Speaker 1: All right, Jason, So here's my idea. Two doors open
up and you're sitting in a steamy, hot bath and
then you like get out and you're naked and you're
crawling across the floor and you're looking at me in
this like seductive kind of way. Yes, okay, but why
are we doing this for a podcast? Who's anything about
a podcast that's the Windows Cry?
Speaker 2: What?
Speaker 3: Well?
Speaker 1: Okay, who said anything about Win Dove's Cry?
Speaker 4: Hello everybody, and welcome to the Surely you Can't Be
Serious Podcast with your.
Speaker 1: Co hosts James D. Graves and Jason's Halliwen. All right, everybody,
welcome back to the Shirley you Can't Be Serious podcast.
We are here for the Prince Sign of the Times
portion of our two part episode Sign of the Times
versus Joshua Tree by YouTube. I am pumped about this comparison.
Speaker 4: This is going to be major because these albums in
nineteen eighty seven are considered to be the best of
these iconic artists.
Speaker 1: Absolutely. Yeah, And that's it's really interesting because I am
a Prince fan, but I was not a Sign of
the Times fan, but Sign of the Times, even though
it wasn't as successful as Purple Rain. It's considered his
best piece by most reviewers, right, I know, right, and
I'm with you.
Speaker 4: For me, before we dove into this, Purple Rain was
my go to one of the best albums of the
nineteen eighties, absolutely top of the heap for me, I
knew the hits on this one, but for us to
take a deep dive and this has been a lot
of fun. I'm anxious to hear what you think. We've
got a lot of songs to cover. I hope you'll
stick around and join us on this journey. We're going
to talk about each song. We'll talk a little bit
about the history of Prince and his discography and what
was happening right before Sometimes came out.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and this is an iconic moment for me and
you because this is the first time we've been recording
in the same room, I know, since we did our
Coming to America Versus Trading Places episode. This is this
is a huge deal. I mean, COVID hit and all
of a sudden zoom was the way that we handle things,
I know, right, But because of my mess ups in
various areas, we're here in the same room recording together,
and I'm glad to be back together this. Yeah, I
didn't see it much better, much better way to do things. Okay,
So are we ready to jump in too? Sign of
the times? Let's do it man. Okay, So we got
we typically start with the history of the artist in
this portion. But Prince was a very shy kind of reserved,
was not out there given a story to a bunch
of people, and so there's not a whole lot out
there about him as a young man. Right.
Speaker 4: He was the son of a singer and a musician jazz,
both of them, right, both gifted musicians known really as
a child prodigy.
Speaker 1: His mom and dad were in a trio, a jazz
trio called the Prince Nelson Trio, Okay, because he was
named after his dad, But he didn't really Junia. He
didn't really like the name Prince, and so everybody who
went to school with him growing up called him Skipper
because he liked the name Skipper. And I'm listen, like
you had the choice between Prince and Skipper, really you
want Skipper? Okay? All right, Okay, So he grew up
in Minneapolis, yes, and he just loved he loved the town. Yeah.
But the other side effect of growing up in Minneapolis
as a young man of color is he didn't really
get a whole lot of exposure to music beyond what
was just on the basically one radio station they had
up there, which was a whole lot of rock as
opposed to motown and rhythm and blues and that kind
of thing. And he got those things from the record stores.
But he and the other guys who grew up with him,
who also became kind of well known musicians, they were
listening to led Zeppelin, they were listening to Jimmy Hendrix,
they were listening to all of the seventies rock bands
of the day, and so that had obviously a profound
influence on the way that he played.
Speaker 4: I know he's a big fan of the Beatles and
Joni Mitchell.
Speaker 1: He grew up playing music, just teaching himself how to
play various instruments, and unfortunately his dad left when he
was very young, like eight years old, and his mother remarried.
His stepdad took Prince to a James Brown concert and
it had this profound influence. Like he got to get
up on stage and then like as he walked backstage,
he saw all the dancing girls and the musicians and
how James Brown kind of controlled the musicians, and how
the dancing girls interacted with James Brown, and like he
was ten years old at the time, and this was
like a huge pivotal moment in his life. And he's like,
I can see my future. I know the two things
that I'm going to do. I'm going to run a
band and I'm going to have dancing girls. So he
started learning instruments and he started his first band, was
called Grand Central. Okay, No, I didn't know that. No, Okay. Anyway,
at some point they said, hey, you know you should
come to the studio. Would you like to come to
the studio and see how that goes. The Warner Brothers
guys came to listen to him and they're like, let's
sign him up. I heard that.
Speaker 4: They fall in love with his abilities. They want to
sign to a record deal. They bring in Prince and
they say, we think we've got a producer for your
first album.
Speaker 1: It's one of the guys in earth Wind and Fire,
Maurice White, Marris White.
Speaker 4: Yeah, which for a nineteen year old kid, who I
mean earth Wind and Fire?
Speaker 1: Are you kidding? Yeah? Sign up?
Speaker 4: And Prince says, no, thanks. I'm not going to turn
this over to anybody else. I'm gonna produce.
Speaker 1: Myself, right, And they're like, you're a nineteen year old kid.
He's like, yeah, I want to produce. And they saw
something in his eyes, and so they came in first day.
They're like, okay, I want to see what you can
do before we agree to let you produce the album. Right,
So he comes in, he sits at the board for
a second, then he goes in, lays down the guitar
track perfect, messes with the board, goes lays the drum
track down perfect, goes messes with the board, lays the
base down perfect, and they're like, okay, we can see
that you can handle this. And he's like no wait, yeah,
I really want to show you. And they're like, no,
you're good, you can do He's like, no wait, you're
gonna see what I can do, and then lays down
every instrument and before he could get to the voiceter's like, okay,
we get you're a genius. Will go now have fun
with your album.
Speaker 4: Okay, d So they get him in the studio he
is producing. His first album, called for You, comes out
in nineteen seventy eight. It's released on April seventh, nineteen
seventy eight, so he's still nineteen years old.
Speaker 1: So Prince's music from the beginning is about either sex
or God.
Speaker 4: Nineteen seventy nine comes along, he doesn't waste any time
back in the studio. Boom another album, nineteen seventy nine. Okay,
so nineteen seventy nine he comes out with an album
called Prince and a song that he made off that
I Want to Be Your Lover. It's kind of his
first well nine out of the gate, right, right, and
then how about this song? So he did that back then,
and then then Shaka Khan did that in nineteen eighty five. Right,
it's like a number one hit nineteen eighty five.
Speaker 1: So after his second album, he's got a stay back down,
I'm a little bit better. He goes to perform, and
then he gets an invitation in nineteen seventy nine to
go on to American bandstand Dick Clark for the first time.
And it's interesting to see his performance back then because
he's doing some kind of silly dancing. It was not
the coordinated pop and lock amazingness that he had. It
is a little goofy, but you know, you know, he's
on the American Bandstand, so he's already hit one level
of success, right, and then what were you doing at
twenty years old? Right? Yeah, yeah, I was quitting college.
That's so. Then Nick Clark comes to interview him after
his set, after his song, and he totally locks up,
like he's got total stage fright, and Dick Clark is like,
so I've heard you know, you play a lot of instruments.
How many you play? And it's like silence, awkward, long silence,
and like as he's about to answer, Dick Clark puts
the microphone back and he's like, we're be with you
in just a minute here, and he's like a thousands
and he just he freezes up. He just panicked because
suddenly he realized, oh my gosh, millions of people are
listening to what I'm about to say, and he's not
It's not this well boiled practice machine. It's I'm speaking
from the hip. And he wasn't ready for it. But
after that he said that will never happen again.
Speaker 4: Wow, he turned into Garth Algar. I like to play
nineteen eighty dirty mind comes out. I had a friend
of my church who carried this tape around with him
all the time, okay, and he got in trouble for
doing that, which you know at church, having Prince dirty mind.
Speaker 1: Okay, So I mean Prince had a lot of really
graphic poor no for the topic, right yeah. Lyrics, Yeah,
for sure, we want to talk about those lyrics or no,
I would go for it. No better know sorry, family friendly? Yeah,
family friends. So your friend had this tape and to
get in trouble for carrying it around all the.
Speaker 4: Time, Well it was, you know, it was on the
confiscate whenever you find it.
Speaker 1: List how many songs did Prince have on a filthy fifteen?
We once had sugar Walls, which Sheena Easton played. Yeah,
he had Darling Nikki from Purple Rain. Oh yeah, and
then what was the other one? He had three magazine?
Speaker 2: What?
Speaker 1: Sorry he had three?
Speaker 4: Yeah, I can't remember what the third one was when
we covered the fifty fifteen. Yeah, flashback to our ac
DC episode, right right, nineteen eighty one comes around. You've
got controversy. Let's just paint the picture a little bit.
Speaker 1: Okay. After the first or second album, he had come
to his band and said, you guys need to find
a character or personality. My character is going.
Speaker 4: To be sex Okay, quickly moving on past controversy. We
could do a podcast in each one of these. Yeah,
we're just grazing through these.
Speaker 1: So my first time, the first time that I saw
Prince was I can remember this. This is I've told
my first movie's story because it was in California. But
it was nineteen eighty three. Are on our we were
driving out to California, okay, and I can remember going
into the hotel room, turning on the TV and seeing
Prince and the Revolution singing nineteen ninety nine and thinking, Wow,
this is different. I've never seen anything like this before,
and it was shocking and amazing and I loved it.
At seven years old, I was like, wow, this is
pretty cool stuff.
Speaker 4: So nineteen ninety nine is where I jump on board.
Speaker 2: Yeah, nineteen ninety nine is such a great pop song,
but the subject matter made it the song of the millennium.
Speaker 1: He had to see that coming. I mean, you know,
I don't even know what to call it a millennium,
right right. I mean he's he's singing the song with
like seventeen years sixteen years before the year that he's
singing about, and it's about kind of this armageddon apocalypse
kind of idea. But he has to know this song
is going to and when nineteen ninety nine rolls around,
this song's gonna be big again. And it was, Oh
for sure, and it was. And the video for that song,
I mean, it's just to them on stage, but he
his dance moves have moved from mediocre to phenomena. Right,
also off of nineteen ninety and you have Little Red Corvette, Yeah,
which is another thing, huge song, huge and so American.
So I mean it's just yeah, that's great. I love it. Okay,
So we're blowing and going right now.
Speaker 4: Then he comes to Warner Brothers and says, I think
I want to be in a movie, right, right. I
want to write and star in a movie, and I
also want to write the soundtrack, right.
Speaker 1: And they're like, well, we like nineteen ninety nine and all,
but are you sure you're ready for the movies? Right?
Speaker 4: No, trust me, I've got this great story. It's kind
of semi auto biutographical, and let's do it. So that
movie is probably right now. Now there's two days.
Speaker 1: To talk about. There's the movie, yep, and then there's
the album, right And We're not here to talk about
either one of those today, right, but we can't avoid
it either. Oh, one hundred percent, yeah, no, it's it is.
Wait wait, wait before we talk about it.
Speaker 4: Go ahead, you really need to purify yourself when the
Waters of Lake mannitaka Okay, Purple Rain might be the
best album in the nineteen eighties.
Speaker 1: I mean it's arguing, it's arguable, it's in the story,
and it's it's in the lineup for sure. Yes, there's
no question about that. I mean, Prince was not a
megastar at this time. This this movie is the thing
that made him a mixed start. But somehow by the
time this movie comes out, By the time this movie
is released, and I you know, they had the album
come out first. That was brilliant on their part, obviously,
but by the time this movie comes out, it was
an event. I mean, you had superstars showing up for
the premiere of Purple Rain, but.
Speaker 4: You have the song when Doves Cry come out that summer, right,
turned out to be the song the biggest hit of
nineteen eighty four.
Speaker 1: I mean, we could go on and on.
Speaker 4: You've got Let's Go Crazy, You've got Purple Rain, You've
got I would die for you, darling, Nikki. I mean,
you've got all these wonderful, wonderful songs. So he's at
the absolute zenith of his popularity.
Speaker 1: This is one of the few times in history that
an artist has had a number one movie, a number
one album, and a number one song all at the
same time. The time that had happened before that was
A Hard Day's Night with the Beatles. All Right, Yeah,
that's a that's a pretty incredible accomplishment. What an amazing zummer.
Speaker 4: Right, Okay, So, coming off of this explosion in popularity
and personal achievement, you roll into nineteen eighty five and
you've got an album that comes out and it's called
Around the World in a Day.
Speaker 1: Right, more psychedelic. He's completely changed the way he's doing things.
The Purple Rain was a significant different, significantly different sound
than what had come before, except maybe nineteen ninety nine,
nineteen ninety nine, nineteen eighty four. There was a change
in the way that he had done stuff. His albums
from the seventies were much more funky. There was there
was a bit more of a disco feel, which made sense, right, sure,
I mean sure, but he really dove into the rock
scene with nineteen ninety nine and Purple Rain, and that
brought a whole new audience to his shows. Then when
he moves from Purple Rain into Around the World in
the Day, it's another different sound it is.
Speaker 4: It's definitely got a Beatles influence. You bring in the sitar,
You've got some Indian type of feels to it. You
do have two big hits off that album. You have
Raspberry Beret and a song called pop Life. So that
album comes out and it's a disappointment. Raspberry Bray big hit,
but after that, not a lot of sales and certainly
nothing compared to Purple Ray. Right, Okay, so that's eighty five.
Nineteen eighty six comes around. He says, I'm going to
do another movie, and this time I'm going to direct.
Speaker 1: Okay, now, then, for this.
Speaker 4: Podcast the rented and watched Under the Cherry.
Speaker 1: Moon, you made a significant sacrifice, and I honor you
in that sacrifice. Here's the thing.
Speaker 4: Let me just let me just talk about this for
just a second.
Speaker 1: Okay.
Speaker 4: It was an hour and forty minutes of beating Okay,
but here's what you got. You got Prints in his Prime,
You've got the bad guy from Beverly Hills, cop Rambo
and Octopusy we talked about.
Speaker 1: Him, Oh right, Stephen Burker, Stephen Burkoff, there we go.
Speaker 4: You've got Kristen Scott Thomas and her opening movie. She
looks gorgeous, okay, right, and then at different points in
the movie, whenever he sings and performs, he's spectacular. So
Under the Cherry Moon bombs critics kill it in Cherry
Bombs and.
Speaker 1: Cherry Bombs, and nobody went to see it.
Speaker 4: So the album that goes with Under the Cherry Moon
is called Parade. Yeah, there's a song on there that
I personally love. It's called Mountains, one of my favorite
print songs. But the song that everybody knows is kiss
right Pretty Woman.
Speaker 1: Julie Roberts sings it in.
Speaker 4: For Kids, very very famous number one hit. Actually when
the Grammy in nineteen eighty six for Best R and
B Song.
Speaker 1: Okay, okay, yep.
Speaker 4: But still Under the Jerry Moon bombs. Parade as an
album not well received.
Speaker 1: Right, and it's not like he's not doing good stuff.
Then it's just not he's not doing good stuff for himself.
Speaker 4: So he's got two we'll call it three disappointing events
that may make people wonder if Purple Rain is just
kind of a shooting star. Right now, keep in mind you,
I just want to point out nineteen seventy nine, eighty
eighty one, eighty two, eighty four, eighty five, eighty six.
He puts out an album almost every year. Yeah, and
just very very prolific artists.
Speaker 1: Right.
Speaker 4: So you get to nineteen eighty seven and you say
to yourself, well, maybe he's out of music.
Speaker 1: No, false, that is not true. That's not the problem.
Speaker 4: He has three albums that he wants to put out
in nineteen eighty seven, all at once.
Speaker 1: Right. So Jimmy Jam was a part of the Time,
which was one of Prince's side projects, and Jimmy Jam said,
just just speaking to his work ethic, he said he
would come and rehearse the Time for four hours or something,
you know, just making sure that they were flawless. Then
he would go rehearse with the Revolution himself, and then
he'd go and go to the recording studio by himself
and just write these amazing songs. And he'd show up
the next morning to work with the Time again and
he's like, oh, hey, listen to this, and they're like
when did you make this? He's like, oh, last night.
He's like, yeah, do you sleep man? Yeah? You just
your NonStop workaholics. So he just, like I said, Minneapolis,
you didn't have stuff to go do because it's cold,
so you just he holed up and made amazing music,
a lot of it, extremely prolific, a lot of it. Yeah.
Speaker 4: So there's three things we got to talk about as
we entered nineteen eighty seven.
Speaker 1: This to me was fascinating.
Speaker 4: There's an album called The Dream Factory that he had
been working on. Okay, and the Dream Factory is a
project that he had worked on with the Revolution YEP.
And it was just a as you went you collected
these odds and end songs and then he would collect
enough of them to have them on an album.
Speaker 1: This is the album that he was really he had
a lot more of Lisa and Wendy being a part
of the writing of the music that was going to
be in this album.
Speaker 4: Right at the same time he's collecting songs for the
Dream Factory, he's also collecting songs for an album called Camille,
And we talked briefly about this in our George Michael episode.
Camille is an album once again, he makes so many songs.
He sings so much that he had grown tired of
hearing his voice naturally, right, and so he would speed
it up. You'll notice on you got the look and
if I were your girlfriend, so that you have this
Camille album and then you have this triple album called
Crystal Ball.
Speaker 1: Right. He was dating and ultimately engaged to Susannah Melvoin,
who was the twin sister of Wendy Melvoyin, who was
his guitarist. Right, Yeah, Yeah, Wendy melvoy came on whenever
Dez left the band because Des had gotten very religious
and wasn't really cool with all of the sex stuff
that was going on in prints at the time. Right,
And so she's his guitarist. He ends up dating her sister.
They become close, they're living together, they're engaged to be married.
And so she's a part of building Paisley Park, which
is this compound that he has where he's not only
going to have his own recording studient, you, he's going
to have his own clothes making manufacturer. I mean he's
doing it where he got he has everything in one spot.
And so she, you know, she's in there like a
new wife. Like decorating the place and doing this stuff,
and she ends up painting this mural of this crystal
Ball on the wall, and that is what the inspiration
for album crystal Ball is.
Speaker 4: Okay, that's cool, that's cool. So he has dream Factory,
which he ultimately says uh nah, and Camille, which had
a cover image and a catalog number. It wasn't like
this is just a jink around project. There was a
press records. There were some pressed records of Camille. Then
he came up with this triple album called crystal Ball,
and he takes it into the record executives and he says, hey, guys,
here you go. This is my epic masterpiece, crystal Ball.
And they listened to it and they were uncomfortable with
the length and they weren't blown.
Speaker 1: Up right, And Princeton had free reign on what he
was doing, like he was given complete creative freedom in
all albums up until this point.
Speaker 4: And keep in mind this is after the failures of
Around the World in the Day and Parade, right, And
so the executives were like, this is we can't have
a triple album. We have to charge forty bucks for it, right,
Sales will be in the tank and we can't do this, and.
Speaker 1: They don't know how to tell him because they've given
him all this freedom. So they're like, Okay, we just
need to carefully break it to him. I don't want
him to know what we're going to say. Carefully break
it to him, all right, right, And so they call
and he won he won't to answer their phone call,
and then he has somebody call them back. It's that
they're waiting on the phone, and as soon as he
picks up the phone, he says, so here, you don't
like my album, right, right?
Speaker 4: And the guy tries to backtrack and he's like, well,
that's that's not really the case, and right, I believe him.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so that he didn't like the album. It's just
too long, too much, too.
Speaker 4: Much, and so he said, we got to cut it back.
Record executive said to himself, well, appease him. We'll make
it a double, right, not a treble, a double right.
Speaker 1: He doesn't know what Prince's reaction is at this point
other than he's mad. He's mad, And so in preparation
they're like, Okay, I guess maybe we should pick the
best two albums worth of songs and we'll bring it
to him, and they do that, and he calls and
Susan Rogers's engineer answers the phone and they're like, hey,
we need to talk to Prince and she says, well,
you can't talk to him right now. He's been up
all my editing the album down because you guys didn't
want all of these songs. So he had already starteds
like he's obviously mad, but he's just like, Oh, I'm
just gonna do it. It's going to beat him to
the bunch. Cut a third of my Baby, you know,
cut it off.
Speaker 4: So he takes Crystal Ball wills it down, yep, and
that becomes signing the Times.
Speaker 1: Yeah. The other thing of importance is while this stuff
is going on, there's a problem with the revolution.
Speaker 4: Yeah, we really need to backup and talk about that.
Speaker 1: He had been working on Factory with Wendy and Lisa,
and there were definitely songs that were coming about there,
but then the band started to have some concerns about
how much money they're getting paid. I mean, they are
a huge driving force behind what he's doing. And yes
he's the one with the work ethic, and yes he's
the one that's brought him to this point, and he's
the obvious genius and artists, but they're like, hey, there's
a lot more money coming in, but we're still making
the same amount of money that we were back in
nineteen eighty one, right, and so we you know, like
to talk to you about maybe, and that made him furious.
And so they are on their parade tour. You know,
they're getting some bad vibes from him initially, and then
for their last show, he destroys his cloud guitar on
stage and they're looking at each other and you know,
this is not like the who you know breaking their instruments.
They can tell he is pissed, and they turned to
each other and they're like, we're fired. Were fired, and
they were right, yep, they were fired.
Speaker 4: They still don't really understand what went wrong, but asking
for more money did not sit well, right, and it
just caused tension and he just wanted to change, yeah,
and they got the boot.
Speaker 1: When he talked to them, he was like, I need
to go places that you guys can't follow me on
and like, well, what are you talking about, and he's like, well,
crossless panties and nippoles, bross, Like what I mean, We've
we've reached the stage that we are artists. We don't
need to do that give me attention stuff anymore.
Speaker 4: Well, plus he had his other band projects, my of
them lost their singer, and so he brought in a
horns player, a couple of horns players, and so the
band was morphing into something different.
Speaker 1: So anyway, doctor Fink is the only member of the
Revolution that comes to be a part of the new band.
Speaker 4: The drama and the changing of parts and the evolution
of the band and the firing of the Revolution and
all these songs in a fight with the record company,
and you have all this drama and disruption and failure,
and it brings us to the doorstep.
Speaker 1: Of Sign of the Times. Let's talk about the album cover. Okay,
let's talk about the album. So the album cover is
shot by Jeff Katz, who's a famous photographer, especially for
musical artists. And he goes in and they've got this
stage kind of set up. You know, if you did
you watch Sign of the Times, the movie I did,
you are a trooper. Yes, I'm just I'm I'm honored
to be sitting in the same room with you watching
these movies that I like. I watched I didn't get
through the first song on the Times, and I like, okay,
I got other things to be doing. So anyway, they've
got this kind of weird stage set up and they've
done a bunch of shooting with Jeff Katz of all
these photos and Prince just they're wrapping it up and
they're leaving, and Prince says to Jeff like, wait, take
one more picture, and Jeff Katz is like, you know
you're not gonna being focused in right there, and Princess, yeah,
I know, he says, Okay, takes the picture, develops it
brings it to him. Prince is completely out of focus
and you've just got this mess of a stage behind him,
and he says, that's it. That's the album cover. Okay.
Before we dive into the album, I just got one
more Okay, one more thing to that which got so
this album, as we said, is significantly different, and it
has a whole lot more jazz elementation to it than
the other albums that he has, which is interesting because,
as we discussed before, both his mom and his biological
dad were jazz musicians, right right. Miles Davis ended up
on stage with Prince on the sign of the Times tour, right, yeah, yeah,
And so he's he's excited that he's got his parents
in the audience. But the other aspect of Prince's personality
is that he is this incredibly competitive guy. Right. We
know this Michael Jackson history. Like he's up there playing.
When Michael Jackson come to see his show, he'll go
and play the bass in his face. When Michael Jackson
would come to his house, he would beat the pants
off of him in ping pong and basketball.
Speaker 5: You know.
Speaker 1: It was just he's such a competitive guy and he
has to prove that he's the best. And so knowing
that Miles Davis is about to come on stage with him,
he's thinking, I'm gonna I'm gonna mess with him. I'm
gonna totally screw him up, right, I'm going to change,
I'm gonna give the band the queue that they're supposed
to change. I'm gonna change in the middle of see
if he's really still got it, because I mean he's
Miles Davis's been doing this for years and years, right, right.
And so they're up on stage. He's excited because his
parents are excited, but he's ready to establish that he's
the man and Miles Davis is just you know, we'll
see right, and so he's all, you know, middle of
the song, all of a sudden, he gives the band
the queue to change what they're doing, and the band
is so in awe of Miles Davis and just staring
at him that they completely miss print queue and it
doesn't work at all.
Speaker 6: But it is like what what you know, He's just
frustrated and angry on stage because they his trick didn't work,
and all the band is just you know, enamored of
Miles Davis, and so it's a failed attempt to establish
that he is the rock king.
Speaker 1: That's funny.
Speaker 4: Yeah, our buddy Pat Kannagalla would be very proud of
you in your jazz story.
Speaker 1: Are our friends of the thirty something movie podcast.
Speaker 4: When you get out done with this, go check them out.
Speaker 1: There are good friends over there. Yeah. Check out the
Misery episode. It is amazing and disturbing and wonderful all
at the same time. Are we ready? I think we're
ready to actually jump into the album at this time.
Let's do it, Okay, okay, all right. So the first
song on the album is Sign of the Times. Sign
of the Times.
Speaker 4: This song was released February eighteenth, nineteen eighty seven.
Speaker 1: This is the first single.
Speaker 4: It was a ridge only on Dream Factory. It reached
number three in the US Hot one hundred, but it
was number one on the R and B S.
Speaker 1: So Printz is at Sunset Sound in La and while he's.
Speaker 4: There with his fiancee, Susanna Melvoine, there's an earthquake. That
earthquake didn't sit well with him, and so he felt
like the world is in peril right now. This earthquake
really set him off, and so he went out and
got to copy the newspaper. And on the July thirteenth,
nineteen eighty six copy of the La Times, the headlines
were AIDS epidemic out of control, star Wars leads all
defense costs, New AIDS findings to alert the world at risk.
And then he got a copy of the Star Tribune
for the Minneapolis murder trial by a gang called the Disciples,
And so he took all of these things plus the Challenger.
Speaker 1: Explosion you were doing. I was in my class.
Speaker 4: I was in my math class and we watched it
live in school.
Speaker 1: Yeah, kids were watching it live. I had gone to
do something and I saw it through the window in
another class happened.
Speaker 4: Yeah, So he had all these events and kind of
swirl of problems in the world and he just got
to work on it on a Sunday and by Wednesday
he had completed the song, lyrics, music, everything.
Speaker 3: Fly.
Speaker 1: Yes. So, do you know what the name of the
song is based on.
Speaker 4: No.
Speaker 1: So he was a Seventh day Adventist and they have
a magazine that's called Sign of the Times, and so
he you know, he said he recorded this on a Sunday.
Susan Rogers said that that would be his most contemplated
like he recorded most of his songs on because it
was his most contemplative time. And obviously, I mean this
is the lyrics in this song are much more poignant
than most of his work up until this point.
Speaker 2: Right.
Speaker 1: It's not darling Nikki, right, No, it's it's talking about
the you know, the tragedies that are going on in
the world right now and some amazing tragedies too. And
the video it completely focuses on the lyrics. I mean
there's no prints in the video. Word, there's no band
in the video. It's all words going with scroll and
vice that you you have to focus on the words
Sammy Hagar would have been proud. That's right.
Speaker 4: So on the single you have a giant black heart
being held up by Kat Glover, who was his dancer, right, Okay.
Speaker 1: So Kat Glover, just since we're bringing her up for
the first time, kat Glover got her fame from Star
Search from a dancing routine that she did with somebody
named Patrick. It was called Cat and Pat. Everybody would
talk about how much Prince looked like Kat Glover, and
it's at some point she did. She did a few
of the album covers, but one of them she really
really looks like him. And she gets a call from
Prince's dad who says it was this cover. Yes, she says,
please tell me that you ever this album. She's like yeah.
That means like, oh, thank Gonnis, I thought my son
had completely lost his mind. The heart is covering her face.
Speaker 4: Yeah, And so it would be possible for Prince to
be dressed in drag behind his hiding the spaceband this art.
So this song really dives deep into issues of the day.
You have aids, you have gangs, you have drugs, you
have the Challenger explosion.
Speaker 1: What do you think of the song?
Speaker 4: You like it?
Speaker 1: So it's interesting musically, like this is it. I love
this song. It's a great song, but very stripped down
it is. I mean, this is very wind Dove's cry.
He was using one of the Fairlight synthesizers, which was
not unusual for the time. We talked about that with
def Leppard deaf Leppard. That was a big mutt laying thing,
was the Fairlight synthesizer. But what was unique about what
he was doing was he was using the stock sounds.
Musical artists are going to go adjust the delay and
the ambience and the reverb and getting the sound that
they exactly want, and he was just like, nope, I'm
just going to use the stock sounds that come out
of the synthesizers. That that makes it another layer of
the uniqueness. And then he does something in this song
and then it kind of you see more of it
in the other songs, and that is he's throwing off
the melody in the rhythm a little bit like when
he says, my cousin tried reefer for the first time.
Now he's smoking horse. It's June. The rhythm is off
like you expect the rhyme to hit and he says horse.
But then it's like delayed and he hits it's June,
which is not what other people were doing at the time.
They weren't throwing the rhythm of the melody off like that.
He's not rapping, no, he is sort of talk singing. Yeah,
it is interesting. It is stripped down, huge hit Spring
of eighty seven. Let's talk about the B side on
this one real quick, okay, sure. So the B side
is a song called La La La he he he.
I gotta say, I'm sorry. I like this song better
than probably ninety percent of Sign of the Times like this.
This song should have been on the album. This song
is fantastic. It's ridiculous and the dog barking kind of
rhythm that they have going on, but it's a fantastic song.
I can't believe it didn't make it on the album.
But I'm glad they put it on the B side.
We don't with Silotimes. Yeah, all right, let's move on.
Speaker 4: The next song is called Play in the Sunshine Time.
Speaker 1: Okay, so this song is not stripped down. This is
that full what you expect from Prince kind of song.
I like it a lot.
Speaker 4: Oh man, it's fun, it's joyful, it's playful. This song
reminds me of nineteen ninety nine, which is sort of
this idea of tonight, we're gonna have fun. It doesn't
matter what's going on in our lives. Tonight is for fun, right.
The piano in this sounds like a toy piano.
Speaker 1: You know I'm talking about this, right, so, and I
love at the beginning he's has that squeals. He says, oh, doggies. Yeah,
it's a good song. I like it. The intro has
this kind of, you know, ambient noise of if you
were sitting out at a park somewhere, the sounds that
she would be hearing. It's got kind of a Beatles'
White album style about that. But yeah, good sound. And
I like how he interacts with his band a little bit.
Speaker 4: There's some back and forth, he says drummer, and the
drummer's like some fun stuff that they do with the song.
Especially after the serious tone of Sign of the Times.
This is full on fun.
Speaker 1: Let's not get too serious, right, all right?
Speaker 4: So we both love playing the Sunshine. Let's move on
to the next song is called Housequake. Shut up already, damn.
Speaker 1: So we're back to strip down again, right, Yeah, this
kind of sounds like storm or something. Yeah, with the
rhythm that's going on. So what do you think? I
like it.
Speaker 4: I don't like it as much as Playing the Sunshine
and some of the Times, but it's good. It's it's funny.
You've got that sped up voice, that Camille voice.
Speaker 3: Right.
Speaker 4: It was originally intended to be on the Camille album.
It was on the Camille album, right that part of
the beginning with this shut up already. Damn it's kind
of funny, you know.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 4: This was recorded the day that he fired the revolution wow.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and had to be inspired by the earthquake that
he actually experienced, right, I think so? Yeah. Yeah. So
the music on this one it's simple and not complex.
I mean it's just weird to me because we know
that Prince is this incredible musician, but he's doing something
with basically like three instruments. It's not right. It's not
out there to wow yet.
Speaker 4: You know, this was considered to be the first single
released on side of the Times. Why that he liked it.
He wanted it out there, okay, but in my opinion,
not in the top half of this up.
Speaker 1: But I like it. This song was born out of
a jam session with the Bengals, Suzanna Hoff's Majors. Ye,
her movies terrible? All right, does anybody know about the quake?
Shut up already? Damn. Okay, you're done with that, all right.
Let's get to a song called the Ballad of Dorothy Parker. Okay,
so this one, the drum machine is obvious. Yes, that
drum machine is unmistakable. It is the whnn LM one
drum machine that has that totally eighties. This is what
we're listening to in the eighties. Did you like this song?
Speaker 4: No?
Speaker 5: Wow?
Speaker 1: Okay, so this is one. I mean, this is a
huge like everybody loves this song and you don't like it? No,
I don't. I don't like it either. I don't get it.
I mean it's he's doing something very, very different. I'll
say that, you know, and I told you whenever we
were talking about Michael Jackson that I was disappointed that
when Michael Jackson, after five years from Thriller, comes out
with Bad, which I just felt like was Thriller Part two,
and that prince you know, say what she will. He
completely changed the way he was doing stuff. I mean,
he's mixing funk he's mixing soul, he's mixing psychedelic and
pop and electro and rock, and he's got all of
these things going on. And I don't know what the
song mean. Sorry.
Speaker 2: No.
Speaker 4: In fact, I read enough and then listened to enough
that I felt a little browbeaten by people telling me
how great it was. Yeah, and I just I couldn't
get there.
Speaker 1: We're gonna get a lot of hate for saying that.
I'm sorry. I'm sorry to all the Prince fans out
there who love the song. You've got to be honest
about how we feel. This is just not my taste.
It's not me either.
Speaker 4: Yeah, but I got a couple of interesting things on this, Okay,
go all right. So despite the fact that neither one
of us enjoy the song. Dorothy Parker is a mid
twentieth century writer known for her wit.
Speaker 1: That's who Dorothy Parker is.
Speaker 4: Prince just chose a name that he thought sounded cool.
This was the first song recorded at Paisley Park. Okay,
So he and Susan Rodgers are working in the studio.
Speaker 1: He's anxious to get going.
Speaker 4: This is the time in his life when he could
couldn't go one day with that recording some type of
music and the sound system had set up at his
new house and he was wanting to test it out
and see how it went. And he asked the guy,
is it ready and the guy says, yeah, it sounds good.
Speaker 1: It's ready to go.
Speaker 4: And he's like, all right, great, and so he and
Susan Rodgers go through there this twenty four hour marathon
session where they're going to record and refine the ballot
to Dorothy Parker.
Speaker 1: Right.
Speaker 4: But the whole time she's listening, she's like, sounds crappy, right,
it sounds the recording board is a huge influence on
how the thing sounds.
Speaker 1: And they've got this brand new recording board in brand
new studio and she's like, this sounds like we're underwater. Yep.
Speaker 4: And she's like, I can hear it. I know he
can hear it. He's going to kill me and think
about working on it for twenty four hours straight. But
she did not have the freedom or didn't feel like
she could say, hey, hold on a second, we got
to call this off and do this tomorrow.
Speaker 1: No, she said, you do not interrupt prints. That's right.
If he's on a roll, you let him wrong. Yep.
Speaker 4: And so that's why the sound is a little bit
garbled in this song.
Speaker 1: I think she corrected most of it. But well, he
gives it. I mean, it gives it a unique sound,
which obviously that's what he's going for on this album.
By the way, you were talking about Dorothy Parker being
this famous writer, right, Yeah, you know he had no
idea who she was when like this. Eric Leads is
one of the guys from the family that he brought
in to play the saxophone and a lot of these
songs on this album, And so he hears it and
he's like, wow, I had no idea that he knew
who Dorothy Parker was. I'm super excited. And then he
tells him and Prince is like, I just like the name.
I don't know who that is. Oh, Lyrically, I don't know.
Have you looked at the lyrics of this song?
Speaker 4: He talks about taking a bath with this pants on?
Sure because he's dating somebody else. Yeah, sure, Dorothy, I'll
take a bath with you. I'm slowing my pants on.
One of his musicians, talking about this song said, I've
listened to this song now for thirty years, and I
still can't.
Speaker 1: Tell what genre of music that is. Yeah, it's not
our taste, not our tastes all right, we're not smart
enough for this song. It's our congratulations to everyone else.
Speaker 4: Who is I guess, yeah, okay, this is a spot
where you flip the record over to the side two of.
Speaker 1: Record one, right on side of the Times, Yes, and it.
Speaker 4: Starts off with a song called it.
Speaker 1: All right. So once again you get that obvious drum
machine going on here, and there are very few fills
in this song. And then once again you've got that obvious,
fair light standard sound on the keyboards and that's almost
all you've got. I mean, obviously him singing too, but
that's it for the song. And it's really repetitive. I
like this one, okay, I like this one. Korea a
mood and the repetition creates a mood. What do you
love about it? Well, it's just it's got a nice
beat to it. He's really leaning into his.
Speaker 4: Vocals here, and I know he likes it, you know
how I know he likes it. This song was on
two versions of Dream Factory on Crystal Ball and made
the final cut for SI of the Times. Curiously, he
likes to play with his lyrics a little bit.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 4: So in the lyrics to this song it is capitalized. Okay,
so I t every time it's mentioned. I want to
do it all night long.
Speaker 1: U What is it he wants to do?
Speaker 4: I don't know, all right, yep, okay, moving on the
next song, Starfish and Coffee.
Speaker 1: So I'm glad we have the bell at the beginning
of this. Let us know that other song is over.
Speaker 5: It was some botifil on a night Miss Kathleen was
Kevin losing food line?
Speaker 1: Was I really dig this song. It's just it's fun.
It's not typical of him at all, and it's fascinating
because it's based on a real person. It is as
tells the story of Cynthia Rose, who was actually a
schoolmate of Susannah Melvoye and would actually they would you
have for breakfast? This morning? Is morning Cynthia? And she
would say starfish and peepee. So Prince, you know, took
a little liberty with that because Peep doesn't is not
quite as marketable. Yes, but starfish and coffee, maple syrup
and jam, butterscotch clouds, a tangerine and a side order
of hands jamange. I mean it really sounds like something
that you would hear on Sesame Street.
Speaker 4: That you say that Becau because he actually did a
TV show called Muppets Tonight where the Muppets actually Rizzo
the rat comes to him, which we love the Muppets.
He says, what do you get the ideas for your songs, Prince?
And he's like, actually, they make a joke because he
can't pronounce his name. And he's like, oh, you can
get it from anywhere. I can get him from this
or that or this or that. And he's like, why
dont you tell me what's on the menu today? And
he writes a song based on what's on the menu
called Starfish and Coffee. So Cynthia Rose was a autistic
savant friend of Susannah and Wendy. Yeah, and they asked
her every day. She'd come in, you know what I
had for breakfast?
Speaker 1: Starfish and peepee.
Speaker 4: So and so one day Prince came and said, you know,
I've been thinking about the girl that you told me about.
Speaker 1: Write down.
Speaker 4: Everything was like, write it all down on a piece
of paper, and so Susannah would write, She'd write the
whole story down. Prince took that wrote the lyrics to
the song and actually gave Melbourne co.
Speaker 1: Writing credit on this song. Love this song.
Speaker 4: This was originally on Dream Factory. It makes me feel good. Listen,
that's great music is The music is cool.
Speaker 1: It's you've got this piano, you've got this backward guitar
bit coming in. But it's not overwhelming. It's just subtle
and kind of a nice little accent to the song.
The playful lyrics that you have. It's it's a beautifully
put together a little song. It just makes you happy. Okay.
Moving on to a song called slow Love. Oh my gosh, this.
I know this is great for some folks, but this
is not my I'm not into very white. I'm not
into the slow love making. No, I'm sorry. I know
other people love it, forgive me again. It's just not
my not my taste.
Speaker 4: There's some interesting things about this song that I want
to talk about. Yeah, but it's not my It's not
my thing either.
Speaker 1: Okay.
Speaker 4: This was originally on Dream Factory back in the day
when Prince Prince would split time between Minneapolis and LA
and he would get a hankering for a song and
a hankering a hankering. So he's out in LA and
He's like, I want to work on Slow Love today. Well,
the master is back in Minneapolis, and so he would
he would call and say, hey, I need I need
that ship to me. Well ups is like next day.
Well that's not that is not fast enough for him.
So he would have somebody drive it over the airport.
They'd put it on an airplane like the next flight,
so it would be there in an hour, right, and
sometimes you'd have barbecue from.
Speaker 1: When you get a hankering. When he got a hanker
in a hankering for barbecue, he'd have that son too,
that's great.
Speaker 4: So he had this master tape manually airshipped to him,
like in the next hour, so he could work.
Speaker 1: Wendy and Lisa worked.
Speaker 4: On this song with him again. This is before they
were fired. But he co wrote this song with a
named Carol R.
Speaker 1: Davis.
Speaker 4: Apparently she was a friend of Princes, but she is
a actress and singer. Rumor was that she would was
dating Prints at the time, but swears that they were just.
Speaker 1: Friends all right.
Speaker 4: Moving on, Moving on, That brings us to a song
called hot Thing.
Speaker 1: This song has that drum machine and that kind of
repetitive melody behind it. I still I like it better.
Speaker 5: Though.
Speaker 1: I like this song. It kind of is gives us
a taste of what's coming up on bad Dance. It's
got a very bad dance feel to me, you think, so,
oh yeah, for sure. See I would go to the opposite.
Speaker 4: I would say this song belongs on Dirty Mind or Controversy.
But hey, that's what it feels like to you, all right,
this is a striverer song, ho.
Speaker 1: I THINGK Streber song. Sure.
Speaker 4: This song reached number fourteen on the Hot R and
B chart, not a Hot one hundred, but the RB chart. Yeah,
so it's a good one. I don't love it, but
it's it's fun. So the next song is called Forever
in My Life.
Speaker 1: So this one I have to think that he wrote
for Susannah Melboyne. Right right, they were engaged, right, who's
supposed to I mean, they were already living like they
were married. He has made this decision to settle down
with just one woman, and so I think that he
wrote it for But what I love is that after
he says it makes me want to settle down. Maybe
it's true, I think I do. I mean, I don't
know if this has to be a firm decision or not.
But that's the way I'm leaning. I think it's funny.
Speaker 4: When he played this for Susanna the first time. Yeah,
He's like, I want to play this song for you.
It's called Forever in my Life.
Speaker 1: Yeah. She's like, who's it about. He's like, we're engaged.
That doesn't mean anything. Yeah, I know you, by the way,
just because we didn't mention this before. When he fired
her sister, she didn't stay engaged to him after that.
It's a little hard.
Speaker 4: Yeah, Thanksgiving would be tough, right, all right, take that
record off back in the sleeve, pull out record too.
Speaker 1: Before we jump in. Unlike many other albums that are
double albums, this album was not a two pocket album.
The records the final were in their own individual sleeves
inside of the one pocket. The sleeves though, had this
cool these cool photographs of Prince and I think, I
think awesome. Cat Lever was on the other one too.
So there's two records, two records in one in one sleep. Okay, now,
two records in one pocket, two sleeves, two slaves, just
as confusing.
Speaker 4: But yes, I'm all right, okay, right, this is where
I get excited. Okay, starting off record too, You got
the look.
Speaker 5: You here.
Speaker 1: I love the way that it starts off in this
kind of dreamy sound and then bam, it's in the
face with the drums. That is very cool, very cool. Okay.
This song was a number two hits.
Speaker 4: You Got That, peaking at number two the week of
October seventeenth, nineteen eighty seven, behind Lost in.
Speaker 1: Emotion by Lecay. Lisa called James, this is a duet?
Was she leasing? Right? And it's funny.
Speaker 4: When he called her, he said, hey, I'd love for
you to sing on this song I'm working on, right,
So he called her up.
Speaker 1: She came over.
Speaker 4: When she got there, she listened to it. She's like, well,
this song's basically done. So she didn't know it was
going to be a duet, so she just kind of
sang the whole thing. And when he listened to it,
she's kind of all over the place and took his
vocals and her vocals and constructed it into a duet.
Speaker 1: It was back and forth in the World.
Speaker 4: Series as well, Boy Versus Girl the World Series. Interestingly enough,
the Minnesota Twins won the World Series in nineteen eighty seven.
Speaker 1: Year nice, Thank you. Minnesota is important because that's where
Minneapolis is. Okay, she's not doing that geography thing and
a little trouble. Why I do it? Why is that good? Okay,
I get it.
Speaker 4: This is the third single released July fourteenth, nineteen eighty seven.
Speaker 1: Right, So she and Easton didn't know. I mean at
the time, before the song came out, she had no
idea she was a backup singer, which she was pretty
big at the moment, right, she was doing well, But
I was like, well, why would she come over if
she's only a backup singer? But then I remember we
talked about in the Motley Crue episode that Freakin Steven
Tyler and Brian Adams were singing backup on the Motley
Crue songs. I guess yeah, all kinds of people with
all kinds of fame don't mind coming to sing backups sometimes.
Speaker 4: Okay, I've got an interesting story about this song. Okay, Okay,
this is gonna blow your mind.
Speaker 1: Okay.
Speaker 4: So Prince had this female friend that loved particular radio
songs that were pop friendly. She could not get enough
of this one particular song, I'm gonna play for you
here in just a second. Okay, And so Prince was
certain that she just liked him because she was familiar
with him, not because she really recognized or understood what
it takes to make a good pop song.
Speaker 1: And so when he set out to write You Got
to Look, he wanted to write.
Speaker 4: The most radio friendly, most ear candy song to try
and test this theory on her. But this is the
song that she liked at the time. So she loved
the song Addicted to Love by Robert Pauler, right, and
she could not help herself, but she would dance every
time that song came on. And he's like, you don't
know what a good pop song is.
Speaker 1: In the world. So and so You.
Speaker 4: Got the Look is based on Addicted to Love.
Speaker 1: Can we talk about the video? Yeah, so dreamy beginning
makes sense because he's fallen asleep sitting in front of
his makeup mirror, right, and he dreams the video basically, right,
And when the video starts, you've got Sheena Easton in
this outfit that looks like what Prince would be wearing.
Speaker 5: Right.
Speaker 1: She's got the shoulder pointy shoulder pads, she's got the
ruffled collar, and she's got her hair styled to the
side just like he did. So it's just very you're
kind of confused about what's going on, and he's where
a freaking fur coat right, singing like Emil. It's this
very confusing, lust filled song. But I think they shot
the video over two days, and so there's this weird
if you go back and watch the video. I don't
know if you noticed this, but there's this weird part
where they're singing back and forth. If you're looking at him,
like and it's a two shot and you're looking at
her back. She's in that prince outfit with the shoulder pads,
but then when it shoots to her, she's in like
a bra top I mean in June and a ponytail,
and you've got the cleavage and you're like, oh.
Speaker 4: Hello, Yeah, I didn't notice that this was shot over
two days in Paris during the Sin of the Times tour.
This one MTV Best Male Video was the thirty eighth
biggest hit of nineteen eighty seven. But this is the
interesting thing about this song. This track was recorded at
the time he was shrinking Crystal Ball, So this is
the only song on Sign of the Times that was
not on either Camille crystal Ball or Dream Factory. This
is how good he is. Oh, I've got all these songs.
Oh well, I've got another one.
Speaker 1: I'll just throw together this massive hit.
Speaker 4: Oh and it'll be a huge song for nineteen eighty seven,
she Easton and Prince. I mean he wrote Sugar Walls
for her. But on the Batman soundtrack there's a song
called Arms of Orion. Love it and it's a Prince
Sheena Easton do it right. If you haven't heard it,
go listen to it.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's well since you've been gone up in seven
see a joke. So this song in the video you
have she and Easton. Obviously you've got Sheila e doing
her kind of acrobatic percussive thing. She looking good. She
had and by the way, she was one of those
people that Prince wrote big hit songs for, like her
biggest hit was a song that he wrote life Right.
And you've got Kat Glover as well doing herd catscat
amazing dances. A couple of things on this.
Speaker 4: In the lyrics of this song, yeah, he talks about
coloring it peachin black. The Side of the Times tour
was only in Europe. The European audiences were very involved audiences,
and so he encouraged them to come to the concert
wearing either peach or black or both. Based on this song,
Susan Rogers, also his producer, said this song was birthed
out of one forty eight hour session.
Speaker 1: Holy two days, no sleep.
Speaker 4: Don't stop him when he's on a roll, all right?
Next song, If I was your girlfriend?
Speaker 3: Would you man Man?
Speaker 1: Hall of thing you forgot when I was Joel Man.
Speaker 4: This was the second single released May sixth, nineteen eighty seven.
Speaker 1: Originally on the Camille album.
Speaker 4: Only reached number sixty seven on the Hot one hundred
in the US, but this was a hit in the UK.
Speaker 1: Nineteen eighty seven. The UK is going to be a
little more accepting of a guy singing a song if
I was your girlfriend and a girl voice, right. This
is interesting because he puts himself in the shoes of
like Wendy and Lisa, like being a lover and a
friend of you know, like if I was your lover
and if I was your friend, would you come to
me if someone broke your heart even if it was me?
Which is an interesting thing, you know, that's not something
that other folks, I guess, tend to think about this song.
Speaker 4: If you've ever seen the movie strip tease with Demi
Moore and Bert Reynolds.
Speaker 1: It always comes back to the strip. Demi Moore does
a little dance to this song, a little dance, particularly
private dance for Bert Royland's character. He's so slimy and
that things moving on.
Speaker 4: To a song called Strange Relationship.
Speaker 1: This song I love Hey.
Speaker 4: This song was originally on Dream Factory, then it went
on Camille.
Speaker 1: He is using his Camille voice here.
Speaker 4: There's a lot of speculation about who this Strange Relationship
is about.
Speaker 1: I can't stand to see you happy? Yeah, I hate
to see you sad, babe, all you and I wa'ts
this strange relationship ship ship.
Speaker 4: Okay, So the original thought is that this was about
Susannah Melboyne okay, okay, or maybe about Wendy or Lisa.
But the truth is this song was created in nineteen
eighty three, Okay. This song is about Vanity.
Speaker 1: Love Oh Vanity six Vanity. Yeah. So Vanity was the
lead singer of Vanity six, and we discussed her in
our Montley Creu episode as well, because when she broke
up with Prince, she started dating Nicky six, the bass
player and foundation of Motley Crew. Yep. It's a good
bit in that episode about Prince sending her roses and
NICKI six seeing them. You should get check it out.
Speaker 4: He gave the song to Wendy and Lisa in nineteen
eighty three and told them to finish it once they
were fired, and they heard the version that was on
the album. Yeah, they were jealous and angry because he
had taken all of their stuff out of it and
morphed it into something different. This song, I love it.
It's one of my favorite songs in the whole album.
Speaker 1: It's still got the drum machine in there, which is
not my favorite. I mean it's not that I don't
like a drum machine in songs from time to time,
but I kind of wish, especially on this song, that
he would have had an actual drum drum set go.
It feels like a revolution song.
Speaker 4: I think it's interesting that it was about Vanity when
she heard the song, Yeah.
Speaker 1: She was not happy. Stories are wife are right?
Speaker 4: She is beautiful and crazy. Moving on to the fourth
single song called I Can Never Take the Place if
You're a Man.
Speaker 1: So now this song you have the real drum set right.
I mean, this is old school Prince to me. This
is not This is straight off of you know what
this is? This is like Manic Monday. That's what this
I mean. This song has a real similar vibe. Yeah,
yeah to Manic Monday. I can see that. Yeah, this
is very much mid eighties Prince as opposed to late
eighties Prince.
Speaker 4: This is my favorite song on the album. Yeah, it's
a it's a.
Speaker 1: Big hit in early eighty eight.
Speaker 4: This was on Dream Factory and then on Crystal Ball,
But this song was written and recorded in nineteen seventy nine.
Speaker 3: Fine, whoa that day?
Speaker 1: But I could never.
Speaker 3: Take Umlass.
Speaker 1: Back when he's just stern twenty first album. Yeah, and
I listened to that version of the song.
Speaker 4: Yeah, it's there, but it's not the pop masterpiece that
this one is.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's not the Polish version that this is. It's
I enjoy this song. I probably like Manic Monday a
little bit better than the song, but I still say
that this is a decent song. Oh my gosh, I
love this song. The guitar sol on this I adore.
He'll play a piece and then he'll mirror it, and
he'll play a piece and then he'll mirror it. Yeah,
and it's just it's just I love it. Yeah, it's
a doodling do that, Yes, yeah, yeah, fancy trick, fancy trick.
Speaker 4: Check this trick out, Check this trick out. Jordan Knight
has a cover of the song Guy from the New
Kids on the Block.
Speaker 1: The Google Dolls have a cover of this song. It's
pretty good.
Speaker 4: Love it, love it, love it my favorite song on
the whole album. All right, all right, take the needle off,
flip it over side four, right, and we start off
with a.
Speaker 1: Song called The Cross. Okay, I don't want to talk
too much of this, because this is my favorite song
on the album. This song is so moving, so powerful, Black.
Speaker 5: Day, stormy Night, No No, No, ho Panside, Don't Cry,
he is Coming, Don't Die with doun knowing the.
Speaker 1: Crowd builds in such an epic way. I mean, you're
literally you're starting with a single note playing on the guitar,
which moves into strumming, which moves into strumming with him singing.
And it's such a passionate song. And as it builds,
you have layer that gets added, and it comes in
by the time you get to the end that you
can tell that the tempo has increased in the song.
You've got a crunching guitar, You've got this big crescendo.
And as I'm sitting here and listen to this, you know,
I told you I didn't have this album. I listened
to this first time while we're getting ready for this,
and I'm just I'm in awe. I'm just blown away
at how good this song is. And I'm sitting there
thinking to myself, this is like seven seeing the Future, right,
And I'm thinking to myself, this is so good. This
is so much like that song that I love because
Seven's one of my favorite songs as well. And then
he ends the song and it's got that harmony, that
very specialized harmony that he starts off seven with, and
so it's just I would love to hear how have
this song end and how a transition into seven. I
have to think that he had to do that when
they did their live show, he had to have done
a version of the Cross followed by seven, because it
just fits too perfectly. Okay, Okay, I like it a
little bit. This is a great song.
Speaker 4: This is a great I saw a music writer talk
about the song and said that if churches would play
songs like this, they would have more people in the pues.
Speaker 3: Bday Coming night, No, He's coming.
Speaker 1: Susannah Melbourne.
Speaker 4: We talked about how this was a Sunday song all right,
so he was very contemplative on Sundays, and she said
when she heard this one for the first time, She's like, well,
he's feeling guilty about something, right.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that was that was his deal. He would feel
guilty about the second song, go Right to God song.
Speaker 4: Also, in regards to this song, depending on when you
hear him play, he either sings it as the Cross
or the Christ.
Speaker 1: Oh wow, kind of interesting. Yeah, that's impressive. This was
originally on in Factory. We both love this song absolutely.
Speaker 4: Yeah, all right, moving on to a song called It's
Gonna Be a Beautiful Night too.
Speaker 1: So this song has a very more stay in the
time feel about it. I can totally see them popping
and sliding along and doing their little dance as they
are playing this song. It's got jazz feel to it
and it's so oh, I love the song. This is
this is one where you just you would be excited
to be in the crowd because everybody would be having
fun as the.
Speaker 4: Song is going. Totally totally this was a live recording
in Paris, August twenty fifth, nineteen eighty six.
Speaker 1: I love that they do the o eio from a
Wizard of Oz. I saw some Oh. Oh, they got
a lot more horns in this song. Uh huh.
Speaker 4: Get a little bit of Eric Leans on that taxaphone.
Speaker 1: Yep, yep, thank you say whatever? That thing is that
thing with the lung hey, what a hey? So I
love this song a lot of fun.
Speaker 4: Yeah like it okay.
Speaker 1: Finally, the last song on the album, song called Door.
I think I know you're gonna think I hate this song,
but I actually kind of like a little bit. I
dig it a little bit more. I can't tell you
what is different about the slow love song, because they
both have that same kind of feel, but this one's
just a little bit more catchy to me. I don't
know what to say.
Speaker 4: It's got some soul to it, It's got it's very soulful,
for sure.
Speaker 1: But I like it a lot. I do okay this song.
Speaker 4: In two thousand and nine, Essence magazine listed this as
one of their twenty five best slow jams of all time.
In twenty ten, users of AOL Radio voted Adore the
number two best print song one of us.
Speaker 2: Two.
Speaker 1: Well, okay, that's going a bit far, I would say, ye,
who said that? Users of AOL radio? So well, like
three guys. I don't know who these guys were. First
of all, this isn't the second best song on his album.
Speaker 4: Actually, it's not the second best song sid the album.
Speaker 1: There's three songs. It's the third best. Oh my goodness,
it's good though. I like it. Yeah, and it's soulful.
It's not really my thing, but it's good man. I
like it all right. So that's the end of the album.
That's the LP. They released the album, and so we
talked about how the way things were supposed to go
was album to her album to her album tour? Right? Yes?
And so he toured this album afterwards. Yes, he never
toured in the US, never had any of us. It
was strictly pure and he did some specialized show like
he did some shows in Denmark. He felt like the
American audience didn't appreciate where he was going with his music,
and he was probably right right, whereas the European audience did.
So it was all all his tour was in Europe.
How are you the tour manager on this thing? And
Prince comes to you and says, hey, you know how
we were going to go tour all those states in
the United States. Erase that and put all the stuff
we've already done back in again because we're going to
do Europe some more. And that's right, right, I just
want to do Europe.
Speaker 4: Yeah, And then after that tour, Yeah, in nineteen eighty eight,
he releases Love Sexy Moon right on to the next thing, yep,
nineteen eighty eight Love Sexy, and then of course in
eighty nine we get the Batman soundtrack.
Speaker 1: Right. So, my neighbor Gudye, he was in France at
this time, right, huh. He saw the show, He got
to see the Sign of the Times show, and he
loves Prince loves this album. We sat it was one
of my listeners on this as we sat and listened
to this song, and then of course we sat and
listened to Joshua Tree after that, and he was like,
oh my gosh, this is so hard. I don't know
how to decide which of these is better. But I
just wanted to say, what a typical set list, just
so you can kind of paint the picture in your head.
Typical set list for the Sign of the Times tour.
They would start the show Sign of the Times, which
is completely appropriate, great beginning song, Yep. Then they would
play play in the Sunshine, Yes, Little Red Corvette House, Quake,
Girls and Boys. Then they play slow Up, Bring it Down,
Slow Love. Then they do it I Could Never take
the place of your Man. Then they would do hot Thing,
Now's the Time, which just as a drum solo, which
is a Charlie Parker song. Okay, they would do you
Got the Look, then they do if I was your girlfriend,
Let's go Crazy when Doves Cry, and they would in
the middle of that song play the la la la
he he heat thing that would play before Purple Rain
in nineteen ninety nine. Pretty good concert, man, man, I
would have loved. I mean, if only I was in
Europe at the time, that would have been amazing. They're
encore for Encore number one Forever in my life, Kiss
the Cross, dude. I'd be losing my mind at that show.
And on Core two It's going to be a beautiful night.
What a great way to finish out a fantastic set.
What a great show that would have been to see.
Speaker 4: Well, that brings us to the end, Sign of the times.
Speaker 1: If you were still with us, that means that you
loved what we have to say, and I would like
to ask you. Will you please go to our Patreon
page Patreon dot com, Forward Slash Shirley Podcast all one word,
and you can become an executive producer of one of
our shows. You can also receive high quality Bluetooth waterproof headphones,
and if you keep going up tiers, you can receive
I'm drinking out of it right now there it is,
right there, I'm drinking out of my custom engraved sameless
steel cup. And finally, if you do top Tier, you
get to pick a show that we do. I mean,
that's pretty that's pretty good. Yeah yeah, yeah, but we
really do. We appreciate the support that you guys have
given us all year long. We're excited to be finishing strong,
excited for what next season holds, and we can't wait
to bring you guys part two of this comparison. We're
going to be back with YouTube Josh Tree another amazing,
amazing album from nineteen eighty seven.
Speaker 4: I think those two were released within like a month.
Speaker 1: Just a few weeks of each other. Yeah yeah, So anyway,
join us here next week.
Speaker 4: We'd love a five star review, Hit us up on
Twitter and Facebook, and we'll see you next time.