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Music Monday: RIP Prince

by Scott Lydon


Today's Music Monday is going to be a little different than usual for two reasons. The first: It's Prince. Seriously. Almost 100% of modern music derives from the ideas he was originating and playing with. He touched rock, he touched soul, he touched dance, he touched everything. And he could even do it all himself, playing all the instruments one at a time. There's really never been a performer like him.


But the second reason this will be a strange Music Monday is that Prince didn't want his stuff to be online. For years his legal team would swoop in and remove his stuff from YouTube and other sites. That means I've got nothing of his to link to here today. SO instead, I'm going to go the other direction. I'm going to link some of his copycats, side projects, and such. Because good God, if anyone deserves a tribute, it's Prince.

94 East - Just Another Sucker

 

So Prince was born into a family that was absolutely soaked in music, which possibly helped him get started early on. This 94 East track was written by Prince, in 1977, and it's one of his earlier compositions. 94 East was formed by Prince's cousin's ex-husband. The band didn't really do much else, but you can hear the start of Prince's funky sound right here.

More to come.

The Time - Get It Up

 

In 1981, Prince was juuust starting to break. Songs like "Controversy" were actually getting lots of attention, but his sex-charged music was sort of hard to play on the radio. His response wasn't to change his style, but to make a side project in which he talked about the same topic in different ways. Rumor has it that on some live shows Prince would stand behind a curtain and ghost-play the music for the band, then go out and do his own set right after. The fact that most people accept this rumor as possibly plausible says volumes about the man himself.

Tevin Campbell - Round And Round

 

Of course, Tevin Campbell got his start in Graffiti Bridge, the sequel to Purple Rain, and like many people who worked with Prince, his career got a ton of attention. And then, like a lot of people who work with Prince, it never really went that high again. It's a shame, but it's kind of understandable. A person's Prince song was very often the best song they ever did.

Kate Bush feat. Prince - Why Should I Love You

 

Although I'm about to link to the originals, Prince has a lovely cover of Betcha By Golly Wow (and a superior version of What If God Was One Of Us) that illustrates how his genius wasn't limited to his own stuff. He even recently covered Bowie's Heroes (of course it's not up any more) in a very magical way. Prince was a harsh critic, so a polite nod to another songwriter was something very special. This Kate Bush cover is somehow so Princey and yet so very Kate Bush as well.

Prince (via the NFL) - Purple Rain

 

The only power strong enough to to keep a Prince song on the Internet is the NFL, so I'm linking to this 2007 halftime show as our final goodbye. If you don't know the glorious heap of of Prince magic that's out there (not even counting what's hidden in the vault) I encourage you to go find any random CD from this list and enjoy. There has not been and will not be another musician like Prince, and I say that as a person who still hasn't completely gotten over the death of David Bowie. God bless you and all your works, Prince Rogers Nelson. What are we going to do without you?

Let us just remind you: some images come from the corresponding Wikipedia page and are here under fair use. See you next week for the long-delayed goodbye to Dennis Davis, and then Gato Barbieri finally gets his Music Monday on the 9th. Unless Willie Nelson dies or something.