https://noisey.vice.com/e...XoEHvkpVJk

I never really liked this song to begin with and still don´t to this day (but I liked the Mustang Mix version and still do ) but I find this article a bit too harsh for trying to put Prince in the same category as Elvis Presley, R.Kelly and the likes when it comes to grooming young girls. Though I found it a bit weird that he used the same modus operandi with Anna Garcia and Mayté Garcia, i.e. making them come to Chanhassen and live there when they were underage, I think it´s a whole different issue if they did it with their parents´ consent , and keep in mind that he waited until they turned 18. Which still doesn´t really change anything about the age difference but come on, what he did is in no way comparable to R.Kelly et al.

This age difference thing is what makes it a bit tough for me to really like songs like The Morning Papers and I Wanna Melt With U. I happen to like both songs but the age difference and the lyrics always make it difficult to fully appreciate those kind of songs, and his fondness of young, "innocent" girls is something I always found a bit odd but hey, I guess that´s rock´n roll ?

Also, I find it strange that Bowie and that guy from Led Zeppelin barely get a mention in these kind of articles.

Here´s an excerpt, click the link above to read the full article.

"

In her 2017 memoir, The Most Beautiful: My Life With Prince, Mayte Garcia, the subject of said song, provides an enlightening if troubling narrative about her experiences with him up to and through their four-year marriage. Garcia first met Prince during his European tour in 1990, at which time she was still very much a teenager, and her subsequent integration, while still an adolescent, into the equally conceptual and sexual New Power Generation project rightfully raises concerns through a contemporary lens , considering the age difference. However, at the time, the problematic nature of their relationship was obscured by muse mythology, the sort of ingrained narrative that loses its glossy romantic sheen in the disinfecting sunlight of the now.

Rock and Roll history is littered with disturbing stories of older men courting adolescent girls. Elvis Presley had about a decade on 14-year-old Priscilla Beaulieu when they met in West Germany in 1959. In 1963, after an intercontinental courtship, she moved away from her family and to Memphis, marrying him a few years later. Apparently incapable of waiting for his cousin Myra Gale Brown to grow up, Jerry Lee Lewis made her his third wife when she was just 13, the added public impropriety of incest doing considerable, if temporary, damage to his career. More recent accusations against R. Kelly and Ryan Adams suggest the ethically suspect practice is still pervasive."

Okay, well ... first of all ... we don't know that The Most Beautiful Girl is about Mayte. She says it is (because it fits her narrative and her ego), but so do plenty of other women. And since Prince never said one way or another, we just don't know. So the idea that the song is somehow troubling because of Prince's relationship with a woman it may or may not be about is ridiculous.

Besides, there's plenty of fodder elsewhere. We all know that Prince was a devotée of the "barely legal." I Wanna Melt With You is truly cringeworthy with its lyrical acknowledgment that he's deflowered a virgin and 18 & Over and Lolita need no other comment than their titles. I mean ... duh.

To be honest, I have always found this side of Prince to be problematic. There is no question that the man had issues. But I think the fact that we have heard of relatively few cases where the girls were truly underage when they met (Anna Garcia and Mayte stand out purely because there aren't googobs of others) - and that they, themselves, say there was no "activity" when they were underage is ... I won't say "comforting." Maybe "mitigating"?

Genesia said:

Okay, well ... first of all ... we don't know that The Most Beautiful Girl is about Mayte. She says it is (because it fits her narrative and her ego), but so do plenty of other women. And since Prince never said one way or another, we just don't know. So the idea that the song is somehow troubling because of Prince's relationship with a woman it may or may not be about is ridiculous.

Besides, there's plenty of fodder elsewhere. We all know that Prince was a devotée of the "barely legal." I Wanna Melt With You is truly cringeworthy with its lyrical acknowledgment that he's deflowered a virgin and 18 & Over and Lolita need no other comment than their titles. I mean ... duh.

To be honest, I have always found this side of Prince to be problematic. There is no question that the man had issues. But I think the fact that we have heard of relatively few cases where the girls were truly underage when they met (Anna Garcia and Mayte stand out purely because there aren't googobs of others) - and that they, themselves, say there was no "activity" when they were underage is ... I won't say "comforting." Maybe "mitigating"?

Agree with you 100%, especially as far as those songs you mentioned are concerned. (Well, Prince DID make me change my mind about 18 and Over after witnessing a superb live version at the Paradiso aftershow in 1995 ) .

Several ladies have claimed that TMBGITW was about them ( Carmen, Mayte, Alissa Milano, Vanessa Marcil). I guess we´ll never find out.

Lolita is a song that I could only listen to once or twice. It does absolutely nothing for me, especially with those silly lyrics.

KoolEaze said:

Genesia said:

Okay, well ... first of all ... we don't know that The Most Beautiful Girl is about Mayte. She says it is (because it fits her narrative and her ego), but so do plenty of other women. And since Prince never said one way or another, we just don't know. So the idea that the song is somehow troubling because of Prince's relationship with a woman it may or may not be about is ridiculous.

Besides, there's plenty of fodder elsewhere. We all know that Prince was a devotée of the "barely legal." I Wanna Melt With You is truly cringeworthy with its lyrical acknowledgment that he's deflowered a virgin and 18 & Over and Lolita need no other comment than their titles. I mean ... duh.

To be honest, I have always found this side of Prince to be problematic. There is no question that the man had issues. But I think the fact that we have heard of relatively few cases where the girls were truly underage when they met (Anna Garcia and Mayte stand out purely because there aren't googobs of others) - and that they, themselves, say there was no "activity" when they were underage is ... I won't say "comforting." Maybe "mitigating"?

Agree with you 100%, especially as far as those songs you mentioned are concerned. (Well, Prince DID make me change my mind about 18 and Over after witnessing a superb live version at the Paradiso aftershow in 1995 ) .

Several ladies have claimed that TMBGITW was about them ( Carmen, Mayte, Alissa Milano, Vanessa Marcil). I guess we´ll never find out.

Lolita is a song that I could only listen to once or twice. It does absolutely nothing for me, especially with those silly lyrics.

And to be fair, despite its reference to the Nabokov novel, I think "Lolita" is just Prince's catchall term for a youngish woman - not necessarily underage - who has designs on him. I mean … the fact that he pairs it lyrically with cheata (cheater) suggests it's as much about the rhyme scheme as anything.

Genesia said:

Okay, well ... first of all ... we don't know that The Most Beautiful Girl is about Mayte. She says it is (because it fits her narrative and her ego), but so do plenty of other women. And since Prince never said one way or another, we just don't know. So the idea that the song is somehow troubling because of Prince's relationship with a woman it may or may not be about is ridiculous.

Besides, there's plenty of fodder elsewhere. We all know that Prince was a devotée of the "barely legal." I Wanna Melt With You is truly cringeworthy with its lyrical acknowledgment that he's deflowered a virgin and 18 & Over and Lolita need no other comment than their titles. I mean ... duh.

To be honest, I have always found this side of Prince to be problematic. There is no question that the man had issues. But I think the fact that we have heard of relatively few cases where the girls were truly underage when they met (Anna Garcia and Mayte stand out purely because there aren't googobs of others) - and that they, themselves, say there was no "activity" when they were underage is ... I won't say "comforting." Maybe "mitigating"?

Yeah, me too. Not even the possible legal issues, just when he was in his late 50's and still surrounding himself with worshipping 22 year old girls.....

I'm not even saying he was sleeping with them all, from what i've read it seems he wasn't, but just the power dynamic - they worshipped him because of who he was and he worshipped them back because he wanted to be close to young beautiful women who hung on his every word. There was something vampiric about it. It made me sad for him though, not angry.

Back in 2004 or so, I did a mix of his and her version, making it a duet, and renamed it "The Most Beautiful U In The World". There have been a couple out since then, but mine starts with Mayte singing the first verse, they bounce back and forth in the choruses or sing together, then they switch off during the break, and their vocals eventually overlay in the last choruses. I put it out on alt.music.binaries.prince or whatever it was at the time. I remember sending it to Rudedog (I think), among others. It was a pretty sweet mix.

The fact that anyone is putting R. Kelly's name in an article with Prince's is the bigger crime here (pedophilia aside).

jaawwnn said:

Genesia said:

Okay, well ... first of all ... we don't know that The Most Beautiful Girl is about Mayte. She says it is (because it fits her narrative and her ego), but so do plenty of other women. And since Prince never said one way or another, we just don't know. So the idea that the song is somehow troubling because of Prince's relationship with a woman it may or may not be about is ridiculous.

Besides, there's plenty of fodder elsewhere. We all know that Prince was a devotée of the "barely legal." I Wanna Melt With You is truly cringeworthy with its lyrical acknowledgment that he's deflowered a virgin and 18 & Over and Lolita need no other comment than their titles. I mean ... duh.

To be honest, I have always found this side of Prince to be problematic. There is no question that the man had issues. But I think the fact that we have heard of relatively few cases where the girls were truly underage when they met (Anna Garcia and Mayte stand out purely because there aren't googobs of others) - and that they, themselves, say there was no "activity" when they were underage is ... I won't say "comforting." Maybe "mitigating"?

Yeah, me too. Not even the possible legal issues, just when he was in his late 50's and still surrounding himself with worshipping 22 year old girls.....

I'm not even saying he was sleeping with them all, from what i've read it seems he wasn't, but just the power dynamic - they worshipped him because of who he was and he worshipped them back because he wanted to be close to young beautiful women who hung on his every word. There was something vampiric about it. It made me sad for him though, not angry.

I undestand the appeal for a rock star to have dozens of young women throwing themselves at you wherever you go but I have always wondered how his music would´ve sounded if he had had more relationships with women who were not necessarily his age but maybe in their 30s instead of their 20s, or women who had their own thing going on instead of being his proteges.

KoolEaze said:

Critical garbaj, clickbait nonsense.

Strawberrylova123 said:

KoolEaze said:

I undestand the appeal for a rock star to have dozens of young women throwing themselves at you wherever you go but I have always wondered how his music would´ve sounded if he had had more relationships with women who were not necessarily his age but maybe in their 30s instead of their 20s, or women who had their own thing going on instead of being his proteges.

Judith Hill is 30, tameron hall in her 40s...folks need to stop trying to #metoo prince. It's annoying

It´s especially annoying because he´s dead and the women involved aren´t the ones who are complaining (except for a few exceptions).

It´s ridiculous that they even mention folks like R.Kelly in that article.

KoolEaze said:

I saw and read and the whole artilce. I thbink why Prince name was placed with these other perverts. Because Mayte was underage. sad to say it. Coming from a long line of huge Prince fans. Mayte and Prince might had been having sex before the age of 18( Mayte0. Because why was Mayte around a grown man who at that time was 32 and she was 16. I know that Mayte's parents knew the naturfe of Prince's songs? So, again. It saddens me that Prince fits in the catergory of Elvis Presley and R. Kelly. Prince did not perform in the United States

42Kristen said:

I saw and read and the whole artilce. I thbink why Prince name was placed with these other perverts. Because Mayte was underage. sad to say it. Coming from a long line of huge Prince fans. Mayte and Prince might had been having sex before the age of 18( Mayte0. Because why was Mayte around a grown man who at that time was 32 and she was 16. I know that Mayte's parents knew the naturfe of Prince's songs? So, again. It saddens me that Prince fits in the catergory of Elvis Presley and R. Kelly. Prince did not perform in the United States

In the early 90s? Of course he did. Act II tour and some odd concerts in 1994 (Palladium etc. ) and lots of shows at Paisley Park with Mayté. But what does that have to do with the topic?

Also keep in mind that he was with Carmen Electra at the time and Nona Gaye. His relationship with Mayté was a bit later (though it probably overlapped with Carmen and Nona).

it wasn't written for Mayte. He would do his thing where he would say "I wrote it for you" but he would say that to 5 different girls. I mean, come ON! He said that "Extraloveable" was written about Andy Allo! That song was written in 1983 and Andy wasn't even born til the early 90's! So I guess he wrote a song about Andy long before she was an embryo. Lock him up! lol

42Kristen said:

Whether or not the song was explicitly written about Mayte, the other points in this article still stand. I knew it was only a matter of time until that aspect of Prince's life was brought back into the public light, especially with the #MeToo movement and people like R. Kelly finally facing some consequences. Was Prince anywhere near as bad as R. Kelly? No, probably not, but it still sounds like he was sometimes deeply flawed (he docked Mayte's pay for overeating..... yikes) and his lust for teenage girls while in his 30's was troubling. That might have been more of an acceptable social 'norm' at the time, but things change for good reasons.

[Edited 2/25/19 16:27pm]

KoolEaze said:

https://noisey.vice.com/e...XoEHvkpVJk

I never really liked this song to begin with and still don´t to this day (but I liked the Mustang Mix version and still do ) but I find this article a bit too harsh for trying to put Prince in the same category as Elvis Presley, R.Kelly and the likes when it comes to grooming young girls. Though I found it a bit weird that he used the same modus operandi with Anna Garcia and Mayté Garcia, i.e. making them come to Chanhassen and live there when they were underage, I think it´s a whole different issue if they did it with their parents´ consent , and keep in mind that he waited until they turned 18. Which still doesn´t really change anything about the age difference but come on, what he did is in no way comparable to R.Kelly et al.

This age difference thing is what makes it a bit tough for me to really like songs like The Morning Papers and I Wanna Melt With U. I happen to like both songs but the age difference and the lyrics always make it difficult to fully appreciate those kind of songs, and his fondness of young, "innocent" girls is something I always found a bit odd but hey, I guess that´s rock´n roll ?

Also, I find it strange that Bowie and that guy from Led Zeppelin barely get a mention in these kind of articles.

Here´s an excerpt, click the link above to read the full article.

"

In her 2017 memoir, The Most Beautiful: My Life With Prince, Mayte Garcia, the subject of said song, provides an enlightening if troubling narrative about her experiences with him up to and through their four-year marriage. Garcia first met Prince during his European tour in 1990, at which time she was still very much a teenager, and her subsequent integration, while still an adolescent, into the equally conceptual and sexual New Power Generation project rightfully raises concerns through a contemporary lens , considering the age difference. However, at the time, the problematic nature of their relationship was obscured by muse mythology, the sort of ingrained narrative that loses its glossy romantic sheen in the disinfecting sunlight of the now.

Rock and Roll history is littered with disturbing stories of older men courting adolescent girls. Elvis Presley had about a decade on 14-year-old Priscilla Beaulieu when they met in West Germany in 1959. In 1963, after an intercontinental courtship, she moved away from her family and to Memphis, marrying him a few years later. Apparently incapable of waiting for his cousin Myra Gale Brown to grow up, Jerry Lee Lewis made her his third wife when she was just 13, the added public impropriety of incest doing considerable, if temporary, damage to his career. More recent accusations against R. Kelly and Ryan Adams suggest the ethically suspect practice is still pervasive."

Ugh. It's funny the very same people today who write for publications like Noisey/Vice who claim to be descendents of P's open minded vision of the future are the first to jump on this dumbassery and tear down people who laid the path. Their view of the world is rooted wholly in negativity. they are the ones being creepy and ruining the freedom and liberation P's music brought. We need a new revolution of sex positivity in music that does away with these pseudo-puritanical way of thinking. There is no way P if he was still alive would agree or any way endorse all this foolishness.

42Kristen said:

Mikado said:

Haha, Christ the media won't rest till every fucking black celebrity has been knocked down. They don't have the balls to actually say Prince was a pedophile, they just "suggest" and "ask questions". Fuck them.

Critically creepy article. Just because you dream up an angle, doesn't make it a good one.

Still, listeners who deified Prince both in life as well as in death may find all the details above a difficult pill to swallow,...REALLY?

Just wait until some reporter digs up the '83 Extraloveable or Lust U Always. I honestly do fear for that day.

-

As he aged his relationship with young women became more sad than creepy. His friendship with Damarus Lewis never really made sense to me. On a seperate note, after all this time not one women has come forward about any misconduct. As opposed to R. Kelly who actually married a teenager. To put him in the same category is absolutely ridiculous.

-

TheKid94 said:

jaawwnn said:

TheKid94 said:

Just wait until some reporter digs up the '83 Extraloveable or Lust U Always. I honestly do fear for that day.

-

As he aged his relationship with young women became more sad than creepy. His friendship with Damarus Lewis never really made sense to me. On a seperate note, after all this time not one women has come forward about any misconduct. As opposed to R. Kelly who actually married a teenager. To put him in the same category is absolutely ridiculous.

-

This is it, I may be iffy about some of his relationships and have my pet theories on it all but ultimately it was his business, not mine, and every person has just been full of praise for him, even from around those difficult 90's years. He was a good guy.

Or Schoolyard. One of his worst lyrics IMO. Thankfully he dropped it from D&P.

I've never liked these songs that have been stated in this thread. I cringed when he sang Lolita on the massive platform of American Idol. Of all the songs he could have showcased...

.

But I do like jaawwnn's summary; he shouldn't be mentioned in the same sentence as R.Kelly etc and there has never been any solid accusations over all the years. Most ex's/protege's have nothing but good things to say

I've always felt mildly amused by 's harem of 18 year-old girls. I suppose morality and ethics are different when you're a big star like him. But those girls were all willing and knew about each other, so...

dodger said:

Mikado said:

dodger said:

Or Schoolyard. One of his worst lyrics IMO. Thankfully he dropped it from D&P.

I've never liked these songs that have been stated in this thread. I cringed when he sang Lolita on the massive platform of American Idol. Of all the songs he could have showcased...

.

But I do like jaawwnn's summary; he shouldn't be mentioned in the same sentence as R.Kelly etc and there has never been any solid accusations over all the years. Most ex's/protege's have nothing but good things to say

Lolita is pretty much an anti-Jailbait song and encourages not sleeping with younger women as an older man - "never make a cheater out of me" and all that.

Oh right, so that was his message to the millions of teenage girls watching

dodger said:

dodger said:

Mikado said:

dodger said: Lolita is pretty much an anti-Jailbait song and encourages not sleeping with younger women as an older man - "never make a cheater out of me" and all that.

Oh right, so that was his message to the millions of teenage girls watching

.

Let's be honest, Prince's days of being watched by "millions of teenage girls" were long gone by 2006.
.
And yes, I don't even understand how 'Lolita' is even part of this discussion above. Have you guys never actually listened to its lyrics? Its very clear message is "if you're underage, don't even try, I'm not interested".
.

Kares said:

dodger said:

Oh right, so that was his message to the millions of teenage girls watching

.

Let's be honest, Prince's days of being watched by "millions of teenage girls" were long gone by 2006.
.
And yes, I don't even understand how 'Lolita' is even part of this discussion above. Have you guys never actually listened to its lyrics? Its very clear message is "if you're underage, don't even try, I'm not interested".
.

Watching American Idol