantasy musical ensemble
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  Speaker 1: and interracial and intergender assemblage of special musicians that could
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  Speaker 1: seamlessly mesh sonic styles. You could say that this vision
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  Speaker 1: began when he was only like six or seven, right
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  Speaker 1: when he was growing up in Minneapolis. I mean he
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  Speaker 1: was listening to s Line, the Family Stone and James
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  Speaker 1: Brown and the Stones, Aretha Franklin, so many artists right
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  Speaker 1: when he was growing up.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, he was initially introduced. You know, you mentioned the
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  Speaker 2: age of seven. That's when his parents split up Mattie
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  Speaker 2: and John Ell. Mattie is mom a part of his personality.
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  Speaker 2: I write in the book sort of a junior psychologist,
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  Speaker 2: about how Maddie represented that side of him that was
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  Speaker 2: loose and sensual and fun loving, and you know, gregarious
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  Speaker 2: and adventurous and then john Ell religious, solemn focused, you know, perfectionist,
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  Speaker 2: you know, and his father wouldn't let him go near
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  Speaker 2: the piano unless he could really play it, so he'd
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  Speaker 2: have to wait till his father left the room, and
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  Speaker 2: then he would. He taught himself out of play, and
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  Speaker 2: then his father got involved and taught him to play better.
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  Speaker 2: And you know, his father got him a guitar, and
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  Speaker 2: by seven eight nine he started to play. But it
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  Speaker 2: wasn't until he met Andre Anderson later Andre Simone, who
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  Speaker 2: was a middle school friend of his when his father
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  Speaker 2: kicked him out of the house, and a famous story
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  Speaker 2: that was depicted in Rolling Stone magazine in the mid eighties.
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  Speaker 2: John Nell was fed up with Princes more like his mom,
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  Speaker 2: gregarious in adventurous way, especially with girls in his room
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  Speaker 2: and under his father's roof, and Prince ends up in
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  Speaker 2: the Anderson home where he lives in the basement with
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  Speaker 2: Andre and the two of them. That's where Andre sort
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  Speaker 2: of turns Prince on. Prince got the notion about this
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  Speaker 2: kind of stuff that you would learn in the black
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  Speaker 2: community of Minneapolis in the sixties into the early seventies,
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  Speaker 2: which is pared down to, you know, ninety two of
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  Speaker 2: Minneapolis it's Caucasian and still to this day it might
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  Speaker 2: be around ninety ninety one percent, but there were black
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  Speaker 2: pockets around Minneapolis. And Andrea talks about it in her
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  Speaker 2: fabulous book about that era of redlining, where you know,
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  Speaker 2: certain neighborhoods could not move into white areas. So for Prince,
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  Speaker 2: he grew up with Aretha Franklin and Ray Charles James Brown.
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  Speaker 2: These were forming inside, giving him sort of a vocabulary.
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  Speaker 2: But it was Andre and Andrea's brothers who at that
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  Speaker 2: time were dealing with a wider swath of music because
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  Speaker 2: the radio stations were more white and more meaning more rock,
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  Speaker 2: you know, and he turned Prints onto Grand Funk Railroad
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  Speaker 2: and sly in the Family Stone and sort of that
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  Speaker 2: that crossover stuff that Prince is so well known for
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  Speaker 2: and why he absolutely wanted, as you just read from
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  Speaker 2: my book, intergender, interracial voices and sound and styles in
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  Speaker 2: anything he did.
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  Speaker 1: You're right. Quote. Prince was twenty six when the official
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  Speaker 1: revolution was detonated, and it was quite the excursion to
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  Speaker 1: get there. So let's get to this. There was a
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  Speaker 1: pre revolution lineup that Prince formed as his backing band
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  Speaker 1: after the release of that first album, which was nineteen
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  Speaker 1: seventy eight for you. So let's get to that pre
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  Speaker 1: revolution lineup and how they came together. It starts as
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  Speaker 1: a trio, that's right.
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  Speaker 2: It starts in the Lauring you know that great apocryphal
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  Speaker 2: mystical thing called the Louring Park sessions, in which Prince
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  Speaker 2: had met Bobby Z. Bobby Rifkin, who became his drummer
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  Speaker 2: for the first nine years of his career, who was
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  Speaker 2: the brother of David Rifkin, who famously helped to engineer
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  Speaker 2: the first real big song to come out of the
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  Speaker 2: Funky aspect of Minneapolis called Funkytown by Lips Incorporated. And
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  Speaker 2: so Prince had gotten a lot of because he was
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  Speaker 2: a young penon, he got a lot of like studio
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  Speaker 2: session stuff, and he met through his manager at the time,
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  Speaker 2: Owen Hunse, he met Bobby Z, who was only about
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  Speaker 2: nineteen twenty at the time. Prince would have been eighteen nineteen.
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  Speaker 2: He's already friends with Andre from growing up with him
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  Speaker 2: in middle school, and they formed this trio and they
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  Speaker 2: rehearse in Hunsi's office in the Loring Park area of Minnesota.
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  Speaker 2: And I actually went to visit this building. You could
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  Speaker 2: go downstairs and right in front of the room where
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  Speaker 2: they practiced as a plaque there now. And Andre had
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  Speaker 2: helped them put the plau up after Prince's death, and
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  Speaker 2: he explained to a lot of the people there where
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  Speaker 2: they used to bring in the equipment, and I took
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  Speaker 2: a photograph of it. And they would play every night.
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  Speaker 2: They'd move the all this office stuff out, play until
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  Speaker 2: dawn and move all these stuff back and then go
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  Speaker 2: back to try to sleep. I guess at that point,
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  Speaker 2: I don't know when they slept, but that was the
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  Speaker 2: beginning of the trio. And that trio really started to
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  Speaker 2: formulate later on when Des Dickerson became a fourth and
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  Speaker 2: started to play with him, the guitar player who ended
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  Speaker 2: up later on, of course, being in his touring bands.
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  Speaker 2: And then later on it expanded out to Matt Think
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  Speaker 2: of course, the doctor. All these different personalities and Gail Chapman,
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  Speaker 2: who I interviewed for the book who was there a
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  Speaker 2: short amount of time, but she was the first white
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  Speaker 2: keyboard player who is very, very classically trained and really
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  Speaker 2: brought that kind of aspect to Prince's sound. But once again,
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  Speaker 2: going all the way back even to his high school
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  Speaker 2: days when he was in a band called Grand Central Eric,
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  Speaker 2: this was a guy who really enjoyed the camaraderie and
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  Speaker 2: the inspiration of jamming and trying different styles and those
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  Speaker 2: bands all the way through high school into the trio period.
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  Speaker 2: They they did a lot of stuff like Santana and
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  Speaker 2: Steely Dan and you know, Parliament Funkadelic. As I mentioned
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  Speaker 2: Stevie wonder It Sli in the family Stone. They did
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  Speaker 2: the full Grand Fight. They did the full gamut of
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  Speaker 2: type of music Chicago, just so they can get gigs
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  Speaker 2: in the predominantly white areas of Minneapolis.
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  Speaker 1: But Warners didn't feel that the band was ready to
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  Speaker 1: put them in the studio. They were wanted Prince to
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  Speaker 1: do it on his own, essentially with the help of
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  Speaker 1: some of the people that they handpicked. Like the first
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  Speaker 1: album you write about how they left to his own vices.
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  Speaker 1: You know he's gonna be there forever. He would take
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  Speaker 1: him forever to finish y.
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  Speaker 2: I think he did forty six overdubs or something on
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  Speaker 2: one song. Yeah, so your Prince was it was signed incredibly.
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  Speaker 2: They they pitched him as the new Stevie Wonder and
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  Speaker 2: this guy Hensey did a fabulous job in convincing Moe
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  Speaker 2: Austin from Warner Bros. To sign him. Now Austin had
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  Speaker 2: signed Neil Young and Fleetwood Mac and Randy Newman. The
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  Speaker 2: list is long, and it's a great it's a great story,
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  Speaker 2: great backstories. He got all these guys Lenny Warnaker and
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  Speaker 2: Katz who produced this, Steely Dan and Templeton who produced
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  Speaker 2: Van Handon. He got all these guys in there to
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  Speaker 2: kind of watch Prince and say, because this kid really
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  Speaker 2: do this. And they all came back to Austin and
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  Speaker 2: said he's killing it, he's doing it, so leave them alone.
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  Speaker 2: And they did and end up costing a very much
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  Speaker 2: more more money than they wanted to spend. And Prince
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  Speaker 2: really want a band. So between for You, which is
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  Speaker 2: very much a solitary entity production, and so is the
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  Speaker 2: second album which was Uponmany's titled Prince. That record you
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  Speaker 2: could tell the difference, And I don't know if you
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  Speaker 2: listened to a lot of this music while you were
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  Speaker 2: reading the book, Eric, and a lot of people have
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  Speaker 2: reported back to me they've done that, they've rediscovered these
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  Speaker 2: early records. And it seemed to me when I started
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  Speaker 2: listening to that again with Fresh Air Ears, that Prince
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  Speaker 2: was trying to put together a band type record to
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  Speaker 2: go on the road and kick ass. And that's when
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  Speaker 2: he started bringing all these other musicians in. And these
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  Speaker 2: songs have more of a chanting quality, you know, and
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  Speaker 2: more of a hybrid of disco and funk and rock
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  Speaker 2: and pop. So there was that great overlap that he
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  Speaker 2: was able to produce. But miraculously, as I said before,
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  Speaker 2: Warners gave him full creative control at you know, nineteen
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  Speaker 2: twenty years old, which is amazing, totally amazing.
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  Speaker 1: At one point he was in New York. Then they
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  Speaker 1: moved him out to California, but then he wanted to
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  Speaker 1: go back to Minneapolis.
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  Speaker 2: That was his home, always back to Minneapolis. They wanted
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  Speaker 2: him to get studio musicians. He didn't. He played all
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  Speaker 2: the instruments. They wanted him to get studio cats or
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  Speaker 2: a road cats to play, but he kept returning to
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  Speaker 2: that trio. He kept returning to Minneapolis, and that's where
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  Speaker 2: he built the band I mentioned before, with Gail and
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  Speaker 2: Dez and Matt Fink and Bobby and his old pal
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  Speaker 2: from middle school. So it's really a fantastic story about
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  Speaker 2: a guy who did want it to be a big star.
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  Speaker 2: He wanted to control his own music, but he also
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  Speaker 2: wanted to be He wanted to find that gang, that
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  Speaker 2: tribe that he could connect to. And I say this
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  Speaker 2: a lot in the book. As you know, the band,
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  Speaker 2: his family family is the band. He felt very strongly
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  Speaker 2: about that. A band was more than just musicians. They
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  Speaker 2: had to have full loyalty at all the time. They
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  Speaker 2: had to have his back. I write quite a bit
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  Speaker 2: in the book about all in. That's a phrase that's
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  Speaker 2: thrown around a lot in the music business, in sports,
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  Speaker 2: but this was true of Prince. Everybody had to have
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  Speaker 2: the same style and the same attitude and the same
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  Speaker 2: almost the same gate when they walked. It's incredible, you know,
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  Speaker 2: he just built this family from the ashes of his
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  Speaker 2: own family life, which didn't work out for him as
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  Speaker 2: a kid.
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  Speaker 1: Booked on rock Podcasts We'll be back after this when.
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  Speaker 2: When opichis with the impatients, Remember absence makes the heart
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  Speaker 2: grow fonder.
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  Speaker 1: You had to pick that night when they first play live,
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  Speaker 1: So clearly it's it's in the debt of Minneapolis sub
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  Speaker 1: zero January night in nineteen seventy nine, one year before
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  Speaker 1: the dawn of a decade. Prince would emerge triumphant that
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  Speaker 1: the band debuted for Warner Brothers. But here again, Warners
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  Speaker 1: just didn't feel that the band was ready to enter
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  Speaker 1: the studio.
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  Speaker 2: And they all admitted that. They all admitted that they
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  Speaker 2: weren't ready for primetime. It was a total disaster. They
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  Speaker 2: played the caprio. It was only for a couple of
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  Speaker 2: hundred people, but all the Warners staff was there. They bombed.
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  Speaker 2: You know, I call it the flop in the book.
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  Speaker 2: But it reinvigorated him and it challenged him, and he
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  Speaker 2: knew he couldn't be stopped. And I thought he did
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  Speaker 2: a very smart thing. He took the band to Colorado,
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  Speaker 2: not Minneapolis, not New York, not Los Angeles.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, he about it fascinating Colorado, of all places.
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  Speaker 2: All places. Goes out there studio, all private, and he
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  Speaker 2: asks everybody in the band to write songs. Everybody writes songs.
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  Speaker 2: Bring him in. I'll write some too. Let's do a
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  Speaker 2: band album. Let's not think about Prince, Let's not think
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  Speaker 2: about Warner Brothers, does not think about going on the road.
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  Speaker 2: Let's just convene and collaborate. And they did and it
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  Speaker 2: was called The Rebels and you could find it on
• 14:32
  Speaker 2: YouTube and there's other bootlegs of it. It almost became
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  Speaker 2: an album. They actually had a photograph of all the
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  Speaker 2: members a la Hot Rocks, you know, the Rolling Stones,
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  Speaker 2: where they were all like, you know, their profiles, and
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  Speaker 2: it never came out. But it was so fascinating listening
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  Speaker 2: to these songs, Eric, because one sounds like Sticks, one
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  Speaker 2: sounds like Steely Dan, one sounds like Parliament, one sounds
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  Speaker 2: like the Ohio Players. It's incredible. They all came with
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  Speaker 2: their own styles, all sing vocals. He just he said,
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  Speaker 2: let's got, let's got, let's become a band. Such a
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  Speaker 2: great idea.
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  Speaker 1: And that was intentional, just let's play whatever music we
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  Speaker 1: want to play or write, et cetera. And it was
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  Speaker 1: like camp. You discs really was camp And.
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  Speaker 2: I don't want to pass over this idea is when
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  Speaker 2: he hired everybody to play. Des Dickerson loved the Cars,
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  Speaker 2: loved Boston, Love love Ultravox, loved uh the Generation X
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  Speaker 2: was Billy Idol's original band. Matt Fink loved Elton John
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  Speaker 2: and David Bowie and Stevie wonder Uh and you know
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  Speaker 2: hooked on Bach. You know later on Lisa Coleman loved
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  Speaker 2: jazz and classical music. They all brought something to the
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  Speaker 2: table which continued to challenge is Prince's prism and his palette,
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  Speaker 2: so we could continue to mind those things. He was
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  Speaker 2: like a sponge and he was so much a genius
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  Speaker 2: at taking all these disparate, seemingly disparate styles. In the
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  Speaker 2: late seventies when there was a total isolation of music,
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  Speaker 2: black stations, white stations, disco rock, never the twain shall
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  Speaker 2: meet different TV shows, different radio stations, different award shows.
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  Speaker 2: And that wasn't the case in the fifties and sixties,
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  Speaker 2: where there was a great meshing of African American sounds
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  Speaker 2: with white sounds. But that split in half of the
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  Speaker 2: music business was very, very, very extremely stringent in putting
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  Speaker 2: the labels on artists, and Prince said from the very beginning,
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  Speaker 2: don't make me black. And he wasn't rejecting his heritage.
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  Speaker 2: What he was saying is I don't want to I'm
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  Speaker 2: not I'm gonna do whatever the hell I want. And
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  Speaker 2: all these musicians, as I write about, really helped him.
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  Speaker 2: They gave him, they butchased him, you know, they supported him.
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  Speaker 2: He saw all these voices saying, hell, yeah, why should
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  Speaker 2: we just do this? Why should we just do that?
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  Speaker 2: Why can't we do anything? And the Rebels sessions really
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  Speaker 2: did bring that out for them.
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  Speaker 1: The early TV appearance is NBC's Midnight Special and American
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  Speaker 1: Bandstand with the band. Now, he could have come out
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  Speaker 1: by himself, but it was important for him to have
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  Speaker 1: the band behind him.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, it was. It's they absorbed him and protected him.
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  Speaker 2: That's what they did. He could be shy, which he
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  Speaker 2: was extremely He could be monosyllabric, which he was with
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  Speaker 2: Dick Clark on that in this interview, or he doesn't
• 17:18
  Speaker 2: even look at him and he just wiggles his fingers,
• 17:21
  Speaker 2: mumbles occasional things. But I'm fascinating, and I point out
• 17:25
  Speaker 2: in the book, I'm fascinated by the fact that they
• 17:27
  Speaker 2: recorded American Bandstand first, but it came out afterwards. So
• 17:31
  Speaker 2: if you look up, the first TV appearance ever by
• 17:34
  Speaker 2: Prince was the Midnight Special. But the interesting thing is
• 17:37
  Speaker 2: you could see the difference immediately there was still a
• 17:40
  Speaker 2: ragtag bunch, kind of punky. The guitar falls off Prince's shoulder.
• 17:43
  Speaker 2: He just lets it fall to the ground. Mike Stone
• 17:46
  Speaker 2: stands up being toppled. They're just winging it, man. It's
• 17:49
  Speaker 2: like a full punk show, you know. They do I
• 17:51
  Speaker 2: Want to Be Your Lover, which was a disco kind
• 17:53
  Speaker 2: of pop it yeah, and Why You Want to Treat
• 17:56
  Speaker 2: Me So Bad, which was his first real rock and
• 17:57
  Speaker 2: roll yeah, with great U know, guitar lead in there,
• 18:02
  Speaker 2: as opposed to the Midnight Special, which was still prints
• 18:04
  Speaker 2: in outrageous costumes, sort of ambisexual, you know, high heels, panties, garters,
• 18:11
  Speaker 2: hair all teased up, and you know, the band in
• 18:15
  Speaker 2: very much pre eighties pastels and different styles. You could
• 18:18
  Speaker 2: see him inventing in a way the eighties. But those
• 18:21
  Speaker 2: those were two huge appearances. But as you said, Eric
• 18:25
  Speaker 2: very smartly, and I think I put it out in
• 18:26
  Speaker 2: the book, it was very important for his management and
• 18:29
  Speaker 2: for him and the band to be represented as a
• 18:32
  Speaker 2: band and be represented in these crossover places where people
• 18:36
  Speaker 2: were not used to it.
• 18:37
  Speaker 1: Now.
• 18:38
  Speaker 2: Of course, there were black bands that crossed over the
• 18:41
  Speaker 2: Commodore's earth Wind and fire Parliament. But Stevie Wonder certainly
• 18:46
  Speaker 2: opened up of the Rolling Stones and had an incredible
• 18:49
  Speaker 2: crossover appeal, and then later on Michael Jackson line of Richie.
• 18:52
  Speaker 2: But with Prince, he was going deeper. He was going
• 18:54
  Speaker 2: in the rock clubs. He's playing in the Ritz in
• 18:56
  Speaker 2: the bottom line and you know, he's playing out in
• 18:58
  Speaker 2: the rocks y at La. None of these acts I'm
• 19:01
  Speaker 2: talking about ever did that. Prince took those bands. So
• 19:03
  Speaker 2: he did the band thing, the kind of thing you
• 19:05
  Speaker 2: have to do, no matter what kind of band you are.
• 19:07
  Speaker 1: I always wondered why here in Connecticut he was never
• 19:10
  Speaker 1: on any of the rock stations. He would be on
• 19:12
  Speaker 1: Top forty only not until the Rock and Roll Hall
• 19:15
  Speaker 1: of Fame appearance where he plays while my guitar gently weeps.
• 19:19
  Speaker 1: Did rock and roll fans suddenly wake up? So? Whoa,
• 19:23
  Speaker 1: oh this guy? Wow? He could play? Yeah, he could
• 19:26
  Speaker 1: always play.
• 19:27
  Speaker 2: He always could. And I think from the very beginning,
• 19:30
  Speaker 2: and I talk about it in one chapter about lineage,
• 19:35
  Speaker 2: and I think very much so, and I don't believe
• 19:38
  Speaker 2: I'm the first to think this, but I put it
• 19:40
  Speaker 2: very very I underscored it quite a bit. Prince was
• 19:43
  Speaker 2: trying to return rock and roll music back to the originators,
• 19:49
  Speaker 2: the Little Richards, the chuck Berrys, the Fast Dominoes. They
• 19:53
  Speaker 2: were sort of left out, you know, when rock became.
• 19:55
  Speaker 2: When rock and roll became rock in the late sixties
• 19:58
  Speaker 2: and seventies, became more of a white somebody like Jimmy
• 20:00
  Speaker 2: Hendricks had a hard time crossing over himself one of
• 20:03
  Speaker 2: the greatest, if not the greatest guitar player of all time.
• 20:05
  Speaker 2: And we mentioned Sli in the Family Stone that was
• 20:07
  Speaker 2: a hybrid band of inter gender and interracial. But Prince
• 20:11
  Speaker 2: was trying to do that from the very beginning. I'm
• 20:13
  Speaker 2: fully convinced of that, and by bringing guitar leads in
• 20:15
  Speaker 2: and other things. And I think that Rock and Roll
• 20:17
  Speaker 2: Hall of Fame is very important for that reason you
• 20:20
  Speaker 2: mentioned Eric, but also I love the fact that he
• 20:23
  Speaker 2: dresses almost like a Chitlin circuit nineteen fifty eight. He's
• 20:28
  Speaker 2: wearing the red pinstripe suit with the bowler hat. He
• 20:32
  Speaker 2: goes out there with all these famous rock and rollers,
• 20:35
  Speaker 2: white guys, and he plays one of the greatest solos ever,
• 20:38
  Speaker 2: which has every sort of trope that you would have
• 20:42
  Speaker 2: seen anybody play in the Chitlin circuit. It's almost like
• 20:45
  Speaker 2: his final which is incredible. I think he was inducted
• 20:47
  Speaker 2: that night and he's saying, I'm at the Rock and
• 20:50
  Speaker 2: Roll Hall of Fame. Don't forget who invented this stuff,
• 20:54
  Speaker 2: and in a very very cool and total Prince way,
• 20:58
  Speaker 2: because he spoke through his music and he was very
• 21:01
  Speaker 2: influenced by a lot of the New Romantics music, the
• 21:04
  Speaker 2: second British Wave that came out of Britain in the
• 21:07
  Speaker 2: early eighties when he traveled there in eighty nineteen eighty
• 21:11
  Speaker 2: I think or eighty one eighty, and he always incorporated
• 21:16
  Speaker 2: whether it was Gary Newman or or craft Work or
• 21:22
  Speaker 2: you know, Todd Rudgren, Joni Mitchelli loved so he was
• 21:25
  Speaker 2: constantly infusing a lot of that music into his music.
• 21:28
  Speaker 2: And yeah, it was tough. It was tough, as you
• 21:31
  Speaker 2: know for anybody, anybody playing, you know, who had black skin,
• 21:34
  Speaker 2: forget about what styles you played to get on MTV.
• 21:37
  Speaker 2: David Bowie famously, you know, petitioned them and challenged them.
• 21:40
  Speaker 2: And I think it's a great triumph that MTV covered
• 21:43
  Speaker 2: the premiere of Purple Rain. Just a couple of years later,
• 21:45
  Speaker 2: here was a station that they wouldn't even play black music,
• 21:48
  Speaker 2: and now they were celebrating maybe the first ever black
• 21:52
  Speaker 2: musical with a lead that was an heroic figure.
• 21:56
  Speaker 1: Absolutely. Now Gail Chapman as somebody who spoke with She
• 21:59
  Speaker 1: was the band, but not long. Her leaving the band was,
• 22:04
  Speaker 1: as you call it, a watershed moment in Prince's career.
• 22:07
  Speaker 1: What was her reason for leaving the band and how
• 22:09
  Speaker 1: was it a watershed moment for Prince?
• 22:12
  Speaker 2: Yeah, so I was very fascinated by Gail's story because
• 22:15
  Speaker 2: it is always presumed in all the biographies that she
• 22:17
  Speaker 2: left because of religious reasons. She was very religious, which
• 22:20
  Speaker 2: she agrees that she was, because Prince would, you know,
• 22:23
  Speaker 2: French kisser during the famous song head, which is dealing.
• 22:27
  Speaker 2: You don't need to be felle Ney to figure that out,
• 22:29
  Speaker 2: and he would make her wear scantly clad clothes, and
• 22:35
  Speaker 2: she was very conflicted about his sort of conflation of
• 22:40
  Speaker 2: sexuality and religiosity, which he did very very strongly around
• 22:43
  Speaker 2: that time and even after she left the band. But
• 22:46
  Speaker 2: that wasn't the case. She said she felt very very
• 22:50
  Speaker 2: pigeonholed as a human being in that group. Because I
• 22:53
  Speaker 2: mentioned the all in thing. He was very very cognizant
• 22:55
  Speaker 2: and maybe unfairly sold because she's a woman, about her weight,
• 22:59
  Speaker 2: about her hairstyle, about everything. He picked out, all of
• 23:01
  Speaker 2: her clothes. It got to be the point where she
• 23:03
  Speaker 2: just felt like she was like a living doll for him,
• 23:06
  Speaker 2: and she wanted to be a serious musician and she
• 23:08
  Speaker 2: wanted to do other things. She said, she told me
• 23:10
  Speaker 2: straight out, maybe I did leave too early, maybe I
• 23:13
  Speaker 2: was being two impetuous, I was young, but she felt
• 23:15
  Speaker 2: like she did need to leave. She left because of
• 23:17
  Speaker 2: her creative soul and because she just wanted to get
• 23:20
  Speaker 2: her identity back. So she left for that reason. But
• 23:23
  Speaker 2: why it's watershed is here comes Lisa Coleman from Los Angeles,
• 23:28
  Speaker 2: child of a wonderful musician who played with the Wrecking
• 23:32
  Speaker 2: Crew and played on the Beach Boys records and all
• 23:34
  Speaker 2: other records, and also a woman who was steeped and
• 23:40
  Speaker 2: grew up with seeing the Jackson five at a you know,
• 23:43
  Speaker 2: at a barbecue, and you know, Rita Coolidge used to
• 23:47
  Speaker 2: babysit her and she would just see, you know, sliding
• 23:49
  Speaker 2: the family stone, come walking down the street. So she
• 23:52
  Speaker 2: was fully already steeped by the time she met Prince
• 23:55
  Speaker 2: in the music business. She finds out he needs a
• 23:57
  Speaker 2: keyboard player, and the story of the two with them
• 24:00
  Speaker 2: meeting where he picks her up at the airport and
• 24:02
  Speaker 2: because they're both super shy, they don't say a word
• 24:04
  Speaker 2: to each other. They go to his lakeside house. He
• 24:07
  Speaker 2: points at the piano without saying a word. You can
• 24:09
  Speaker 2: almost imagine this. She sits down, and of course she's nervous.
• 24:13
  Speaker 2: According to her, He goes upstairs to call management and
• 24:15
  Speaker 2: tell them this is not gonna work out. Man, this
• 24:18
  Speaker 2: woman hasn't set a peep to me. I don't know
• 24:19
  Speaker 2: anything about her. Then she starts playing this Mozart piece,
• 24:24
  Speaker 2: and Prince jumps up, hangs up the phone, grabs his guitar,
• 24:27
  Speaker 2: runs down, and she says, from the first chords they connected.
• 24:30
  Speaker 2: How did they connect? Not from talking, not from arguing,
• 24:35
  Speaker 2: or sexually, or philosophically or spiritually. They connected through music.
• 24:40
  Speaker 2: She goes, from that point on, I was his sister,
• 24:43
  Speaker 2: and I followed him anywhere he wanted to go. And
• 24:46
  Speaker 2: he said the same of her. She is my other side.
• 24:51
  Speaker 2: When she plays. She I'm a great piano player, and
• 24:54
  Speaker 2: Prince was. But there was something about Lisa's style and
• 24:57
  Speaker 2: the way she caressed this pian Ano's keys and it
• 25:01
  Speaker 2: just from the very first it blew him away. And
• 25:04
  Speaker 2: because she was precocious and she loved to dress sexy
• 25:07
  Speaker 2: but be wild, and there was never a problem with
• 25:10
  Speaker 2: the two of them ended up in the sack because
• 25:12
  Speaker 2: she was gay, and she challenged his thought process, challenged
• 25:16
  Speaker 2: his religiosity growing up as a Seventh day Adventist. Like
• 25:20
  Speaker 2: I said, his father was very stringent, very religious, so
• 25:22
  Speaker 2: it stuck with him. So there was something about Lisa
• 25:24
  Speaker 2: brought him a little bit more out of the cocoon
• 25:26
  Speaker 2: that I think Gail could have ever done, or be
• 25:29
  Speaker 2: honest with you, Eric, anybody could I think I write
• 25:31
  Speaker 2: in the book it was almost like she was genetically
• 25:34
  Speaker 2: engineered to be Prince's sidekick because female yin to his yang.
• 25:40
  Speaker 2: And it's just a beautiful story. Their story is one
• 25:43
  Speaker 2: of my favorite things to write about. It was one
• 25:45
  Speaker 2: of my favorite things to write about in the book.
• 25:48
  Speaker 1: Booked on Rock podcast We'll be back after this.
• 25:51
  Speaker 2: Be right back with a snack, Jack, go go away.
• 25:55
  Speaker 1: Now. Andre Simone exits the band in nineteen eighty one
• 25:58
  Speaker 1: to pursue a solo career.
• 26:00
  Speaker 2: It was a fade of company. Andre said, from the
• 26:03
  Speaker 2: very beginning, I want to be in a band. I
• 26:06
  Speaker 2: want to be in the Rolling Stones, You want to
• 26:08
  Speaker 2: be in Jimi Hendrix and the Experience. But he's not
• 26:13
  Speaker 2: a nut. This was his best friend. They both talked
• 26:16
  Speaker 2: about being stars since they were eleven years old, promised
• 26:19
  Speaker 2: one another. Whoever made it first, the other person's coming along.
• 26:22
  Speaker 2: So there's sort of like this personal ton team between
• 26:25
  Speaker 2: these guys. And he didn't feel an obligation, but it's
• 26:29
  Speaker 2: an opportunity and he took it. He was his bass player.
• 26:32
  Speaker 2: He said, I'll play with you for the group, for
• 26:35
  Speaker 2: the entire three record contract you have with Wonders. And
• 26:38
  Speaker 2: he did. He did. He played all the way through
• 26:40
  Speaker 2: the famous Dirty Mind Tour, through all those clubs. I
• 26:43
  Speaker 2: was talking about rock clubs, disco clubs, funk things. But
• 26:49
  Speaker 2: he always really wanted to go off on his own.
• 26:51
  Speaker 2: And also this should not be forgotten, and I talk
• 26:54
  Speaker 2: about it indepthly in the book. Prince's idea of playing
• 26:57
  Speaker 2: with a band, what he called the jam time called
• 27:00
  Speaker 2: wood shedding, what he liked to do for hours and hours.
• 27:04
  Speaker 2: Sometimes we spill into sound checks or after hours clubs.
• 27:07
  Speaker 2: Sometimes you know, back at warehouses that he built. He
• 27:10
  Speaker 2: liked to build song structures, especially funky ones out of
• 27:14
  Speaker 2: out of you know, different basslines people came up with
• 27:16
  Speaker 2: with different you know, keyboard parts, and you know, yes,
• 27:19
  Speaker 2: the argument is he didn't give credit all the time
• 27:22
  Speaker 2: where credit is due. Now, on the other side of that,
• 27:24
  Speaker 2: he gave credit completely to people like Morris Day and
• 27:27
  Speaker 2: Vanity six and Apollonia six when they had no reason to.
• 27:32
  Speaker 2: He wrote all those songs, but he he was creating
• 27:35
  Speaker 2: this mythos around the Minneapolis sounds. So you know, for instance,
• 27:39
  Speaker 2: the story goes Simone wrote the baseline to controversy boom
• 27:44
  Speaker 2: boom boat, Oh, don't don't boom boom, and that they
• 27:48
  Speaker 2: just called it, you know, Andrea's tune, Andrea's baseline. Well,
• 27:52
  Speaker 2: Prince went home and he wrote a song. That's what
• 27:54
  Speaker 2: a song is. It's not boom boom, that's a bassline.
• 27:57
  Speaker 2: You can't copyright a baseline. There's no melody in that.
• 27:59
  Speaker 2: But it's a grow you know. And it would have
• 28:01
  Speaker 2: been nice for him to give Simone the credit, but
• 28:03
  Speaker 2: he was, you know, produced arrange written by Prince, and
• 28:07
  Speaker 2: that happened a couple of times too many for Andre
• 28:10
  Speaker 2: and I think years.
• 28:11
  Speaker 1: Later he wrote a hit single for Andre. Prince did
• 28:14
  Speaker 1: right in the eighties.
• 28:16
  Speaker 2: The dance Electric Right he wrote for him. Yeah, a
• 28:19
  Speaker 2: few years later after he left and he was having
• 28:21
  Speaker 2: some trouble and the interesting he has an interesting story.
• 28:23
  Speaker 2: So Prince was taken in the Anderson home where he
• 28:25
  Speaker 2: had nowhere to go after his father kid him out
• 28:28
  Speaker 2: and Missus Anderson took him in. She had six kids,
• 28:32
  Speaker 2: I think I'm right about that, and her ex husband,
• 28:35
  Speaker 2: ex husband that she took care of. Plus she volunteered
• 28:37
  Speaker 2: at two or three centers for the homeless and for
• 28:40
  Speaker 2: wayward kids. And she took this kid in and she
• 28:44
  Speaker 2: wasn't trying to, you know, take advantage of the fact
• 28:46
  Speaker 2: that he was a superstar, that he was a superstar
• 28:48
  Speaker 2: in waiting. All she wanted was to take care of
• 28:50
  Speaker 2: this kid. So when Andre was having a little trouble,
• 28:54
  Speaker 2: you know, getting a hit, he asked his mom to
• 28:56
  Speaker 2: give Prince a call, and she called him and what
• 29:00
  Speaker 2: they used to call around the neighborhood, Queen Annie got it,
• 29:03
  Speaker 2: got Prince on the phone and she said, you give
• 29:05
  Speaker 2: my boy a song, help him out. Prince did gladly,
• 29:09
  Speaker 2: and that really, really kindled their friendship again, and they
• 29:11
  Speaker 2: remained friends until his death. Off and on they would
• 29:16
  Speaker 2: meet and play basketball or chat. And Andre said, and
• 29:19
  Speaker 2: this was true of everybody who was in the revolution
• 29:21
  Speaker 2: or the bands leading up to the revolution. You could
• 29:23
  Speaker 2: get behind that facade that he put up in strange ways,
• 29:30
  Speaker 2: game of checkers, basketball, ping pong, swimming, talking, you know,
• 29:36
  Speaker 2: just sitting by the fire, you could break down those barriers.
• 29:39
  Speaker 2: And every time they'd come back, he would reveal that
• 29:42
  Speaker 2: side of himself, just for a few minutes to them,
• 29:44
  Speaker 2: and then he would go back being Prince.
• 29:46
  Speaker 1: Right, Well, let's talk about well the replace. The replacement
• 29:52
  Speaker 1: bassist is Mark Brown. He replaces Andre, and he, like
• 29:57
  Speaker 1: you say, it wasn't long before he was fully immersed
• 30:00
  Speaker 1: in the Prince boot camp. How tough could Prince be?
• 30:04
  Speaker 2: Very much so he was toughest on Brown, Mark Mark Brown,
• 30:07
  Speaker 2: He called him Brown Mark, and forever known that way publicly.
• 30:11
  Speaker 2: Mark Brown was but nineteen when he was in a
• 30:13
  Speaker 2: few bands in the area, and Prince knew of him,
• 30:17
  Speaker 2: and he wasn't showy, and he was kind of tall
• 30:19
  Speaker 2: and brooding the way Andre was, so he kind of
• 30:21
  Speaker 2: you replaced the whole look. He was into the looks
• 30:23
  Speaker 2: and he needed that kind of image in the visual
• 30:26
  Speaker 2: very important to him, and he told him right from
• 30:31
  Speaker 2: the beginning. Bobby's he told him when picked him up
• 30:33
  Speaker 2: at his job. He was working at seven to eleven,
• 30:35
  Speaker 2: playing music at night, and he said, are you sure
• 30:38
  Speaker 2: you're ready for this? Are you sure? And of course
• 30:40
  Speaker 2: you know, Mark Brown's a guy. I got a chance
• 30:41
  Speaker 2: to play a prince. And he meets Prince, and Prince
• 30:44
  Speaker 2: he plays for him for about maybe two songs fifteen minutes,
• 30:48
  Speaker 2: and Princes like, fine, I just want to know you.
• 30:51
  Speaker 2: And he starts to ask him all his questions and
• 30:52
  Speaker 2: again presses him, are you sure this is a big deal? Yes, yes,
• 30:57
  Speaker 2: take the weekend think about it. So of course, Mark says,
• 31:00
  Speaker 2: comes to the first rehearsal, he listened to all the
• 31:03
  Speaker 2: songs all night, didn't sleep all the songs off the
• 31:05
  Speaker 2: first couple of albums, goes in, He's playing. He's about
• 31:10
  Speaker 2: ten minutes into this first jam. Prince kicking him in
• 31:13
  Speaker 2: the ass with his his healed feet and why and
• 31:18
  Speaker 2: Prince is going play the bass, play the bass, and
• 31:22
  Speaker 2: Brown marks, isn't it what I'm doing? So he sends
• 31:26
  Speaker 2: him home and somehow he calls his mother in tears
• 31:30
  Speaker 2: Mark and she says, well, maybe he means listen to
• 31:34
  Speaker 2: what he's doing on the record, try to get inside
• 31:35
  Speaker 2: of it. She sort of tutored him, and he did.
• 31:38
  Speaker 2: He listened to them again and somehow they kind of
• 31:40
  Speaker 2: revealed themselves. Hit the style. Bobby Z always said he
• 31:44
  Speaker 2: had a certain drumming style. So when he laid drums
• 31:46
  Speaker 2: down on a record and Bobby had to recreate it live,
• 31:48
  Speaker 2: he knew that there was certain accents he put on
• 31:50
  Speaker 2: the one, or symbol crashes on the three. He did
• 31:54
  Speaker 2: things that you wouldn't normally do as a drummer because
• 31:56
  Speaker 2: Prince was, you know, a multi instrumentalist, where Bobby Z
• 31:59
  Speaker 2: was the trained drummer and similar to to Mark Brown.
• 32:03
  Speaker 2: So when he came back, he got it and Prince
• 32:06
  Speaker 2: smiled at him, and from that point on he was in.
• 32:09
  Speaker 2: And how about this one? He plays one warm up
• 32:12
  Speaker 2: gig was then Sam's then becomes the famous First Avenue
• 32:16
  Speaker 2: which I visited and described. I got a great core
• 32:19
  Speaker 2: of it again thanks to Andrea and everybody at First Avenue.
• 32:21
  Speaker 2: Take me backstage. I'm looking at set lists and the
• 32:24
  Speaker 2: stick you know, the long stickers that they put on
• 32:26
  Speaker 2: the on the on the boards where it says Matt
• 32:29
  Speaker 2: Prince guitar and very year.
• 32:31
  Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, this is where the song Purple Rain is
• 32:34
  Speaker 1: recording was recorded.
• 32:35
  Speaker 2: Yes, yes, nineteen eighty three. But yeah, getting back to
• 32:37
  Speaker 2: so they introduced Brown Mark to you know, a couple
• 32:41
  Speaker 2: of hundred people, and his very first professional gig is
• 32:44
  Speaker 2: opening up for the Rolling Stones in front of nearly
• 32:46
  Speaker 2: one hundred thousand people in LA and it's one of
• 32:49
  Speaker 2: the worst stories in the history of entertainment.
• 32:53
  Speaker 1: Well, those first three albums without the Revolution, that would
• 32:56
  Speaker 1: be the self titled Well Let's say for You and
• 32:59
  Speaker 1: seventy he ate the self titled album seventy nine Dirty
• 33:02
  Speaker 1: nine in nineteen eighty and then Controversy in eighty one.
• 33:04
  Speaker 1: So four albums without actually the Revolution credited. They're on
• 33:09
  Speaker 1: nineteen ninety nine, nineteen eighty two's nineteen nine to nine
• 33:13
  Speaker 1: album the title track Iconic. But this also has the
• 33:16
  Speaker 1: track that you say is Prince's first truly indestructible recording,
• 33:20
  Speaker 1: Little Red Corvette, And this is an example of where
• 33:24
  Speaker 1: we hear the unveiling of the Revolution, specifically Des Dickerson's
• 33:27
  Speaker 1: guitar solo. You say it symbolized the culmination of the band.
• 33:32
  Speaker 1: Edict talk about that and how this album marks the
• 33:35
  Speaker 1: beginning of the revolution era.
• 33:37
  Speaker 2: I think that's a great story, Eric, because Des Dickerson
• 33:40
  Speaker 2: and when he went to audition at Dell's Tire shop
• 33:45
  Speaker 2: in North Minneapolis, in this cool little area where Prince's
• 33:49
  Speaker 2: father used to play, which is very symbolic. He was
• 33:53
  Speaker 2: a shredder. He was known of a rock guy. He
• 33:55
  Speaker 2: played a new wave bands and rock bands, and he
• 33:58
  Speaker 2: was known as a real He could play. But when
• 34:02
  Speaker 2: he shows up, he's being demure. He heard Prince. He heard
• 34:05
  Speaker 2: this leads on there. He knew this guy could play,
• 34:07
  Speaker 2: so he just eased in. And then when Prince pointed
• 34:11
  Speaker 2: at him and said give me something, then he gave
• 34:13
  Speaker 2: him something. Prince was impressed by that. He was all
• 34:16
  Speaker 2: in from the very beginning. He understood he was a
• 34:17
  Speaker 2: prose pro. So he rewards and Prince rewards him. In
• 34:21
  Speaker 2: nineteen eighty two, it's his voice you hear first on
• 34:25
  Speaker 2: the song nineteen ninety nine, you hear him first, and
• 34:29
  Speaker 2: then Lisa Coleman along with Jill Jones, who was new
• 34:32
  Speaker 2: to the conclave that he was building in Minneapolis, and
• 34:36
  Speaker 2: then you hear, Prince, those are the voices you hear
• 34:37
  Speaker 2: that open up the record and open up the song.
• 34:39
  Speaker 2: Nineteen ninety nine. The second song, which was at that
• 34:42
  Speaker 2: time the biggest Prince hit, was Little Red Corvette. He
• 34:46
  Speaker 2: gave him the solo and he led him solo, and
• 34:49
  Speaker 2: it's an iconic solo. It was I think it voted
• 34:52
  Speaker 2: in the top one hundred guitar solos from Guitar Player magazine.
• 34:55
  Speaker 2: Blah blah blah. But that's Deez Dickerson, and that was
• 34:58
  Speaker 2: a way for Prince to reward him, as he would
• 35:00
  Speaker 2: do with say Matt Fink, who came up with the
• 35:03
  Speaker 2: Dirty Mind title track keyboard part. Prince plays it on
• 35:07
  Speaker 2: the record, but he gives you know, think credit, and
• 35:10
  Speaker 2: he gave the wild solo and he kills it on
• 35:13
  Speaker 2: the song I mentioned earlier ahead on that record. So
• 35:17
  Speaker 2: he would give little ballbles like this to the band
• 35:19
  Speaker 2: and make them feel part of the recording processes, even
• 35:22
  Speaker 2: though it was ninety eight percent him. But nineteen ninety
• 35:25
  Speaker 2: nine is very much, to use your word from earlier,
• 35:28
  Speaker 2: what ashed moment for Prince, because all the tracks are
• 35:30
  Speaker 2: about six seven, eight minutes nine minutes long, and it
• 35:36
  Speaker 2: sort of reflects what I was talking about earlier, that
• 35:39
  Speaker 2: jam edict where he would get him all in a
• 35:41
  Speaker 2: room and they would play and he would say, what
• 35:43
  Speaker 2: you got, Matt, what you got Lisa, or in some
• 35:46
  Speaker 2: ways he'd say, this is what I got, and they
• 35:48
  Speaker 2: would enhance it and they would build these tracks and
• 35:51
  Speaker 2: you could kind of feel that, and songs like Automatic
• 35:53
  Speaker 2: and Lady Cab Driver and Let's Pretend We're married, And
• 35:56
  Speaker 2: even in the big hits like nineteen ninety nine and
• 35:58
  Speaker 2: Little Red Corvette, both of them have vamps at the end.
• 36:01
  Speaker 2: They don't just fade out, they fade out in a single.
• 36:03
  Speaker 2: But if you listen to those on the album, you
• 36:05
  Speaker 2: got that whole outside chicken scratch thing with pay for
• 36:09
  Speaker 2: nineteen ninety nine and Little Red Corvette goes into that
• 36:12
  Speaker 2: real kind of groove jazz thing where he sort of
• 36:16
  Speaker 2: just does these vocal catalystmics at the end and these
• 36:19
  Speaker 2: strange sounds come in and it's very ethereal, and it's
• 36:22
  Speaker 2: extremely it's extremely indicative of what happens when you play
• 36:27
  Speaker 2: with other people and you understand the people you're playing with.
• 36:31
  Speaker 2: So yeah, and technically they weren't announced from the stages
• 36:35
  Speaker 2: the Revolution on that tour, but it's the first time
• 36:37
  Speaker 2: it does appear on a record, and it was the
• 36:39
  Speaker 2: first time I think they really because Dirtymind was recorded
• 36:43
  Speaker 2: as a demo in his own house. It wasn't even
• 36:45
  Speaker 2: supposed to be released. But nineteen ninety nine is his
• 36:48
  Speaker 2: first foray into real pop stardom, and you know the
• 36:51
  Speaker 2: band was right there with him.
• 36:53
  Speaker 1: Booked on rock podcast, We'll be back after this, I swim.
• 36:57
  Speaker 2: I'll make it up.
• 37:00
  Speaker 1: Revolution prints the band the Era is the book author
• 37:02
  Speaker 1: James Campion as our guest. So the success of nineteen
• 37:05
  Speaker 1: ninety nine's album is evident in the numbers. His first
• 37:08
  Speaker 1: top ten album, It peaked at number nine. Title Track
• 37:11
  Speaker 1: reached number twelve, Delirious reached eight, Little Red Corvette peaked
• 37:14
  Speaker 1: at number six, and it sets up what is the
• 37:17
  Speaker 1: peak of Prince's commercial success. Purple Rain released in nineteen
• 37:20
  Speaker 1: eighty four, number one album twenty four consecutive weeks at
• 37:24
  Speaker 1: the top of Billboard, when Doves cry Let's Go Crazy
• 37:27
  Speaker 1: both number one, the title track number two I Would
• 37:31
  Speaker 1: Die for You number eight, twenty five million copies sold worldwide.
• 37:35
  Speaker 1: This does not, however, include guitarist Dez Dickerson. What happened
• 37:40
  Speaker 1: with Dez and who replaces him?
• 37:42
  Speaker 2: Well, the dead story is very very interesting. He says
• 37:46
  Speaker 2: he had a religious experience along the road in nineteen
• 37:49
  Speaker 2: eighty and he was extremely conflicted, not unlike a little
• 37:53
  Speaker 2: bit Gail Chapman, but he really was the one that
• 37:55
  Speaker 2: was conflicted about Prince's again conflation of rigil religious themes.
• 38:01
  Speaker 2: You know, he says the Lord's prayer in the middle
• 38:03
  Speaker 2: of controversy and sexual very very deep sexual themes in
• 38:09
  Speaker 2: some cases, in some songs, he kind of joins them together.
• 38:12
  Speaker 2: And you know, he wrote very very stark songs about
• 38:16
  Speaker 2: incests and sado masochism and you know, threesomes and homosexuality
• 38:21
  Speaker 2: and bisexuality. And he was very open, more open than
• 38:23
  Speaker 2: any of an artist of his time and maybe ever.
• 38:26
  Speaker 2: And so he was conflicted about that Dez. But also
• 38:29
  Speaker 2: Dez really wanted to be in that club rock band,
• 38:32
  Speaker 2: just like Simon. You know, he wanted to It was
• 38:37
  Speaker 2: getting a bit show busy for him. I think I
• 38:39
  Speaker 2: call one of the chapters show biz, and it was
• 38:41
  Speaker 2: just everything choreographed, big shows. Princes started to incorporate the
• 38:46
  Speaker 2: LM drum machine into the show. So poor Bobby Z
• 38:49
  Speaker 2: had to learn how to play drums, acoustic drums, with
• 38:51
  Speaker 2: the electronic drums, with all the backing tracks. It was
• 38:54
  Speaker 2: a lot for Dez, and I think he just started
• 38:59
  Speaker 2: to not show up to rehearsals or be a little petulant,
• 39:03
  Speaker 2: and Prince started to see that, and that doesn't fly
• 39:08
  Speaker 2: in Prince world. But because Dez was almost like an
• 39:11
  Speaker 2: older brother figure and really helped him. And I mentioned
• 39:13
  Speaker 2: earlier about that Rolling Stones show that they opened for
• 39:15
  Speaker 2: the first brown Mark show. We didn't get into that,
• 39:17
  Speaker 2: but it was such a disaster. They were booed and
• 39:19
  Speaker 2: they were throwing garbage at them, and Prince went home.
• 39:21
  Speaker 2: But it was Des Dickerson, not Mick Jagger, not the
• 39:24
  Speaker 2: you know, any of the people that ran the whole
• 39:27
  Speaker 2: thing could get Prince back on that stage, but Des
• 39:30
  Speaker 2: Dickerson did, so there was some kind of symbiosis between them.
• 39:33
  Speaker 2: And then in his memoir, Dez says, look, I just
• 39:37
  Speaker 2: had had it. He was drinking a lot, he missed
• 39:39
  Speaker 2: his girlfriend, whom he wanted to marry. He had this
• 39:42
  Speaker 2: religious experience and it just he couldn't square what was
• 39:45
  Speaker 2: going on with his lifestyle, and so he sort of
• 39:49
  Speaker 2: squeezed out. Well, he leaves on his own accord, and
• 39:51
  Speaker 2: Prince tries to help him in the music business, as
• 39:54
  Speaker 2: he did with Andre, but once again it's just like
• 39:59
  Speaker 2: this weird. That's why say I wrote it in a
• 40:00
  Speaker 2: novel style, because it's almost like a Greek arc. This
• 40:04
  Speaker 2: guy was, he always fell backwards into stuff. Here comes
• 40:07
  Speaker 2: Wendy Melvoyn, eighteen years old, wonderful, instinctive guitar player, another
• 40:12
  Speaker 2: daughter of a studio cat who played with Tom Waits
• 40:15
  Speaker 2: the Beach Boys, played on tons of stuff, who was
• 40:18
  Speaker 2: in the Wrecking Crew too fit. You can't make this
• 40:20
  Speaker 2: stuff up. And she's right there, and she's Lisa Coleman's lover.
• 40:25
  Speaker 2: The two of them grew up in La and now
• 40:27
  Speaker 2: they're together, they're partners, and she slips right in and
• 40:33
  Speaker 2: they love her. The band is completely revitalized by her presence.
• 40:37
  Speaker 2: The whole Dez Dickerson thing, which was kind of a
• 40:39
  Speaker 2: bummer because they loved Dez, but he was such a
• 40:41
  Speaker 2: dower figure towards the end that it just worked out famously,
• 40:44
  Speaker 2: And of course it's Wendy and Lisa from there on.
• 40:47
  Speaker 1: In I'd Love You talk about Prince carrying around a
• 40:51
  Speaker 1: purple notebook with movie ideas in it for months now,
• 40:57
  Speaker 1: you say the film's music. Prince leaned on the revel
• 41:00
  Speaker 1: more than ever before for the film's music. Talk about that.
• 41:04
  Speaker 2: Yeah, that's and that's funny. People always refute the Purple
• 41:06
  Speaker 2: Notebook story, but I won't let a good story. Oh yeah,
• 41:12
  Speaker 2: that's too good. But yeah, clearly, I mean they are
• 41:18
  Speaker 2: the stars just like him of the movie. He made
• 41:20
  Speaker 2: sure they were in there. As my good friend Rob Sheffield,
• 41:23
  Speaker 2: who wrote the forward to this, I love you Rob.
• 41:25
  Speaker 2: He pointed out in his forward he didn't have to
• 41:27
  Speaker 2: put those people in that movie. He didn't could have
• 41:30
  Speaker 2: been all about him, but he wanted it to be
• 41:31
  Speaker 2: about the band, and he wanted it to be about
• 41:33
  Speaker 2: the time that's in there, and even put Daz Dickerson
• 41:35
  Speaker 2: in there in his new band, The Modern Airs after
• 41:37
  Speaker 2: Dad's left. So it was an all inclusive sort of
• 41:40
  Speaker 2: family as the band band of the family. But as
• 41:42
  Speaker 2: far as making the music, yes, they played all that.
• 41:45
  Speaker 2: He wanted that stuff to be live, to sound like
• 41:47
  Speaker 2: a band. It had to do it to work in
• 41:49
  Speaker 2: the film, but also to work in his new persona
• 41:51
  Speaker 2: as a rock god. He went from sort of underground
• 41:55
  Speaker 2: sexual Marauda so that the person that runs on the
• 41:57
  Speaker 2: fringes expealists and explorer of sounds and styles right down
• 42:04
  Speaker 2: the middle to nineteen ninety nine Big Star on MTV.
• 42:08
  Speaker 2: And now he's going to his own film and control
• 42:10
  Speaker 2: all of the narrative. He's gonna tell his story, even
• 42:12
  Speaker 2: though eighty percent of it its total bull, but he's
• 42:15
  Speaker 2: gonna tell it in his way, make his myth, and
• 42:17
  Speaker 2: he's gonna include them. And in order to do this
• 42:20
  Speaker 2: and pull it off, you know, the first, the last,
• 42:21
  Speaker 2: I think read, the last forty minutes of that movie
• 42:24
  Speaker 2: is just music, and it's incredible, and people would cheer
• 42:28
  Speaker 2: in the theaters because it was like a concert, and
• 42:32
  Speaker 2: the band had to be great, and he had to
• 42:34
  Speaker 2: make those songs live. So they recorded Let's Go Crazy Live,
• 42:36
  Speaker 2: and as you mentioned earlier in a show in August,
• 42:39
  Speaker 2: on August third, nineteen eighty three, they recorded a live
• 42:42
  Speaker 2: show at First Avenue, I Would Die for You and
• 42:46
  Speaker 2: Maybe I'm a Star. So they recorded those two and
• 42:49
  Speaker 2: then they recorded as an encore that night the Purple
• 42:52
  Speaker 2: Rain that you hear on the record, and that only
• 42:55
  Speaker 2: works if they do it as a band, and it's
• 42:58
  Speaker 2: the first record that says the Revolution. And if you
• 43:00
  Speaker 2: ever see Purple Rain today, and I'm sure there's some
• 43:02
  Speaker 2: human beings somewhere breathing that has not seen this, but
• 43:06
  Speaker 2: if you haven't put it on before the lights go up,
• 43:10
  Speaker 2: when the Warner Brothers label fills the screen, you hear
• 43:14
  Speaker 2: the guys say, ladies and gentlemen, the Revolution, no printing
• 43:19
  Speaker 2: the Revolution. That's pretty damn cool.
• 43:22
  Speaker 1: Booked on rock Podcasts. Will be back after this.
• 43:26
  Speaker 2: So okay, I mean you know where we are. Tell
• 43:29
  Speaker 2: your brad.
• 43:32
  Speaker 1: Andre Swinson was on this podcast to talk about it
• 43:35
  Speaker 1: the books that she wrote the fortieth anniversary of Purple Rain,
• 43:39
  Speaker 1: and I believe she was the one who was talking
• 43:41
  Speaker 1: about at the end of that song because the song
• 43:44
  Speaker 1: was so new, the audience wasn't sure what to make
• 43:48
  Speaker 1: of it or how to respond, so they inserted Minnesota
• 43:50
  Speaker 1: Vikings crowd sounds at the end. So when you listen
• 43:57
  Speaker 1: to that's that's you're hearing an audience at a minnesot
• 44:00
  Speaker 1: Vikings game.
• 44:00
  Speaker 2: Part of it. It's funny too, because there there's something
• 44:05
  Speaker 2: about the end of that song and that record Purple Rain,
• 44:08
  Speaker 2: where you know, just hear Matt and Lisa just fluttering
• 44:13
  Speaker 2: making rains and you could just almost hear people just
• 44:17
  Speaker 2: kind of talking and leaving the building. It it's like
• 44:19
  Speaker 2: a weird sort of vibe to it. You know that
• 44:21
  Speaker 2: I love but yeah, and I love you Andrea. Thank
• 44:26
  Speaker 2: you for everything you did for me.
• 44:27
  Speaker 1: Oh he did.
• 44:28
  Speaker 2: He was a great, great help in this book.
• 44:30
  Speaker 1: Let's go crazy. Let's talk about this one because you
• 44:32
  Speaker 1: said it embodies the all in edict. Yes, does this
• 44:36
  Speaker 1: song exist without the Revolution's contributions?
• 44:39
  Speaker 2: Now? I don't think so. I really, I think I
• 44:42
  Speaker 2: try to make the point in this book. I'm sorry.
• 44:45
  Speaker 2: Except for really dirty mind. I think he recorded Prince
• 44:49
  Speaker 2: with the idea of having a band, so we had
• 44:51
  Speaker 2: a band in mind, and he says this great thing.
• 44:53
  Speaker 2: There's a quote I have from him when he was younger.
• 44:55
  Speaker 2: He said when he played each instrument, when he played
• 44:57
  Speaker 2: all the instruments, he played it as if he a
• 45:00
  Speaker 2: different guy. On bass. He was the drummer. So he
• 45:03
  Speaker 2: knew that this was his chance to be a drummer
• 45:05
  Speaker 2: and get a drum track down so he can impress,
• 45:08
  Speaker 2: you know, the singer songwriter. So he put himself in
• 45:10
  Speaker 2: that mindset. So when you listen to those songs, it
• 45:12
  Speaker 2: sounds like a band. Dirty Mind does sound like a
• 45:15
  Speaker 2: band too. When You Were Mine absolutely does Dirty Mine.
• 45:18
  Speaker 2: There's There's a Sister, which is a blistering punk song,
• 45:23
  Speaker 2: Head which is an incredible funk song. Those all sound
• 45:26
  Speaker 2: like a band, but it's it's clearly him, stark pure,
• 45:31
  Speaker 2: even when he gets into controversy in this Like I mentioned,
• 45:33
  Speaker 2: Des wrote the bassline to Controversy Dot dez Andre and
• 45:38
  Speaker 2: later on he had the band play on Jack You Off,
• 45:40
  Speaker 2: the last song on the record, So there are elements.
• 45:42
  Speaker 2: And I think a lot of songs like do Me
• 45:44
  Speaker 2: Baby were better live than on the record, and I
• 45:46
  Speaker 2: know that's sacrilege and I love his recording of that,
• 45:48
  Speaker 2: but they just killed that every time I think on
• 45:51
  Speaker 2: that tour in future tours. But definitely not anything on
• 45:55
  Speaker 2: Purple Rain, including Darley Nicky, which is all him. But
• 45:59
  Speaker 2: again that's a live, live sounding tune and they recorded
• 46:04
  Speaker 2: Computer Blue live, and they recorded a lot of that
• 46:07
  Speaker 2: stuff live as a band. But they inspired him. So
• 46:10
  Speaker 2: if they're not on the recordings, Brown Mark said he
• 46:12
  Speaker 2: needed human beings so we could hear the human feel
• 46:15
  Speaker 2: of it and then recreated in the studio and he
• 46:17
  Speaker 2: did that beautifully. But yeah, I think the central theme
• 46:21
  Speaker 2: to my book, Eric is that I don't think any
• 46:23
  Speaker 2: of this music during this period, save maybe most of
• 46:27
  Speaker 2: Dirty Mind, and that's most of but there's still some,
• 46:30
  Speaker 2: you know, Matt fink on there and Lisa Coleman's voice
• 46:33
  Speaker 2: could be made without these collaborators.
• 46:36
  Speaker 1: When doves Cry does not have a bassline, why did
• 46:39
  Speaker 1: you decide to leave it out? Because he did try
• 46:43
  Speaker 1: putting a bassline in, I think at first didn't like it.
• 46:46
  Speaker 2: Well, I just want to make this point. I was
• 46:48
  Speaker 2: not old enough to hear Sergeant Pepper's when it first
• 46:51
  Speaker 2: came out. I heard that fantastical, mythical, groundbreaking record. Ten
• 46:57
  Speaker 2: years later I listened to a midnight recording of it,
• 47:00
  Speaker 2: or on its twentieth anniversary in nineteen seventy seven. I
• 47:04
  Speaker 2: was a freshman in high school. But I tried to
• 47:07
  Speaker 2: put my mind in what it must have been like
• 47:09
  Speaker 2: to hear that as a kid in the sixties. And
• 47:12
  Speaker 2: then you go and look up with everything that was
• 47:14
  Speaker 2: going on at the time, and it's completely a different animal.
• 47:17
  Speaker 2: But I was alive when Dove's Cry, and let me
• 47:19
  Speaker 2: tell you, nothing sounded like this. Nothing. It was completely
• 47:26
  Speaker 2: an original thing, but it really It had what rock
• 47:29
  Speaker 2: getar at the beginning, classical piano at the end, sort
• 47:32
  Speaker 2: of sol motown trills on the piano. The backbeat was
• 47:38
  Speaker 2: very much in the style of soul and funk at
• 47:43
  Speaker 2: the time. So it wasn't completely you know, as I'm saying,
• 47:46
  Speaker 2: out of nowhere, but all those things messed together. How
• 47:50
  Speaker 2: he put that together is extremely original, and it's extremely biographical.
• 47:55
  Speaker 2: Talks about his relationship with his mother and his father
• 47:57
  Speaker 2: in there, which is exactly where it was when he
• 48:00
  Speaker 2: as a kid, and his fear of becoming like them,
• 48:04
  Speaker 2: which he had a lot of them in him, and
• 48:06
  Speaker 2: the fact that it had to be stark and almost
• 48:09
  Speaker 2: cold but right in your face. It had to hitch
• 48:11
  Speaker 2: it and it did. It hit all of us. It
• 48:13
  Speaker 2: was huge, biggest song of the year nineteen eighty four,
• 48:16
  Speaker 2: and the bassline for him, just warmed it up too much.
• 48:20
  Speaker 1: Yeah, and he had That's how brilliant he was as
• 48:23
  Speaker 1: an artist.
• 48:24
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 48:25
  Speaker 1: Just the thought that he that that put you know,
• 48:26
  Speaker 1: that crosses his mind because just this is unthinkable for
• 48:31
  Speaker 1: a dance song, a pop song to not have a bassline. Yeah,
• 48:35
  Speaker 1: So the guys in the Revolution must have been like,
• 48:38
  Speaker 1: what are you doing?
• 48:39
  Speaker 2: Well, everybody was everybody, buddy. The only person who's who
• 48:42
  Speaker 2: supported him was Magnoli, the guy who directed Purple Rain,
• 48:45
  Speaker 2: because when he put it under the montage, because that
• 48:49
  Speaker 2: wasn't in the record till the end, so Prince had
• 48:51
  Speaker 2: already moved on and was doing stuff around the world
• 48:53
  Speaker 2: in the day. That's why it's got such a sparse
• 48:54
  Speaker 2: and wild and wide sonic spectrum, because all the stuff
• 48:58
  Speaker 2: was already in the camp for Purple r But Magnoli
• 49:00
  Speaker 2: came back to him and said, hey, listen, Albert Magnoli.
• 49:03
  Speaker 2: He's like, I need I need this tune for this,
• 49:05
  Speaker 2: for this montage that has Prince regretting all these things
• 49:08
  Speaker 2: he's done in his life, so we could get redemption
• 49:10
  Speaker 2: and then go on and win the girl and and uh,
• 49:13
  Speaker 2: you know, impress the first Avenue crowd and all that stuff.
• 49:17
  Speaker 2: And so Prince went back and did this, which is incredible.
• 49:21
  Speaker 2: He did it on command, and he did it brilliantly,
• 49:23
  Speaker 2: and when Magnolia put it into the film, it worked.
• 49:27
  Speaker 2: He got Prince's idea. So management, band members, friends, family,
• 49:34
  Speaker 2: other music, nobody got it, and it didn't matter because
• 49:37
  Speaker 2: Prince just knew. And boy the hell did he ever know.
• 49:40
  Speaker 1: Booked on Rock podcast will be back after this?
• 49:43
  Speaker 2: All his life vital, He looked away to the future,
• 49:48
  Speaker 2: did the horizon never his mind on where he was.
• 49:55
  Speaker 1: Find the bookdown Rock website at bookedown rock dot com.
• 49:59
  Speaker 1: During all the back episodes of the show, the latest
• 50:02
  Speaker 1: episode in video and audio links to all of the
• 50:05
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• 50:07
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• 50:12
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• 50:15
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• 50:18
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• 50:21
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• 50:24
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• 50:28
  Speaker 1: The global success of that film and the album that
• 50:31
  Speaker 1: it put prints on a level of fame that few
• 50:33
  Speaker 1: have reached. You'd be talking Madonna, Michael Jackson level. You
• 50:37
  Speaker 1: could say Taylor Swift nowadays.
• 50:39
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 50:39
  Speaker 1: What affect did the pressures of that kind of fame
• 50:42
  Speaker 1: have on Prints and the family unit that was the
• 50:45
  Speaker 1: revolution after Purple Rain?
• 50:47
  Speaker 2: Yeah? Well, great question, Eric, and I know I'd write
• 50:51
  Speaker 2: quite a bit about this in the book. And thank
• 50:52
  Speaker 2: you for reading it obviously, but I should say one
• 50:56
  Speaker 2: thing and you'll get it. Only the and Elvis Presley.
• 51:03
  Speaker 2: I've ever had the number one song, to the number
• 51:05
  Speaker 2: one album and the number one movie in America at
• 51:09
  Speaker 2: the same time except for Prince Roger's nonsense. So already
• 51:14
  Speaker 2: that's biting off a lot more than you could chew.
• 51:16
  Speaker 2: And Prince wanted to be a star since he was
• 51:18
  Speaker 2: in middle school, and he planned it, and he massaged it,
• 51:21
  Speaker 2: and he erected it, he manipulated it, he did it
• 51:24
  Speaker 2: all and he brought his troops with him. The only
• 51:28
  Speaker 2: problem with that is that Prince is a restless and
• 51:31
  Speaker 2: I talk about it all the time, constant evolving being
• 51:36
  Speaker 2: in his spirit and his art and everything. He could
• 51:40
  Speaker 2: never stand stasis. And when you do a movie and
• 51:43
  Speaker 2: you do all those songs, Bobby Z said, those songs
• 51:45
  Speaker 2: are so perfected because he had the time. Up until then,
• 51:48
  Speaker 2: Prince put out a record every year, and he would
• 51:51
  Speaker 2: do so for the rest of his career, except for
• 51:54
  Speaker 2: nineteen eighty three because he was working on the movie
• 51:56
  Speaker 2: and the soundtrack to Purple Rain and all the videos
• 51:59
  Speaker 2: that came along with that. So he was already feeling
• 52:03
  Speaker 2: a lot of pressure, and it was a slow moving train.
• 52:07
  Speaker 2: You know. At first they put out uh when Doves Cry, Oh,
• 52:11
  Speaker 2: it's got no baseline. I don't know about this BAM
• 52:13
  Speaker 2: number one everywhere, huge, biggest single of the year. Here
• 52:17
  Speaker 2: comes the album. I don't know. He's a rock. He's
• 52:19
  Speaker 2: gonna lose some of his maybe his black audiences. A
• 52:21
  Speaker 2: BAM number one all over the place. Then the movie
• 52:24
  Speaker 2: comes out, Well, who the hell is this guy? Who
• 52:26
  Speaker 2: the hell is Prince? What right does this guy have
• 52:29
  Speaker 2: to put his name at the top of a BAM
• 52:31
  Speaker 2: number one movie in the country. So it's all coming
• 52:34
  Speaker 2: way even though he's built it up, it's way fast,
• 52:37
  Speaker 2: and it's it's making him feel like he has to
• 52:39
  Speaker 2: be the kid character. And I'm sorry, a whole generation
• 52:43
  Speaker 2: of people are gonna remember him from that film or
• 52:45
  Speaker 2: as that character, and that was his doing, but it
• 52:48
  Speaker 2: was too much for him. By the time he goes
• 52:50
  Speaker 2: on tour, he's already recorded almost the entire Around the
• 52:53
  Speaker 2: World in a Day album, which is the one after that,
• 52:56
  Speaker 2: and he's already recorded an album for the Time for Sheila.
• 52:59
  Speaker 2: He all all these characters around him, He's way ahead
• 53:03
  Speaker 2: of the thing. And now he's got to be this
• 53:05
  Speaker 2: character he was a year ago, and that is torture
• 53:08
  Speaker 2: for Prince, and it really showed throughout the entire tour.
• 53:12
  Speaker 2: At some point he just quit and he told the
• 53:14
  Speaker 2: band that's it. I'm going to look for the Latter,
• 53:17
  Speaker 2: which is a song that he wrote with his father
• 53:19
  Speaker 2: about heaven and everything that was recorded a couple of
• 53:22
  Speaker 2: days before with the revolution while they were on the road,
• 53:24
  Speaker 2: and when everybody asked them, what the hell does that mean,
• 53:27
  Speaker 2: he said, well, you know, sometimes it snows in April,
• 53:30
  Speaker 2: so he really didn't have any answer to this. But
• 53:32
  Speaker 2: the pressures just crushed him and no one could understand it,
• 53:38
  Speaker 2: and he started to isolate himself more and isolate himself
• 53:40
  Speaker 2: more and interact with the band less and not be
• 53:43
  Speaker 2: on the bus with them looking at tapes of the
• 53:45
  Speaker 2: concerts and not joking around. And because they was such
• 53:49
  Speaker 2: a coastlinent unit. And for a while, because Prince was
• 53:51
  Speaker 2: dating Wendy's sister Susannah, he kind of lived with Wendy
• 53:55
  Speaker 2: and Lisa there in their place and they'd get together
• 53:59
  Speaker 2: in this warehouse and it was like a club, you know.
• 54:01
  Speaker 2: They did everything together. They played sports together, and they
• 54:04
  Speaker 2: went to movies together, and now he was isolated and
• 54:08
  Speaker 2: he was a big star. We've seen this story a
• 54:10
  Speaker 2: million times. It's like the story of every biopic ever written,
• 54:13
  Speaker 2: but it's true in the case of Prince. But it
• 54:15
  Speaker 2: was because he was such a restless, creative soul. He
• 54:18
  Speaker 2: couldn't take just Purple Rain for two years. And he
• 54:22
  Speaker 2: had to do it. He had to get all those
• 54:24
  Speaker 2: singles to be in the top ten, to get all
• 54:26
  Speaker 2: of those human beings to come see that movie, to
• 54:28
  Speaker 2: get to be the biggest tour of nineteen eighty four
• 54:31
  Speaker 2: into eighty five. He had to do it, but he
• 54:34
  Speaker 2: hated it. He wanted to do something else.
• 54:37
  Speaker 1: Immediately he was asked to be part of We Are
• 54:39
  Speaker 1: the World. He said no. Why did he decline?
• 54:42
  Speaker 2: Well, I think that anybody asking Prince now, I remember
• 54:46
  Speaker 2: this was not well known information then, But in my research,
• 54:50
  Speaker 2: you're gonna ask a guy who's never been produced. When
• 54:53
  Speaker 2: he was eighteen years old, he was his own producer.
• 54:54
  Speaker 2: He's gonna work for Quincy Jones. And now I know
• 54:57
  Speaker 2: he loves Quincy Jones and Quincy Jones as a master,
• 54:59
  Speaker 2: but that's not gonna fly. He never sang in front
• 55:02
  Speaker 2: of anyone. How he always sang was microphone hanging above
• 55:06
  Speaker 2: the board. He would kick the engineer out, He'd kick
• 55:08
  Speaker 2: everybody out and record all his vocals by him side.
• 55:11
  Speaker 2: Never recorded a vocal after the age of seventeen with
• 55:15
  Speaker 2: anybody in the room.
• 55:17
  Speaker 1: That is amazing.
• 55:18
  Speaker 2: He's gonna sit with forty six people and sing a
• 55:20
  Speaker 2: song written by another person. That's never gonna happen. And
• 55:24
  Speaker 2: he's gonna sing a song by Michael Jackson and Lionel Richie.
• 55:26
  Speaker 2: He's never sung a song in front of anyone, and
• 55:28
  Speaker 2: since he's seventeen years old, and he's never sung another
• 55:31
  Speaker 2: song by another artist except for a case of You Live,
• 55:35
  Speaker 2: and only once by Joni Mitchell. So you're gonna put
• 55:38
  Speaker 2: Prince who's never done the three things you have to
• 55:41
  Speaker 2: do to be on weird with the world, sing in
• 55:42
  Speaker 2: public with other people, sing another person's song, and just
• 55:50
  Speaker 2: show up with all those people. It's completely against his psychology.
• 55:54
  Speaker 1: Now that backfired on him because people probably thought he
• 55:59
  Speaker 1: was looking down at it like this is not worth
• 56:02
  Speaker 1: my time, and that's not what it was. In fact,
• 56:04
  Speaker 1: he offered something to Quincy. He said, let me record
• 56:08
  Speaker 1: something here and I'll send it to you.
• 56:09
  Speaker 2: Yeah, like a guitar. He said, let me go to
• 56:11
  Speaker 2: the different studio. But that was what they were trying
• 56:13
  Speaker 2: to do camaraderie. Leave your ego at the door. Prince
• 56:17
  Speaker 2: had an ego that was embedded in his psychology. He
• 56:20
  Speaker 2: would he I am fully convinced he did not belong
• 56:24
  Speaker 2: in that room, despite the fact that two is of
• 56:26
  Speaker 2: his most The two paragons of his life when he
• 56:30
  Speaker 2: was younger, except for James Brown, was Ray Charles. His
• 56:33
  Speaker 2: first teacher music teacher worked for Ray Charles and told
• 56:36
  Speaker 2: him about Ray Charles and how he crossed over and
• 56:38
  Speaker 2: did country music and anything he wanted. He controlled his
• 56:41
  Speaker 2: own publishing, all the things Prince wanted to do, and
• 56:43
  Speaker 2: Stevie Wonder whoeverybody said he was the new one who
• 56:45
  Speaker 2: he played all the instruments on his record. They were there,
• 56:48
  Speaker 2: so you would think just to be in their presence,
• 56:50
  Speaker 2: but it just wasn't in him. Now. The thing that
• 56:53
  Speaker 2: made that worse was he sent she'll e there in
• 56:58
  Speaker 2: his stead, and they don't want Hill so y badly.
• 57:01
  Speaker 2: Then he lies and says he has the management, lies
• 57:04
  Speaker 2: and says say he's sick. And then after winning the
• 57:07
  Speaker 2: awards on the American Music Awards, he goes out partying
• 57:11
  Speaker 2: in public, and then when the paparazzi tries to take
• 57:13
  Speaker 2: pictures of him and his entourage, he sends his bodyguards
• 57:17
  Speaker 2: out to wrest the film from them, excuse me, and
• 57:20
  Speaker 2: they beat him up. Now, he didn't ask them to
• 57:22
  Speaker 2: beat him up, but that's what happened. It was in
• 57:23
  Speaker 2: all the papers. So not only does he show up
• 57:26
  Speaker 2: to the world he's out partying. It looks so bad
• 57:30
  Speaker 2: and he doesn't even tell it, doesn't even tell the
• 57:31
  Speaker 2: band or his management. Nobody knows. They find out at
• 57:34
  Speaker 2: three in the morning when they get phone calls from newspapers.
• 57:36
  Speaker 2: So it was such a huge deal, and he was
• 57:40
  Speaker 2: all the myths, all the stories that because Prince Gott
• 57:42
  Speaker 2: talking to the press in nineteen eighty, all the stories
• 57:46
  Speaker 2: started to come out. He's a freak, he's a jerk,
• 57:50
  Speaker 2: he's up his own ass. All that stuff came out
• 57:53
  Speaker 2: and it was hard to deny with anyone around, and
• 57:55
  Speaker 2: it was a terrible, terrible look. But he did. There's
• 57:59
  Speaker 2: a great postcri to this. He did write a song
• 58:03
  Speaker 2: and give it to the album We Are the World,
• 58:04
  Speaker 2: and performed a version of it on the day that
• 58:07
  Speaker 2: they had live aid in July of eighty five for
• 58:10
  Speaker 2: the Tears in your Eyes, which is a religious kind
• 58:12
  Speaker 2: of song, a connotation to to Jesus's feeding the loaves
• 58:18
  Speaker 2: and the fishes, feeding the multitudes. Of course, with the
• 58:21
  Speaker 2: feeding Africa, we should say for young people, we Are
• 58:24
  Speaker 2: the World was a song for African famine relief. So
• 58:27
  Speaker 2: here is Prince on at his own time in a
• 58:31
  Speaker 2: hot studio trailer outside of one of the venues he
• 58:36
  Speaker 2: played at two in the morning with Susan Rogers's engineer
• 58:39
  Speaker 2: putting this song together, as she said, with stale chips
• 58:43
  Speaker 2: and salami sandwiches and warm soda. When all those people
• 58:48
  Speaker 2: who sang and we Are the World got fully fifteen
• 58:50
  Speaker 2: thousand dollars cater and they all had limos, and they
• 58:53
  Speaker 2: were in a great A and M Studios being produced
• 58:55
  Speaker 2: by Quincy Jones. So that's a kind of a nice
• 58:57
  Speaker 2: little thing where Prince was like, you know, I'm going
• 58:59
  Speaker 2: to give this. I'll take this shit, but I'm gonna
• 59:01
  Speaker 2: give this song and let's move on. But it took
• 59:04
  Speaker 2: years for him to get over, for a lot of people,
• 59:07
  Speaker 2: including his fans, to get over that snub.
• 59:10
  Speaker 1: Booked on rock podcasts, We'll be back after this think
• 59:13
  Speaker 1: about the future. Hey, guys, thanks so much for checking
• 59:19
  Speaker 1: out the Booked on Rock podcast. If you've just found
• 59:22
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• 59:25
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• 59:27
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• 59:30
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• 59:33
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• 59:36
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• 59:45
  Speaker 1: the full episodes on video, along with video highlights from
• 59:48
  Speaker 1: episodes on the Booked on Rock YouTube channel. Find it
• 59:51
  Speaker 1: at Booked on Rock. Thanks again for listening. Now back
• 59:54
  Speaker 1: to the show. Two more albums featuring the Revolution, nineteen
• 59:58
  Speaker 1: eighty five's Around the World in a Day with two
• 1:00:01
  Speaker 1: of my absolute favorite print songs, Raspberry Beret and Pop Life.
• 1:00:05
  Speaker 1: I love those two songs. Then you have nineteen eighty
• 1:00:08
  Speaker 1: six's Parade with Kiss the Big Single, another great song.
• 1:00:11
  Speaker 1: How much did the overexposure of Purple Rain influence those
• 1:00:14
  Speaker 1: next two albums? I mean you touched upon it. He
• 1:00:17
  Speaker 1: was ready to move on. But it's drastically different around
• 1:00:20
  Speaker 1: the world in a day. I mean it's sonically different.
• 1:00:24
  Speaker 1: He's moved on with the different snare drum sounds. I mean,
• 1:00:27
  Speaker 1: everything just has a different vibe to it.
• 1:00:29
  Speaker 2: Absolutely, And he spoke to characters a lot of people
• 1:00:33
  Speaker 2: right right, it's very psychedelic, so a lot of people
• 1:00:37
  Speaker 2: started talking about it. It's his Sergeant Peppers blah blah blah.
• 1:00:39
  Speaker 2: But very much like Sergeant Peppers, where the Beatles became
• 1:00:42
  Speaker 2: so famous, they went inside themselves and created a new
• 1:00:44
  Speaker 2: band so they wouldn't have to be the same old
• 1:00:47
  Speaker 2: mop Tops. And that's kind of a Prince Dave with
• 1:00:48
  Speaker 2: around the world in the day. He tells stories of characters,
• 1:00:53
  Speaker 2: you know, all the mister McGhee and the farm and
• 1:00:56
  Speaker 2: pop life running through or you know the characters in
• 1:00:59
  Speaker 2: tam or the devil in God and arguing in Temptation,
• 1:01:04
  Speaker 2: and you know, the Preacher, and that he does a
• 1:01:07
  Speaker 2: great job of kind of kind of absorbing himself in
• 1:01:11
  Speaker 2: character writing. And with Parade, he just went completely weird.
• 1:01:15
  Speaker 2: That was a strange departure. A lot of jazz string arrangements,
• 1:01:21
  Speaker 2: deep funk, a lot of Wendy and Lisa's stuff in there.
• 1:01:24
  Speaker 2: Once again. I was there working at Record World in
• 1:01:26
  Speaker 2: nineteen eighty six when that record came out, and nothing
• 1:01:29
  Speaker 2: in the world sounded like this. This is right in
• 1:01:31
  Speaker 2: the middle of gated drums and big sounds and echoey guitars,
• 1:01:34
  Speaker 2: he comes up with the data sounding record You're Ever
• 1:01:36
  Speaker 2: Gonna Hear just absolutely sounds like he came from another planet.
• 1:01:40
  Speaker 2: So he was again constantly and will never stop even
• 1:01:43
  Speaker 2: after he disbands the Revolution, he will never stop experimenting
• 1:01:47
  Speaker 2: for the rest of his career.
• 1:01:48
  Speaker 1: Oh absolutely, yeah, never stop. The thing is, at that
• 1:01:51
  Speaker 1: time still MTV and radio was they were embracing anything
• 1:01:54
  Speaker 1: that he would give to them, and so he was
• 1:01:57
  Speaker 1: still getting the hit singles. Kiss was a big yeah,
• 1:02:00
  Speaker 1: number one yeah, number one single. You write quote. The
• 1:02:04
  Speaker 1: story of the Revolution ends as it began, with Prince's
• 1:02:07
  Speaker 1: default position, a constant state of evolving mixed with a
• 1:02:11
  Speaker 1: prince absolute when struck by a notion, there was no
• 1:02:14
  Speaker 1: reasoning with arguing against or stopping him. When does the
• 1:02:19
  Speaker 1: revolution era officially come to an end and what led
• 1:02:23
  Speaker 1: to Prince cutting ties with them? Matt Fink was the
• 1:02:26
  Speaker 1: last to leave.
• 1:02:27
  Speaker 2: That is correct. Matt stayed on for tours. Yeah, he yes,
• 1:02:31
  Speaker 2: brad Mark to stay, but he was very upset about
• 1:02:33
  Speaker 2: a lot of things, not the least of which is
• 1:02:35
  Speaker 2: is after Prince gave him the Kiss demo, which was
• 1:02:38
  Speaker 2: kind of like a country, did he he helped to
• 1:02:41
  Speaker 2: develop it into what it was. And Prince, you know, again,
• 1:02:43
  Speaker 2: just like other situations with Simone or Morris Day, maybe
• 1:02:47
  Speaker 2: promised him, according to him, that he would give him credit,
• 1:02:49
  Speaker 2: did not, So he was already rankled. I think at
• 1:02:52
  Speaker 2: that point he was just on retainer, so he was
• 1:02:54
  Speaker 2: or he was getting paid a salary. He wasn't in
• 1:02:56
  Speaker 2: the band quote unquote When and Lisa wanted more money,
• 1:03:01
  Speaker 2: he always said he would take care of them, and
• 1:03:03
  Speaker 2: he did to a certain extent, but they didn't really
• 1:03:05
  Speaker 2: have lives. They wanted to buy a house, They had
• 1:03:08
  Speaker 2: to live in an apartment or a hotel that was
• 1:03:09
  Speaker 2: right next to where he recorded in chan Hassan, where
• 1:03:12
  Speaker 2: he would eventually build Paisley Park Studios and where he
• 1:03:16
  Speaker 2: would live and where eventually he would die and everybody
• 1:03:21
  Speaker 2: which just overworked. I think he wanted to move in
• 1:03:24
  Speaker 2: another direction, because that's what he did. He was a
• 1:03:26
  Speaker 2: constant state of evolving as you read there, and the
• 1:03:31
  Speaker 2: dust up with Wendy and Lisa. I think because of
• 1:03:33
  Speaker 2: his trust issues since he was a kid with his
• 1:03:35
  Speaker 2: mom and his dad, because he loved them so much,
• 1:03:37
  Speaker 2: banned his family family as the band. He felt like
• 1:03:40
  Speaker 2: they should just take what he gave them and be
• 1:03:42
  Speaker 2: happy with it and be in love with him, and
• 1:03:43
  Speaker 2: they're all in love and blah blah blah. But they
• 1:03:46
  Speaker 2: were like, look, we need more money, we want our
• 1:03:48
  Speaker 2: own place, and that they not almost They quit before
• 1:03:53
  Speaker 2: the Hit and Run tour, which is the first time
• 1:03:55
  Speaker 2: I saw Prints in nineteen eighty six at the Garden
• 1:03:57
  Speaker 2: before they went to Europe and Japan. The two of
• 1:04:00
  Speaker 2: them quit. Not a lot of people know this, and
• 1:04:02
  Speaker 2: Bobby Z talked them back into it and they came back.
• 1:04:05
  Speaker 2: So Prince already saw cracks, and he already had an
• 1:04:08
  Speaker 2: idea where he wanted to go, but the way he
• 1:04:11
  Speaker 2: did it was so symbolic and so strange and dam
• 1:04:14
  Speaker 2: quite frankly, a little mean, where he just he's playing
• 1:04:17
  Speaker 2: the last show in Japan. He's playing the guitar solo
• 1:04:21
  Speaker 2: for Purple Rain, and he throws his guitar down and
• 1:04:24
  Speaker 2: the roadie comes out and grabs it, and he throws
• 1:04:27
  Speaker 2: it down again, and he gives them both a look,
• 1:04:31
  Speaker 2: and Lisa looked at Wendy and they both put their
• 1:04:33
  Speaker 2: finger across their throat and they said, that's it now. Lisa,
• 1:04:37
  Speaker 2: since she'd been with him and she was the sister
• 1:04:40
  Speaker 2: from nineteen eighty, would not even believe it until he
• 1:04:42
  Speaker 2: finally told them. But to his credit, he all he
• 1:04:44
  Speaker 2: went to visit each one of them, and he talked
• 1:04:47
  Speaker 2: to them and told him what he wanted to do.
• 1:04:48
  Speaker 2: He called Bobby his brother, and he could never have
• 1:04:51
  Speaker 2: done it without him, and he asked Matt Fink if
• 1:04:53
  Speaker 2: he wanted to stay, and Matt ended up staying, but
• 1:04:56
  Speaker 2: was still very upset that his family had left. But yeah,
• 1:05:00
  Speaker 2: that was the end of the revolution. It was announced
• 1:05:02
  Speaker 2: by Joni Mitchell a couple of months later publicly, and
• 1:05:05
  Speaker 2: we were all as fans, just shocked because you could
• 1:05:08
  Speaker 2: see the progression as each record became more and more
• 1:05:11
  Speaker 2: ensconced in that style. And then of course he released
• 1:05:15
  Speaker 2: The Side of the Times, which we all thought was
• 1:05:17
  Speaker 2: again a solitary entity. Oh, he's going back to those
• 1:05:19
  Speaker 2: old ways, and that was his opus. I think that's
• 1:05:22
  Speaker 2: his greatest record, and I think it's the greatest record
• 1:05:24
  Speaker 2: of the nineteen eighties, but probably seventy percent of those
• 1:05:28
  Speaker 2: songs were written with the help of Wendy and Lisa
• 1:05:30
  Speaker 2: and Brown Mark and Matt Think and they were on
• 1:05:32
  Speaker 2: a lot of those. He took them off because he
• 1:05:34
  Speaker 2: wanted to start fresh. And again, maybe a little mean spirited,
• 1:05:38
  Speaker 2: a little myopic, but yeah, that was the very, very
• 1:05:42
  Speaker 2: sad ending to a great era.
• 1:05:44
  Speaker 1: Well, I wasn't going to finish with one more question,
• 1:05:46
  Speaker 1: but I'm going to sneak in one more because I'm
• 1:05:48
  Speaker 1: really curious now after you said that, what do you
• 1:05:51
  Speaker 1: think of his music post revolution in the nineties the
• 1:05:55
  Speaker 1: two thousands didn't seem to get the tension that it
• 1:06:00
  Speaker 1: did back in the eighties.
• 1:06:01
  Speaker 2: Yeah, no, Eric, it was great. I was a huge fan.
• 1:06:04
  Speaker 2: I saw Prince play about a dozen times over the years.
• 1:06:07
  Speaker 2: Never missed him. Loved all those records for whatever they were.
• 1:06:10
  Speaker 2: You know, I wasn't a huge fan of Graffiti Bridge.
• 1:06:15
  Speaker 2: I thought the Batman thing was okay. At the time,
• 1:06:18
  Speaker 2: I was like, what is he doing? But then later
• 1:06:20
  Speaker 2: on that album actually grew on me. Absolutely adored Love Sexy.
• 1:06:23
  Speaker 2: That was one of the greatest tours I ever saw.
• 1:06:24
  Speaker 2: I did it in the round Chilean drums. Levy seesarm
• 1:06:28
  Speaker 2: based brilliant band. I saw his new tour, another brilliant band.
• 1:06:32
  Speaker 2: I love the Symbol album absolutely. I think Dimes and
• 1:06:37
  Speaker 2: Pearls has got to be in his top five of
• 1:06:39
  Speaker 2: all time.
• 1:06:40
  Speaker 1: Just about to say that, yeah, that's with the new
• 1:06:42
  Speaker 1: power generation. Really song Diamonds and Pearls is beautiful. Cream's
• 1:06:48
  Speaker 1: on there.
• 1:06:49
  Speaker 2: Yep, great album. So I love all that stuff. But
• 1:06:52
  Speaker 2: I concentrated on this for two reasons. When Prince died,
• 1:06:56
  Speaker 2: I was asked to do his eulogy. He died on
• 1:06:59
  Speaker 2: a Thursday. My deadline was Friday. So I just regurgitated
• 1:07:03
  Speaker 2: a couple of thousand words. And I noticed that most
• 1:07:05
  Speaker 2: of what I wrote about was my twenties in the
• 1:07:07
  Speaker 2: nineteen eighties, and not because Prince was very famous then,
• 1:07:11
  Speaker 2: or because I'm a white guy and he played a
• 1:07:12
  Speaker 2: lot of white cross silver music, which I think a
• 1:07:14
  Speaker 2: lot of fans who are African American or maybe may
• 1:07:17
  Speaker 2: feel that way. Please don't. I wrote about it because
• 1:07:21
  Speaker 2: in many ways, when Prince died, it was like when
• 1:07:22
  Speaker 2: John Lennon died. For people in the sixties, it's like
• 1:07:24
  Speaker 2: my youth died. I realized it right, then it's gone.
• 1:07:28
  Speaker 2: It was already gone. But now that he was gone,
• 1:07:31
  Speaker 2: and you would never play Purple Rain again, it really
• 1:07:33
  Speaker 2: hits home. And I find that, as you said, he
• 1:07:38
  Speaker 2: was the center of the universe. If he wasn't, he
• 1:07:42
  Speaker 2: was knocking on the outside and changing the paradigm of
• 1:07:44
  Speaker 2: pop music, race, gender styles. He was so important eric
• 1:07:50
  Speaker 2: to the music business, to the way we evolve as
• 1:07:53
  Speaker 2: a country and a culture, in politics, whether sexual, racial,
• 1:07:59
  Speaker 2: all that stuff. He was so important. He never was
• 1:08:02
  Speaker 2: that important. Again, he was still great, and again he
• 1:08:07
  Speaker 2: had a few missteps and he had the whole symbol thing.
• 1:08:09
  Speaker 2: And I support her the whole time I went to
• 1:08:11
  Speaker 2: go see him play.
• 1:08:12
  Speaker 1: Yeah, only think of that he was fighting for artists
• 1:08:17
  Speaker 1: as much as he was fighting for himself. Again, people
• 1:08:20
  Speaker 1: read that the wrong way. People read that as if
• 1:08:22
  Speaker 1: he was being arrogant and conceited. But he was basically saying, look,
• 1:08:25
  Speaker 1: artists are getting ripped off here.
• 1:08:27
  Speaker 2: Damn.
• 1:08:28
  Speaker 1: The slave written on his face was right, they were slaves, slaves.
• 1:08:33
  Speaker 2: It was a little much for some people because he's
• 1:08:35
  Speaker 2: a multimillionaire.
• 1:08:36
  Speaker 1: But that's him, yes, Prince, but controversial, he.
• 1:08:40
  Speaker 2: Said, right. He never does halfway measures but he always
• 1:08:43
  Speaker 2: said for them. I write about it in the book.
• 1:08:45
  Speaker 2: He always wanted to release as many albums as many.
• 1:08:47
  Speaker 2: That's why he had other bands like The Time and
• 1:08:48
  Speaker 2: The Family. We didn't get a general incredible because he
• 1:08:52
  Speaker 2: couldn't do it. They wouldn't let him. It's too much,
• 1:08:54
  Speaker 2: you're getting oversaturated. They would use those those music marketing terms.
• 1:08:57
  Speaker 2: But he didn't care. He wanted to create. I have
• 1:09:00
  Speaker 2: to keep going, evolving, moving, and you couldn't convince them otherwise.
• 1:09:03
  Speaker 2: So triple albums, double albums all over the place. So yeah,
• 1:09:06
  Speaker 2: he was still experimental. He was still raising eyebrows, he
• 1:09:10
  Speaker 2: was still tilting his head. It took him a while
• 1:09:11
  Speaker 2: to do embraced hip hop, and he finally did and
• 1:09:13
  Speaker 2: he did great things with it. But he will never
• 1:09:17
  Speaker 2: I mean, he was so and that's why let me
• 1:09:20
  Speaker 2: just finish with this, Eric, if I could, I wrote
• 1:09:22
  Speaker 2: this book for other generations. The older I get, the
• 1:09:25
  Speaker 2: younger people are you know. I do this tour in
• 1:09:28
  Speaker 2: the East Village for the punks, for these for the
• 1:09:30
  Speaker 2: Punk seventies tour period for these middle of these high
• 1:09:36
  Speaker 2: school kids that are in a private school called Pingre
• 1:09:39
  Speaker 2: here in New Jersey. Every spring, and I love it.
• 1:09:41
  Speaker 2: I love all the professors, I love the kids, but
• 1:09:44
  Speaker 2: I can't say the clash. I gotta show pictures. I
• 1:09:46
  Speaker 2: gotta explain who they are. I gotta explain who Blondie
• 1:09:49
  Speaker 2: is the Ramons. Never in a million years that I
• 1:09:50
  Speaker 2: ever think I'd have to do that, but of course
• 1:09:52
  Speaker 2: I do. I'm sixty two years old now, I'm gonna
• 1:09:54
  Speaker 2: be sixty three in a couple of days. There is
• 1:09:57
  Speaker 2: a lot of things have happened since then, and I try.
• 1:10:00
  Speaker 2: I keep up with it, writing for music, for magazines
• 1:10:01
  Speaker 2: and stuff like that, but people forget. I've asked twenty
• 1:10:05
  Speaker 2: somethings Prince, what do you know about him? Oh? Yeah,
• 1:10:07
  Speaker 2: he's a guy, has hit, he had songs, he was
• 1:10:09
  Speaker 2: in a movie. They have no idea. I hope this book.
• 1:10:14
  Speaker 2: I hope this book will show them how important and
• 1:10:16
  Speaker 2: how huge and how influential and paramount his career and
• 1:10:21
  Speaker 2: his music, and how important the revolution was to him.
• 1:10:25
  Speaker 1: Well, yeah, and I was going to finish by asking
• 1:10:27
  Speaker 1: you about that. Sometimes it snows in April segment there
• 1:10:30
  Speaker 1: the personal experience for you, all right, A good way
• 1:10:34
  Speaker 1: to sum up the memory of Prince in his time
• 1:10:36
  Speaker 1: with the Revolution. If you could just share that story
• 1:10:38
  Speaker 1: of your visit to Paisley Park.
• 1:10:40
  Speaker 2: Yeah, if you haven't been, you should go. And I
• 1:10:43
  Speaker 2: got to go with Andrea, whose name is in there
• 1:10:46
  Speaker 2: on the plaques, and she helped that. She went to
• 1:10:48
  Speaker 2: visit Prince when he was alive there several times, and
• 1:10:53
  Speaker 2: she was very pregnant at the time with her second child.
• 1:10:56
  Speaker 2: And everybody's doing great, but she was very emotional and
• 1:11:00
  Speaker 2: it made me emotional. And you go everywhere around in there,
• 1:11:03
  Speaker 2: and you go to a studio and they play you
• 1:11:06
  Speaker 2: snippets of print songs, and the sound system is so good,
• 1:11:09
  Speaker 2: and they're so clear because they're not like finished mixed versions.
• 1:11:13
  Speaker 2: You feel like you're in the room with them. And
• 1:11:15
  Speaker 2: they play a verse or two of sometimes the Snows
• 1:11:18
  Speaker 2: and April, which he recorded on the date in nineteen
• 1:11:21
  Speaker 2: eighty six, in which he will die in twenty sixteen,
• 1:11:26
  Speaker 2: thirty years later, which really hits you in the chin.
• 1:11:29
  Speaker 2: And to hear when he and Lisa joking around with
• 1:11:31
  Speaker 2: him before they start, and then they start doing this beautiful,
• 1:11:33
  Speaker 2: gorgeous song about death and about April, right the month
• 1:11:39
  Speaker 2: he died. In the very building in which he died
• 1:11:42
  Speaker 2: is a lot to take in and then standing next
• 1:11:45
  Speaker 2: to his friend who missed him very much. So it
• 1:11:49
  Speaker 2: was a very emotional period, a very emotional journey for me.
• 1:11:53
  Speaker 2: And I'm so glad I got this book out, and
• 1:11:56
  Speaker 2: I'm so glad I get to tell these stories and
• 1:11:58
  Speaker 2: talk to you, Eric, because nobody it takes me through
• 1:12:00
  Speaker 2: my timeline of my books better than you.
• 1:12:02
  Speaker 1: Honestly, I appreciate that.
• 1:12:04
  Speaker 2: Man. You take me through it, buddy, and it makes
• 1:12:07
  Speaker 2: me relive it. And I hope, of course, I hope
• 1:12:09
  Speaker 2: to sell books, but I just want people to realize
• 1:12:12
  Speaker 2: that when I write these things, it takes me two
• 1:12:14
  Speaker 2: years of my life and then a year for it
• 1:12:16
  Speaker 2: to come out with the publisher, between the covers, art
• 1:12:18
  Speaker 2: and buying rights for this and that it's the one
• 1:12:23
  Speaker 2: joy I get is that I could effusively tell the
• 1:12:27
  Speaker 2: stories of great artists that I love and maybe share
• 1:12:30
  Speaker 2: that with some people.
• 1:12:31
  Speaker 1: And this book is out there forever now, somebody could
• 1:12:33
  Speaker 1: be discovering this book ten years from now, twenty years
• 1:12:35
  Speaker 1: from now, thirty years from now. Yeah, So that's the thing.
• 1:12:39
  Speaker 1: Revolution prints the Bandy Era out now. Find it wherever
• 1:12:42
  Speaker 1: books are sold. Look for at your nearest bookstore. And
• 1:12:44
  Speaker 1: you can always find your nearest independent bookstore at bookdo
• 1:12:48
  Speaker 1: on rock dot com and people can reach out to
• 1:12:51
  Speaker 1: you James online where you are a social media monster
• 1:12:56
  Speaker 1: on Instagram mostly I think right, that's your yeah, go to.
• 1:12:59
  Speaker 2: I love it's a good Yeah at James Campion on Instagram,
• 1:13:02
  Speaker 2: at fear No Art on X. I just joined that
• 1:13:04
  Speaker 2: Blue something. This guy you on there, I gotta hit you.
• 1:13:07
  Speaker 1: I am, I got it. I have like five followers,
• 1:13:10
  Speaker 1: so I use the support. It's a slow building.
• 1:13:14
  Speaker 2: And then you could find me at James Bartolameo Campion
• 1:13:19
  Speaker 2: at Facebook and there's a Facebook page for Revolution Uh
• 1:13:22
  Speaker 2: and Jamescampion dot com where you can read all my
• 1:13:25
  Speaker 2: writings and the Prince eulogy if you'd like, if you
• 1:13:28
  Speaker 2: listen to the to This podcast, which everyone should, and
• 1:13:31
  Speaker 2: you could also order a book for me directly. I
• 1:13:33
  Speaker 2: will sign it to you and mail it out to you. Unfortunately, Eric,
• 1:13:36
  Speaker 2: I should announce. I used to offer free shipping, but
• 1:13:39
  Speaker 2: shipping costs and material costs like everything else, are through
• 1:13:42
  Speaker 2: the roof and I just can't. I mean, it's killing
• 1:13:45
  Speaker 2: me my bottom line for the books because I don't
• 1:13:47
  Speaker 2: get free books. I only get five comps. I buy
• 1:13:50
  Speaker 2: the books at at price and then hopefully I get
• 1:13:51
  Speaker 2: a couple of books out of it, but at least
• 1:13:53
  Speaker 2: I get to sign them for people. People ask me
• 1:13:55
  Speaker 2: to write little inscriptions in there for their birth This
• 1:13:58
  Speaker 2: has been a great one. A lot of people for
• 1:13:59
  Speaker 2: their birthday, our wives birthday for and they want me
• 1:14:02
  Speaker 2: to write all this stuff about song lyrics. It's just
• 1:14:04
  Speaker 2: a joy to do. Really.
• 1:14:05
  Speaker 1: I asked you myself. My nephew. My nephew texts me
• 1:14:10
  Speaker 1: and he says, Lisa, his wife, Lisa's Lisa's uh stepdad
• 1:14:14
  Speaker 1: is a big Beatles fan. And I was wondering if
• 1:14:15
  Speaker 1: you know any authors that that can maybe you know,
• 1:14:18
  Speaker 1: sign a book, a Beatles book. And you were the
• 1:14:20
  Speaker 1: first person I thought, and I said, I've got somebody.
• 1:14:24
  Speaker 1: I'll reach out so you maybe look real important. Because
• 1:14:27
  Speaker 1: he's like, oh man, this is so cool. Man. He
• 1:14:30
  Speaker 1: loved it. He loved it. That's the that's the book,
• 1:14:32
  Speaker 1: by the way, on Hey Jude, thank you.
• 1:14:35
  Speaker 2: It was a great it was a great honor. It's
• 1:14:36
  Speaker 2: always honored to sign people put inscriptions in there, especially
• 1:14:39
  Speaker 2: for friendly and friends, and and it's just again paying
• 1:14:43
  Speaker 2: the forward sharing. Uh, Miss Prince so much missed that era,
• 1:14:47
  Speaker 2: like we all miss our youth and the first time
• 1:14:49
  Speaker 2: we heard the songs, whether it's Prince songs or Beatles
• 1:14:51
  Speaker 2: songs or Van Allen songs or anything, you know, it's
• 1:14:54
  Speaker 2: it's a part of our DNA and we love to
• 1:14:56
  Speaker 2: share it. And that's what rock writers are, you know,
• 1:14:58
  Speaker 2: we always say it. We just music at heart. We're
• 1:15:01
  Speaker 2: music writers and we just want to get the next
• 1:15:04
  Speaker 2: UH mixtape out there and and invade your mind and
• 1:15:07
  Speaker 2: hopefully introduce you to some of new stuff.
• 1:15:09
  Speaker 1: You haven't got to keep that legacy alive. James Campion,
• 1:15:12
  Speaker 1: Thanks man as always a blast to have you on.
• 1:15:15
  Speaker 2: Eric, keep doing what you're doing. It's really great work.
• 1:15:18
  Speaker 2: Peace everybody.
• 1:15:26
  Speaker 1: That's it. It's in the books.