Wooow. Ok, I'm so glad I went to experience Vancouver.

The line: Y'all, I don't remember all of your names, and I don't know how to spell any of them, so I'm going to refer to you as the Fabulous Line People, or FLPs for short. The night was sooo much better because you guys were so cool.

The soundcheck: Wow. Prince plays 'Money Don't Matter' and works with Eric Leeds on the sax part for 'Xenophobia'. He spends the rest of the time chatting with us. He sits on the edge of the stage, in white pants, loopy funky boots like the ones in Seattle, and a black and white symbol jersey. No makeup, which is still hard for me to get used to, he really looks different without it. Probably sat and talked for about an hour. We asked about an afterparty, and he asked if we wanted one. We said yes, so he arranged for us to get into the Voda, underneath the Westin hotel. This wasn't announced to the general crowd, just to us special people. =-) Anyway, there were only a couple dozen of us, so he called us over to sit closer, and we talked a little about the music business, and about his creative process; how he'll write for a while and then not, and how he composes on various instruments, sometimes even the drums (ie: 'Forever in my Life'). Mostly we talked about what it's like for him, and us, to be having this intimate experience instead of the stadium crowd thing of the past.

Somebody at the soundcheck: "It's cool that you see that you really are just a human being."
Prince: "What did you think I was?"
Me: "Funk machine."
Prince: "Well, I'm that too."

He said that he's having the most fun ever on this tour, and that it's a good challenge, because the music isn't hiding behind a crappy stadium sound system or a theatrical production, so it has to be really good. Which it is. Which brings me to. . .

The show: Kicked ass. I was front and center, rigth by his guitars on the floor (they are small and sexy like him). Same setlist as Seattle, pretty much. I posted it from another review below, if you are curious. This show was a little more energetic, I think, with a little more dancing and more involved segues between songs. Two of my FLPs got to go onstage for the 'better to give or recieve' bit, which was cool. One of them says within earshot of him onstage, "omigod, I think I'm going to pee my pants", and he repeats it to the crowd, and then says, "don't do that, I just bought those pillows". I also found Avalanche and Family name more moving this time, having had more time to aquaint myself with the songs over the past month. It really just hit me that Prince COULD have been born into slavery, as could any of us. How many potential Princes or Michaelangelos or Shakespears or Einsteins died in that system? How many dearly beloved? This is not the first time I've had that thought, but seeing Prince so moved by it really drove it home for me. And then he bounces along into Take Me With U, and tries to make you feel better. So yeah, he rocked, like always.

The afterparty: Myself and the FLPs scoot over to the club. There was a band, and a few people when we got there, but nothing exciting. We hung out, danced a little. A video was played of the first part of the show, looked like it was videotaped from back by the soundboard or something. Awful video quality, but the audio was good, and it was fun to hear. Otherwise, though, boring for me, since I don't drink, it was too loud to talk to people, and I was too wiped out to dance much more. So anyway, Prince comes in after midnight and goes into this roped off area with his band (and Mani, I think) and proceeds to ignore us. After our warm treatment at the soundcheck, combined with my dashed hopes of an aftershow, I was bummed. Towards the end of the evening, some people were taking turns sitting and chatting with Prince a little, and I thought about going and saying thanks, but I decided that wasn't very original and I would just leave him alone.

Around 2am the club staff was getting grumpy with us, as they wanted to close. A couple of my FLPs sat down to talk to Prince, as the rest of us were being ushered out of the club. This sucked, because
a) they were talking to Prince and we weren't
and
b) it was raining and cold outside and we didn't have the car keys.
Thankfully, one of Prince's guys (road manager or something?) noticed what was going on. Never underestimate the power of hanging out with two cute blond girls. He took us back in to where Prince and our friends were talking, so we pulled up seats. Mani (I think) was sitting next to him, and then there were about 6 of us sitting around this table, with some other people standing and sitting nearby, listening and adding comments sometimes. So yeah, we did religious philosophy discussion for a good hour, maybe longer. I got to be the token athiest at the table, so I kinda took some heat, but he was fairly nice about it, though he obviously knew who the rock star at the table was: not me. He's cocky, but charming. So am I, dammit, and I'm not afraid to defend my thoughts, I don't care WHO he is, so it was fun. I'm a philosophy student, you have to realize, so this is what I DO, this is what I LOVE, and I was getting to do it with a very interesting guy and his very interesting fans (especially the ones who weren't drunk). We all know Prince has weird Issues with semantics, so it made it a little hard to talk to him at times, but he was thoughtful and respectful. An aside, ladies: I feel obligated to tell you, he looks you right in the eye when he talks to you, and touches or grasps your hand to emphasize a point or show that he agrees with one, and it's very. . .ahem, endearing. But I quickly forgot that I was supposed to be in awe (except of his shoes, they were worthy of awe, they were, like metallic silver, major shoe envy happening here), and it turned out to be a reallly good conversation.

Yeah, it was amazing. His art is so dear to me, and it was wonderful to have a meaningful exchange with him. The concert ended up being a side perk, if you can imagine! I'm sure I'll never quite hear his voice again without remembering this night. Really fabulous.

And hey, email me, FLPs!

Doves,
tackaMel!ssa


Set List
The Rainbow Children
Muse 2 The Pharaoh
Money Don't Matter 2 Night
Xenophobia
A Case Of You (Joni Mitchell cover)
Mellow
Love Rollercoaster (Ohio Players cover)
1+1+1 Is 3
The Other Side Of The Pillow
Strange Relationship
The "WNPG Radio station":
- Sing A Simple Song (Sly & The Family Stone cover)
- La-La (Means I Love You) (Delfonics cover)
- Didn't Cha Know (Erykah Badu song, featuring bass player Rhonda Smith on lead vocals)
When You Were Mine
Avalanche (from the fan-club CD "One Nite Only")
Family Name
Take Me With U
Raspberry Beret

Encore (varying between solo piano and full band)
Adore
I Wanna Be Your Lover
Free
Starfish And Coffee
Sometimes It Snows In April
Girls & Boys
Diamonds And Pearls
The Beautiful Ones
Nothing Compares 2 U
How Come U Don't Call Me Anymore?
Anna Stesia

AWESOME

Maceo will be back on the tour for the following four stops:

EDMONTON
CALGARY
REGENA
SASKATOON

After that he is playing Irving Plaza, New York on Friday, June 6.

eh...i'll probably pass on the Canadian tour since it's the same setlist. If the aftershows were announced ahead of time I'd probably go.

man...seems like he really changed. Could you imagine the Prince from, let's say, 1995 to do this chatting thing?

Nice to see that he and Eric Leeds are playing together again. I don't think that anybody expected that.
[This message was edited Wed May 29 15:51:01 PDT 2002 by calldapplwondery83]

tackam said:

Wow! That sounds COOL! Eric is Back!!!

Great report! thanks.

Awesome. Thank u.

Wow that was terrific!

Can't wait for ONA to come to Winnipeg.

wow!

thanks so much for this report.

great review. thanks.