Gosh, I never really like much of the "protege" stuff. It just never measured up. But the Time were probably the best. Their ablums were fun and we listened to them alot. The rest were just lost in time, the work Prince did for them was great, but ultimately, they just didn't have his talent or staying power. Jill was ok. Vanity and Appolonia, not too dreadful either. Carmen Electra was one of the WORST EVER!! That woman should have never been let in a studio EVER!!!

bonnie184 said:

Haven't seen this discussion in a long time, thought I'd revive it. I listen to these albums just as much as Prince releases. As we all know his legacy and genius is the work done between 81-88. But what is rarely mentioned when discussed, is the work done for other artist in that same time frame. Some of the tracks are phenomenal, it's mind blowing how many quality songs he wrote during that time period. My favorites protégé tracks include Screams of Passion, Mutiny, High Fashion, Desire, Cool, Gigolos Get Lonely Too, 777-9311, Get it up, The Walk, Wild and Loose, Drive Me Wild, If a Girl Answers, Nasty Girl, Mia Bocca, Violet Blue, Baby, You're a Trip, Eight, Ten, Six, 'The Glamorous Life, A Love Bizarre, etc... The Top 2 are 5 star releases. 1. The Family 2. What Time Is It? 3. Jill Jones 4. Vanity 6 5. 8 6. The Time 7. Romance 1600 8. Apollonia 6 9. Ice Cream Castle 10.16 11 Glamorous Life 12.Time Waits For No One 13.Carmen Electra 14.The Voice To me what qualifies is an album that has Prince's input on more than 1/2 of it. So Pandemonium, May 19,1992 and Sheila E. self titled album are out.

1 thru 3...u r right on!

The others kinda run together for me, but The Time's self titled and Madhouse 8 round out my top 5.

bonnie184 said:

I listen to these albums just as much as Prince releases.

Same here, in fact more so. Most of favourite Prince stuff, and the music I still listen to the most are the related and produced artists. IMO, it's just as much a part of the Prince canon as releases under his own name.

This is basically my mantra, but I don't mind repeating myself: If you put it altogether chronologically, you see the evolution really clearly. Like he'd really stretch out a sound/idea as far as it could go on a protege album, or he'd try new stuff that you'd later see incorporated into his own releases.

The whole package thing he was going for, where he'd control not just the sound, but the attitude, dress, and public persona of the protege acts really appeals to me because I'm into that kind of thing with producers and teams 'creating' acts. I still 'what if' about Paisley Park being Prince's own little hit factory, with P, W&L and Jam/Lewis producing all kinds of satellite acts. The music on Paisley Park was still stellar, but he really could've done so much more with it and had real hits if the label had been managed better.

I agree with purpledoveuk too, Ingrid's album is really special because it's really different to anything else on PP, and I'd probably attributed that to Ingrid herself and Michael Koppleman rather than Prince, but still.

I don't consider Madhouse as a protege, but since you have them on your list i would place them at the top.

I listen to the associated artists music as much as regular Prince albums too. I recently did a whole series of "brief history" threads on my favourite associated artists/proteges.

The fact that some people seem to forget is how much of an input Prince actually had on a lot of these albums, in most cases he wrote and produced almost all of them as well as playing nearly all of the instruments.

Albums like The Family, the first 3 Sheila albums, Jill Jones, and even Apollonia 6 are imo quintessential Prince. I can fully respect and appreciate the work and songwriting in the other albums such as Mavis Staples, Chavez etc, but these do not hold me the same as what i like to call Prince's golden period of involvement with other acts.

Something like the Carmen Electra album is a fun thing to have, but imo after the Taja Sevelle album Prince's work with proteges/whatever lost some of it's spark. Much like his own albums.

I also agree with NouveauDance about being able to see/hear the evolution of Prince as a musician/songwriter in these albums. Something like The Family was an album that Prince tried new things with and would later go on to use in his own music.

For all the talk of re-masters blah blah, i think that it would be just as important to re-master these albums and make them available once more.

Moving to associated artists forum