"Little Red Corvette" was his first crossover hit since the disco days of "I Wanna Be Your Lover". Other than that, Prince was mainly known on R&B radio only. The "Purple Rain" album had a rock feel to it but it was still the "Minneapolis Sound" that everyone knew him for.

If the "Purple Rain" album and movie had been successful in the R&B world, as usual, but had been a flop in the pop world, do you think Prince would have dared to release a "far out" sounding album like "Around The World In A Day" knowing that he only had his R&B audience to fall back on?

I really don't think so. I think it would have been business as usual with the album following "Purple Rain".

who's to say...i'm thinking that he woulda done atwiad regardless.

Had it not been the hit it was, after PR, Prince might have still tried to go after that big commercial hit, and the material on ATWIAD wouldn't have done that, so I think you have a point.

I don't think he would have.

He probably would have pulled out the material he talked about in interviews at the time as "1999 part two" and released that with a more (at the time) traditional "Prince" sound.

But that is just my guess.

My guess is that Prince wanted the big crossover commercial success just at least once in his career.

With "Purple Rain" as a flop, he probably would have released something else with commercial potential. Maybe without the rock elements. I'm not too sure about the "back to R'n'B" approach though. But he probably wouldn't have released ATWIAD, I think.

Great question. I think his mega success with PR afforded him the creative wiggle room to venture out without fear.

He never would have been strictly R&B, he never was from the very beginning. He had rock tracks on every single album. With his choices of television appearances in the early years such as "Saturday Night Live", "The Midnight Special", "American Bandstand", and "Solid Gold", along with opening for The Rolling Stones (which he got booed off the stage), it was obvious he wanted to reach the widest audience possible, he just wasn't accepted in the pop world yet.

What I meant by him having only his R&B fanbase to fall back on like before "Purple Rain" being the huge crossover success that it was, is that they would have been far less tolerable with an album like "Around The World In A Day" than the pop world, not to mention the large European audience with a much broader taste range that he picked up with "Purple Rain".

As NouveauDance said, I think he would have still been searching for that big pop hit which would have meant sticking to a type of music that fit in well with the mainstream at the time.
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[Edited 9/18/06 14:32pm]

I know he lost a lot of his black fan base with the release of ATWIAD, it was just too far out there for his funky fans. He made a slight comeback with SOTT with the release of Strange Relationship and Adore.

I don't think P would've released ATWIAD-if Purple Rain wasn't a success (or better yet didn't sell as much as the 1999 LP). I also believe if The Time would have stayed together and dropped a hot LP after Ice Cream Castle then ATWIAD as a LP would have never seen the light of day-just alot of interesting b-sides would've came about-lol. That's just my opinion though.

Several of the tracks for ATWIAD were actually recorded before Purple Rain even came out. It seems clear he already knew which direction his music was going in and the success of Purple Rain did not derail him from that. So yes, evidence suggests he would have released ATWIAD.

metalorange said:

interesting...

but I'd have to disagree with you about the direction of the music. Prince is so multi-talented to say he was headed in a particular direction would be undercutting his vast range of musical talents. Prince can make a 360 degree turn in his music on a single compliation..from alternative to gospel and everything in between.

P!

I don't think Prince decides what comes out of him at any given point. ATWIAD was the next album in cue in his soul. I don't think he was daring to do anything. Perhaps the success influenced which way ATWIAD would go sound wise, but ATWIAD was going to come out in some form.

FunkshaII said:

It's been said by associates (including Michael B on the Org) that Prince thinks and plans projects out well in advance. Of course he's capable of being spontaneous, and some projects just don't make it to fruition, but the general direction of some of his albums have been thought out well in advance.

Something else to think about....if Purple Rain would not have been so successful, Prince would not have carried as much weight with Warner Bros. and they may not have allowed ATWIAD to come out. At least how it is configured now.

I remember at the time (1985), there was a struggle between Prince and Warner Bros. as to the timing of the release (so soon after Purple Rain) and content of the album.

Prince ultimately won out because of the success of Purple Rain (the album, movie, and tour). They even gave him his own record company (Paisley Park).

Without that success, no record company and a lot less pull and a good chance no ATWIAD as we know it today.

I just want to add...that in the PR tour book, he was certainly planning for ATWIAD

Sowhat said:

Maybe not as we know it, but it would have come out. We may have then seen the more rock version of the title track instead of the one that ended up on the album. But I still believe that album and most of those songs would have been on it.

Recording and releasing are two different things. When being criticized by fans about "Around The World In A Day", Prince also said himself that year in "Rolling Stone" magazine that he had a follow-up album to "1999" and could have easily released that if he wanted to and it would have been a hit.

It looks to me that he had it planned out ahead of time for what to release if "Purple Rain" failed or succeeded. If it had failed, I can almost promise you that the follow up album to "1999" would have been released because he knew he had an audience for that type of music. If "Purple Rain" had failed in the pop world and he released "Around The World In A Day", a large portion of his R&B fanbase would have dropped him like a hotcake, many did even with the success of "Purple Rain". Also, Warner Brothers would never had allowed him to release an album like ATWIAD if they had lost a great deal of money on the movie "Purple Rain". ATWIAD would have cost them more money and Prince would have been committing career suicide.

Prince has never been dumb. Even with the success of "Purple Rain", he knew better than to release a lead single for "Around The World In A Day" to warn people of the new direction of the album. He knew ahead of time he was going to lose some fans but still wanted their money for the album.

vainandy said:

I can see all that...but what would he have released instead? Him saying he had a 1999 followup doesn't mean he had one recorded. What would the follow up to 1999 consist of? Meaning what track was HE thinking about when he said that? Maybe it was in his head...but we all know if it's in his head it comes out in music. So there would have to be some sort of recordings that would convince him that a 1999 follow up was in the works.

I still don't get why people think Around the World in a Day was this huge departure from Purple Rain. Because the cover was a 'psychedelic' painting!?

Do me a big favor and sit yourselves down:

Listen to Take Me With U. Now listen to Raspberry Beret.
Listen to Baby I'm a Star. Now listen to America.
Listen to Purple Rain. Now listen to The Ladder.


If you can't at least hear similarities, I don't know what your ears are telling you. It wasn't much of a departure from Purple Rain to begin with.

The thing with Prince at that time was that he was never afraid to experiment.
Raspberry Beret, Pop Life and America would have been enough to carry ATWIAD to the masses even if Purple Rain hadn't been the success it had been.

But there was no way Purple Rain would not have been a success. If it wasn't ATWIAD the question could have been asked about any follow up to Purple Rain.