MD431Madcat said:

clearly you aren't a person that's well versed in what FUNK is.

Salford / Manchester/ the stone roses / the smiths/ james/ new order/10cc/ and the Chorlton era Bee Gee's -

***(before they went to america and got produced by others to sound like a Black DISCO group)?!?!

this is Funky to you? erm... ok!

since Northern england is so Funky..

please name one (1) successful Original FUNK or Funky group currently active there...

one that isn't playing cover songs in pubs, weddings and various other 'functions'.

Take your time...

ecnirp98 said:

Happy Mondays were pretty funky and from Salford, I managed bands in Manchester in the late 80's/early 90's and allot of good music came out of Salford/MaDchester in 80's & 90's, like Joy division/the Smiths/James/New Order/Inspirals/Stone Roses. Go back abit further you have the Bee Gee's & 10CC, full of funk.

Also, Aziz Ibrahim is speaking at the conference, he played in the Stone Roses, Fools gold is one of the funkiest tracks you will ever hear.

[Edited 5/14/17 20:13pm]

hehehe I said the Happy Mondays were pretty funky, they were, it was a groovy time with WFL & Step On etc, the other bands were more examples for great music, rather than The Funk !!

And Prince loved to play Manchester, whenever he played the UK he always came to Manchester, 2 of the best Prince Gigs I went to were at the Academy in 2014, awesome nights

Angelsoncrack said:

Seriously? This again? FWI to anyone that didn't see the other thread I created on this topic-

he clogged up the old thread shitting on Salford and Manchester.

He's a troll. Take no notice, just stay on topic and talk about the conference, guys.

For a place that doesn't 'do funk' (apparently), I can't find links to any other cities hosting a 3-day Prince conference...

Don't take this thread off topic, please folks.

This conference is going to be fantastic.

I would urge all orgers going to check out Sam Coley's talk, as it specifically focuses on online fandom

Dibblekins said:

Angelsoncrack said:

Seriously? This again? FWI to anyone that didn't see the other thread I created on this topic-

he clogged up the old thread shitting on Salford and Manchester.

He's a troll. Take no notice, just stay on topic and talk about the conference, guys.

For a place that doesn't 'do funk' (apparently), I can't find links to any other cities hosting a 3-day Prince conference...

FYI, it's a world-wide academic conference. The attendees will not necessarily be professional funk soldiers. In fact, most popular culturologists aren't entertainers (just like most political scientists are not politicians and most astronomers aren't stars).

i wonder how many people will actually pay 240 for people to regurgitate what we already know

[Edited 5/21/17 8:50am]

Dilan said:

i wonder how many people will actually pay 240 for people to regurgitate what we already know

[Edited 5/21/17 8:50am]

This comment is kinda level-headed.

Dilan said:

i wonder how many people will actually pay 240 for people to regurgitate what we already know

[Edited 5/21/17 8:50am]

You clearly don't understand how academia works. It's not about facts. It's about relating the importance of Prince's career, and different aspects of it, into different fields, contrasting and comparing with different cultures, movements and work.

For example, the talk:

Joni Todd (Independent Scholar, USA)

'I’ll Paint a Beard on the Mona Lisa Even Though It’s My Favorite Jaw': The revolutionary careers of Prince and Marcel Duchamp.

Named after the Duchamp-referencing lyric from "I'll Do Anything", which in itself will be an obscure reference to many - how many people have thought to make an educated comparison talk and the life and work about Prince and Duchamp? How many people there will be aware of Duchamp at all ? Not many, in all likelihood - therefore an interesting, original talk.

or how about this one?

John Narayan (University of Warwick, UK)

Prince and the Racial Revolution: Walking the line between the post-racial and blackness

Yes, many have an awareness that Prince at times in his career positioned himself as a post-racial man of Uptown, a world where color didn't matter, racial ambiguity was something he deliberately played on to avoid being pigeonholed (for example, deliberately casting a white woman as his mother in Purple Rain) - and at other times in his career, Prince was proudly, fiercely, unapologetically black in how he presented his image - for example, look what the rise of hip-hop did when you compare the racial mix of The Revolution compared with the original New Power Generation - you go from Wendy, Lisa and Bobby to Sonny, Michael, Tony, Levi, etc.

But who in academia has explored in an intelligent, analytical and studious method how Prince walked on both sides of this line at different points in his career? That sounds like an absolutely fascinating talk.

There are talks on gender, identity, poetry, sound construction, liberation, fandom, performance, Hollywood, technology - all by people who literally study these things as a lifelong career. People from institutions as esteemed as Harvard and Stanford. In short, some of the most educated and intelligent people in the world.

If your understanding of this event is of people standing up regurgitating things you already know, then you have managed to spectacularly miss the point.

Militant said:

Dilan said:

i wonder how many people will actually pay 240 for people to regurgitate what we already know

[Edited 5/21/17 8:50am]

You clearly don't understand how academia works. It's not about facts. It's about relating the importance of Prince's career, and different aspects of it, into different fields, contrasting and comparing with different cultures, movements and work.

For example, the talk:

Named after the Duchamp-referencing lyric from "I'll Do Anything", which in itself will be an obscure reference to many - how many people have thought to make an educated comparison talk and the life and work about Prince and Duchamp? How many people there will be aware of Duchamp at all ? Not many, in all likelihood - therefore an interesting, original talk.

or how about this one?

John Narayan (University of Warwick, UK)

Prince and the Racial Revolution: Walking the line between the post-racial and blackness

Yes, many have an awareness that Prince at times in his career positioned himself as a post-racial man of Uptown, a world where color didn't matter, racial ambiguity was something he deliberately played on to avoid being pigeonholed (for example, deliberately casting a white woman as his mother in Purple Rain) - and at other times in his career, Prince was proudly, fiercely, unapologetically black in how he presented his image - for example, look what the rise of hip-hop did when you compare the racial mix of The Revolution compared with the original New Power Generation - you go from Wendy, Lisa and Bobby to Sonny, Michael, Tony, Levi, etc.

But who in academia has explored in an intelligent, analytical and studious method how Prince walked on both sides of this line at different points in his career? That sounds like an absolutely fascinating talk.

There are talks on gender, identity, poetry, sound construction, liberation, fandom, performance, Hollywood, technology - all by people who literally study these things as a lifelong career. People from institutions as esteemed as Harvard and Stanford. In short, some of the most educated and intelligent people in the world.

If your understanding of this event is of people standing up regurgitating things you already know, then you have managed to spectacularly miss the point.

I do wonder who the event is aimed at though, its quite expensive and a 3 day midweek conference, so anyone who works, like myself, would struggle to attend.

I can't see many Prince fans attending, so I expect it will be more of a cultural discussion, rather than Prince specific, with a nod to his influences, the person who knows the answers to the makeup of his bands gender/race/influences etc cannot answer unfortunatley.

ecnirp98 said:

Militant said:

Yes, many have an awareness that Prince at times in his career positioned himself as a post-racial man of Uptown, a world where color didn't matter, racial ambiguity was something he deliberately played on to avoid being pigeonholed (for example, deliberately casting a white woman as his mother in Purple Rain) - and at other times in his career, Prince was proudly, fiercely, unapologetically black in how he presented his image - for example, look what the rise of hip-hop did when you compare the racial mix of The Revolution compared with the original New Power Generation - you go from Wendy, Lisa and Bobby to Sonny, Michael, Tony, Levi, etc.

But who in academia has explored in an intelligent, analytical and studious method how Prince walked on both sides of this line at different points in his career? That sounds like an absolutely fascinating talk.

There are talks on gender, identity, poetry, sound construction, liberation, fandom, performance, Hollywood, technology - all by people who literally study these things as a lifelong career. People from institutions as esteemed as Harvard and Stanford. In short, some of the most educated and intelligent people in the world.

If your understanding of this event is of people standing up regurgitating things you already know, then you have managed to spectacularly miss the point.

I do wonder who the event is aimed at though, its quite expensive and a 3 day midweek conference, so anyone who works, like myself, would struggle to attend.

I can't see many Prince fans attending, so I expect it will be more of a cultural discussion, rather than Prince specific, with a nod to his influences, the person who knows the answers to the makeup of his bands gender/race/influences etc cannot answer unfortunatley.

I guess it's aimed mostly at academics. I understand what you're saying - I took time off work so I can attend.

Salford University 64 Pages of Speaker extracts:

http://blogs.salford.ac.u...tracts.pdf

NOTED YOUR COMMENT On the other thread Militant

Militant said:

ecnirp98 said:

I do wonder who the event is aimed at though, its quite expensive and a 3 day midweek conference, so anyone who works, like myself, would struggle to attend.

I can't see many Prince fans attending, so I expect it will be more of a cultural discussion, rather than Prince specific, with a nod to his influences, the person who knows the answers to the makeup of his bands gender/race/influences etc cannot answer unfortunatley.

I guess it's aimed mostly at academics. I understand what you're saying - I took time off work so I can attend.

Im thrilled that Academics are talking about Prince and deeply contemplating his relevance

and Profound Cultural impact....

His work is being taken Seriously and deservedly so..

Malcom X and Martin Luther can rest in peace

~Prince has taken things to the next level

[Edited 5/21/17 20:14pm]

Militant said:

This is the main documentary.

I just listened to this Militant...

Fantastic work...Thank you

...Im of the Same opinion regarding PARADE

Timeless

how lucky we were to have shared the journey with this amazing genius. He will be studied & revered for years to come.

Lovejunky said:

Militant said:

I guess it's aimed mostly at academics. I understand what you're saying - I took time off work so I can attend.

Im thrilled that Academics are talking about Prince and deeply contemplating his relevance

and Profound Cultural impact....

His work is being taken Seriously and deservedly so..

Malcom X and Martin Luther can rest in peace

~Prince has taken things to the next level

[Edited 5/21/17 20:14pm]

I can't help thinking Prince would have a smirk on his face seeing a load of Academics debating his impact on culture/race/music/sexuality, I can imagine him walking in the conference having been to the wreka stow and just putting something funky on............

IM A TROLL THAT KNOWS MORE ABOUT MUSIC THAN YOU'LL EVER KNOW!

***BTW IM STILL WAITING TO HEAR ABOUT ONE FUNKY ARTIST DOING SOMETHING ORIGINAL IN MANCHESTER!

Angelsoncrack said:

Seriously? This again? FWI to anyone that didn't see the other thread I created on this topic-

he clogged up the old thread shitting on Salford and Manchester.

He's a troll. Take no notice, just stay on topic and talk about the conference, guys.

Prince played anywhere where there would be a pay cheque!

***

my heart is with the innocent people that lost thier lives at Manchester Arena.. it totally Sucks!!!

ecnirp98 said:

MD431Madcat said:

clearly you aren't a person that's well versed in what FUNK is.

Salford / Manchester/ the stone roses / the smiths/ james/ new order/10cc/ and the Chorlton era Bee Gee's -

***(before they went to america and got produced by others to sound like a Black DISCO group)?!?!

this is Funky to you? erm... ok!

since Northern england is so Funky..

please name one (1) successful Original FUNK or Funky group currently active there...

one that isn't playing cover songs in pubs, weddings and various other 'functions'.

Take your time...

[Edited 5/14/17 20:13pm]

hehehe I said the Happy Mondays were pretty funky, they were, it was a groovy time with WFL & Step On etc, the other bands were more examples for great music, rather than The Funk !!

And Prince loved to play Manchester, whenever he played the UK he always came to Manchester, 2 of the best Prince Gigs I went to were at the Academy in 2014, awesome nights

Will questlove be at the conference. he really knows his stuff when it comes to P?

MD431Madcat said:

clearly you aren't a person that's well versed in what FUNK is.

Salford / Manchester/ the stone roses / the smiths/ james/ new order/10cc/ and the Chorlton era Bee Gee's -

***(before they went to america and got produced by others to sound like a Black DISCO group)?!?!

this is Funky to you? erm... ok!

since Northern england is so Funky..

please name one (1) successful Original FUNK or Funky group currently active there...

one that isn't playing cover songs in pubs, weddings and various other 'functions'.

Take your time...

ecnirp98 said:

Happy Mondays were pretty funky and from Salford, I managed bands in Manchester in the late 80's/early 90's and allot of good music came out of Salford/MaDchester in 80's & 90's, like Joy division/the Smiths/James/New Order/Inspirals/Stone Roses. Go back abit further you have the Bee Gee's & 10CC, full of funk.

Also, Aziz Ibrahim is speaking at the conference, he played in the Stone Roses, Fools gold is one of the funkiest tracks you will ever hear.

[Edited 5/14/17 20:13pm]

Funk from England came in the form of a band known as Heatwave,Rod Temperton was in it,one very funky muso.Late 70s,80s.

About to leave to catch my train to the conference. I'll be dropping in with updates, also on the org Twitter account.

Dez talk is at 7pm tonight UK time.

I'll be interested in following updates from the conference...

Militant said:

Dilan said:

i wonder how many people will actually pay 240 for people to regurgitate what we already know

[Edited 5/21/17 8:50am]

You clearly don't understand how academia works. It's not about facts. It's about relating the importance of Prince's career, and different aspects of it, into different fields, contrasting and comparing with different cultures, movements and work.

For example, the talk:

Named after the Duchamp-referencing lyric from "I'll Do Anything", which in itself will be an obscure reference to many - how many people have thought to make an educated comparison talk and the life and work about Prince and Duchamp? How many people there will be aware of Duchamp at all ? Not many, in all likelihood - therefore an interesting, original talk.

or how about this one?

John Narayan (University of Warwick, UK)

Prince and the Racial Revolution: Walking the line between the post-racial and blackness

Yes, many have an awareness that Prince at times in his career positioned himself as a post-racial man of Uptown, a world where color didn't matter, racial ambiguity was something he deliberately played on to avoid being pigeonholed (for example, deliberately casting a white woman as his mother in Purple Rain) - and at other times in his career, Prince was proudly, fiercely, unapologetically black in how he presented his image - for example, look what the rise of hip-hop did when you compare the racial mix of The Revolution compared with the original New Power Generation - you go from Wendy, Lisa and Bobby to Sonny, Michael, Tony, Levi, etc.

But who in academia has explored in an intelligent, analytical and studious method how Prince walked on both sides of this line at different points in his career? That sounds like an absolutely fascinating talk.

There are talks on gender, identity, poetry, sound construction, liberation, fandom, performance, Hollywood, technology - all by people who literally study these things as a lifelong career. People from institutions as esteemed as Harvard and Stanford. In short, some of the most educated and intelligent people in the world.

If your understanding of this event is of people standing up regurgitating things you already know, then you have managed to spectacularly miss the point.

but its not worth £240 to receive information about how Prince was unapologetically black and an a contrast between an unreleased song

[Edited 5/24/17 15:09pm]

Dilan said:

Militant said:

Yes, many have an awareness that Prince at times in his career positioned himself as a post-racial man of Uptown, a world where color didn't matter, racial ambiguity was something he deliberately played on to avoid being pigeonholed (for example, deliberately casting a white woman as his mother in Purple Rain) - and at other times in his career, Prince was proudly, fiercely, unapologetically black in how he presented his image - for example, look what the rise of hip-hop did when you compare the racial mix of The Revolution compared with the original New Power Generation - you go from Wendy, Lisa and Bobby to Sonny, Michael, Tony, Levi, etc.

But who in academia has explored in an intelligent, analytical and studious method how Prince walked on both sides of this line at different points in his career? That sounds like an absolutely fascinating talk.

There are talks on gender, identity, poetry, sound construction, liberation, fandom, performance, Hollywood, technology - all by people who literally study these things as a lifelong career. People from institutions as esteemed as Harvard and Stanford. In short, some of the most educated and intelligent people in the world.

If your understanding of this event is of people standing up regurgitating things you already know, then you have managed to spectacularly miss the point.

but its not worth £240 to receive information about how Prince was unapologetically black and an a contrast between an unreleased song

[Edited 5/24/17 15:09pm]

For a lot of People Hearing Prince being discussed honoured by the Intellectuals of our world who are for the large part without hyperbole is actually Priceless..

Militant said:

About to leave to catch my train to the conference. I'll be dropping in with updates, also on the org Twitter account.

Dez talk is at 7pm tonight UK time.

looking forward to your reports from last night with Dez...cant believe he actually played guitar!!

Dez was on BBC Breakfast TV this morning being interviewed, its filmed at Salford Quays, video won't stay online long as its on BBC Site, dez is on at 3:06:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/ipla...-25052017#

[Edited 5/25/17 13:42pm]

ha so funny when you know the presenters no fuck all about Prince. A quick run through google to find some questions

A good conference is about so much more than the papers: Thursday evening, dinner at a Pizza Express in Manchester: 8 amazing people – black, white, women, a man (ya, he was a bit outnumbered!), gathered here from the USA, Canada, the UK ... and probably an age span of 30 years or more between us. All together because we love Prince. Laughter. A lot of laughter. A LOT. At my end of the table: stories of first becoming aware of Prince, like really noticing ... and of ending up in YouTube marathons, watching live performnces from 9 p.m. to 4:00 a.m. (on a work night), transfixed. These sensible professors, writers, lawyers, journalists, independent scholars, org lurkers, org posters: a collection of funny, thoughtful, smart, sassy, sexy people. All together: beautiful. Thanks Prince.

antonb said:

ha so funny when you know the presenters no fuck all about Prince. A quick run through google to find some questions

The funny thing is, one of the presenters Naga knew a whole lot more about Prince:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3553403/Did-didn-t-Moment-BBC-Breakfast-host-Naga-Munchetty-asked-live-air-encounter-Prince-reveals-asked-dance-21st-birthday.html

It was very lazy journalism and abit disrespectful to Dez to not know some basics, like they showed Wendy playing Purple Rain, she pretty much replaced him, so why not show 1999 where he's in the video???

He did a very nice swerve on them when they asked about some of the Prince secrets/rumours, and he replied it was more amazing people didn't know about his sense of humour and he was a prankster, I got the feeling he's given that line a few times !!!

Apparently, one of the conference discussions was about whether Prince was a misogynist or a feminist. And the speaker contended that he was too complicated to be either. I agree for the most point except of the use of the word misogynist (that word is thrown around too loosely. Even Prince at his most sexist was never a woman hater.)

So I put a bunch of photos up at The Violet Reality fb page if you guys are interested.

It was an absolutely fantastic three days. I'm going to do a full video review for YouTube over the next week which I'll post here but I just wanted to share some quick highlights :

- Dez's keynote speech was amazing, enlightening, and hilarious! He shared stories of his audition with Prince and Andre, and noted that recently he heard "the other side of the story" from Andre regarding the discussions Andre and P had after Dez left his audition. He noted that at the end of the audition, Prince asked him several very deep questions about life and he instantly felt P was wise beyond his years. He also talked about Prince had asked him for a 3 year commitment in 1983 and he just felt so exhausted with everything by that point that he felt he couldn't do it. What's interesting to me is that Prince had talked about this "3 year commitment" back in 1983 - as we know, P broke up The Rev in 86, which raises an interesting question as to whether that was always the plan, for The Revolution to only last 3 years. He briefly played guitar licks including the Little Red Corvette solo, I wanted more guitar though!


- As far as the talks, most were phenomenal, some veered too much towards academia, but for the most part were brilliant. I particularly enjoyed the talk about Prince as a transcendent poet, the talk/discussion about "Under The Cherry Moon" being Prince's "most authentic self", ie, the idea that Christopher Tracy is more representative of Prince's personality than The Kid was, and the idea that the main reason UTCM was a commercial flop was because people wanted more of The Kid, and weren't prepared for a character like Christopher Tracy to be coming from Prince. There was a great talk focused solely on "The War" and how the storyline portrayed in it "Microchip in your neck" etc compares and contrasts with other concepts of Afro-futurism like P-Funk concepts, etc.
My friend Sam Coley from Birmingham City University did a talk about online fan communities, where he mentioned things like the org, Peach & Black Podcast, and some folks called The Violet Reality - and another friend, Simon Barber also from BCU did a fantastic talk about his experiences attending the Celebration last month.


- Other great talks discussed Prince's love/hate relationship with the internet, Prince's spiritual journey, and a talk about humour and sexuality that focused on songs like "International Lover", and a talk by my friend Chris Aguilar-Garcia (aka madartista) talking about Prince and his "Revolutionary Queerness" which was fascinating!


Unfortunately due to the way the conference was structured, lots of talks happened simultaneously so I'm sure there were several fantastic talks that I missed, but that's the way the cookie crumbles.


- After the final set of talks, we were ushed to the Digital Performance Lab, and we had a Skype Q&A with none other than Prince's cousin Chazz Smith who was incredible! He is so proud and passionate about growing up with Prince and watching his ascent to fame and I'm so glad I got to ask him a question - I asked him to share stories about how Prince and Andre grew up idolizing Sonny Thompson as I'm always fascinated by that story and how Sonny ended up being in Prince's band years later, and is perhaps the singular example of someone that Prince grew up idolizing actually being in Prince's band (You could argue Larry as well, but he was never really a permanent bandmember) - Chazz lit up when I asked this question, and he said that he, Prince and Andre used to go over to Sonny's house and stand outside his window listening to him play, and would be blown away at his ability, not just on one instrument but several, which was massively inspirational to P and Andre.


This was followed by a live performance and party with a band jamming on loads of different Prince songs. I headed home at this point, it had been a long few days! Just as amazing as the talks, was the chance to connect with so many Prince fans, and people who actually critically and intellectually study his work. It was truly amazing and I really want to thank Dr Kirsty Fairclough, Dr Mike Alleyne, Dez, Hayley Drinkall, Prof Sarah Niblock, Ken Paulson, and Tim France for putting the event together, as well as all staff, speakers and attendees. Particularly given Monday's events in Manchester, and the very real possibility immediately after th event might not even be able to proceed, I'm sure they had one of the most stressful weeks of all their lives, but it all came off without a hitch (save a couple of technical issues here and there )

A truly, truly fantastic few days.

purplerabbithole said:

Apparently, one of the conference discussions was about whether Prince was a misogynist or a feminist. And the speaker contended that he was too complicated to be either. I agree for the most point except of the use of the word misogynist (that word is thrown around too loosely. Even Prince at his most sexist was never a woman hater.)

So I don't think I was at the specific talk you're referring to, but in the talks that focused on his movies, the question came up as to whether it's difficult to show Purple Rain to younger people now because of the sexist aspects - ie The Kid slapping Apollonia, Morris throwing the girl in the dumpster, The Kid co-ercing Apples to strip off and jump in the water, etc.

Of course, it was countered that the overall arc has The Kid struggling with perpetuating the cycle of abuse that his parents are in, and ultimately breaking away from it and finding redemption.