3121 Spy Report: Montreux


As we wandered into the venue at the Montreux Jazz Festival, we could hear the entire new Planet Earth CD playing over the speakers. My friend and eye both agreed that "The One U Wanna C" was our favorite so far but we knew that would probably change over the next 500 listens we anticipated having very soon. The NPG kicked the night off by marching in thru the crowd playing "When The Saints Go Marching In." A hot jazz set then began with a healthy dose of the funk and all the band's solos met with some well-deserved applause. It was Jazz Cuisine on Funk steroids! Prince slipped in quietly and proceeded 2 bring the house down as the band once again segued from "Down By The Riverside" in2 "Satisfied." Some wonderful highlights included Shelby's amazing rendition of "Love is a Losing Game," Josh getting a shot in the spotlight, Cora playing drums with her HANDS at one point, and a funky "I Feel 4 U" going right in2 "Controversy," with chants of "Eye Like Funky Music" sprinkled on top mixed with P's greazy guitar chops just 4 fun. The Musicology dance party was a blast as always, and when a dude came up 2 sing "Play That Funky Music," his english wasn't happenin' so P asked him 2 sing it in French! C'est Magnifique! The crowd chanted "Come 2gether" during the NPG's rockin' version of the Beatles classic and kept the chant going a while after P and the band left the stage b4 coming back 4 more. Late in the show Prince played Little Red Corvette "acoustic style" followed by a touching "Sometimes it Snow in April," that had everyone singing along. A beautiful night, P was clearly having fun, and the entire crowd couldn't have been better -- all left smiling and soaked!


Updated by 3121 ~ Monday 7/16/2007
[Edited 7/16/07 18:01pm]

justcoco said:

Did anyone from the .org attend this show?

just been on 3121 and the report has been updated with this


love the bit about him coming on stage with an umbrella i can just imagine it hope we get some pics from this
[Edited 7/16/07 18:44pm]

damn right, no rest there.. lol !

2 reports from HQ.

http://www.housequake.com...adid=89482

What a night in Montreux..started very jazz with When the saints go marchin in, a lot of horns and renato in the 1st hour, including What a wonderful world, a superb extended version of Satisfied !!

Prince on Guitar in a very Xpectation style.... then 2nd part very funky with girls & boys, musicology with people dancing on stage. Prince plays 3 different guitar, the stratocaster, the blue one and the orange one. Show lasted 2 and 1/2 hours, voice was great (falsetto was irresitible and Shelby got VOICE !!). I was a bit dissapointed because "last part" of the show was PRince on guitar alone( acoustic way but on amplified electric guitar) . Played L Red Corvette and Sometimes it snow in April, with Renato on keyboard, and then... end of the show.

1st hour was really something else, different than regular shows, 2n hour was very funky , groove . Great version of Take me with U stopped to do .... GUITAR . The live version really is a Killer !!!


Good night, I go to sleep. See u in London.

-----

hello
coming straight from the concert
3 hours of power
the (im my opinion strange) setlist (maybe not the complete)
when the saints go marching in
jazz intros (awesome 20 minutes)
down by the riverside
satisfied (very long version)
girls & boys
purple rain
what a wonderful world
love is a losing game (shelby)
sweet thing (shelby)
got a broken heart again
musicology
play that funky music
i feel for you
controversy
crazy
nothing compares you
7
come together
take me with you
guitar
little red corvette
sometimes it snows in april

a great concert
(today its my birthday - and that was a nice gift)
but i think too much horn solos
and too much shelby

good night
[Edited 7/16/07 19:03pm]

Meh setlist.

This better not be the deal in London.

Funkmeimfamous said:

Or what?

[Edited 7/17/07 0:16am]

thanks for the pictures

This article is published in an italian newspaper. I can't translate cuz my english is crappy. It says, by and large, that Prince is a genius and that this has been the concert of the year. There are also seven pictures.

http://qn.quotidiano.net/...dore.shtml

Classe e sudore,
il ritorno di Prince
Unica data continentale alla 41esima edizione del Montreux Jazz Festival: il mago di Minneapolis incanta la platea
di Ernesto de Pascale
MONTREUX, 17 luglio 2007 - Ciliegina sulla torta della 41esima edizione del Montreux Jazz Festival, Prince e la sua band hanno fatto le cose in grande per questa esibizione a sorpresa annunciata dal patron del festival Claude Nobs con grande soddisfazione, solo 7 giorni prima, e subito esaurita.

In un lunghissimo set dai toni spesso stravaganti ed inusuali il mago di Minneapolis ha offerto un saggio del suo personale gusto armonico e del suo senso del jazz in una prima ora che è spaziata da citazioni colte come Night In Tunisia a richiami piu' Black come "The World Ia a Ghetto" dei War, attraverso una versione elettrojazz della ellingtoniana "It don't mean a thing" fino al tradizionale "Down By The Riverside" tramutatosi dopo poche battute in un torrido jazz rock che il chitarrista/cantante nero ha eseguito con hendrixiana scompostezza.
Per i 6500 presenti la serata aveva del magico, e cosi' si è andati avanti per molte ore.

I primi 45 minuti, tutti solo strumentali, difficilmente torneranno nelle scalette del nostro, si vociferava intorno al banco di regia. E' stato quando "Maesta' Prince" ( come lo hanno incoronato i giornali locali ) si è avvicinato al microfono per intepretare «Satisfied», il bellissimo blues dal suo - ad oggi - ultimo album «3121» che Minneapolis, Memphis e la Svizzera si sono pero' fuse in un solo melting pot.
Da quel momento in poi la sala Stravinski del Montreux Jazz Festival si è tramutata in un grande e accogliente dancefloor. «This is gonna be a long night». ha esclamato il piccoletto prima di attaccare i suoi vecchi successi di«Purple Rain».


Chiamata in causa la vocalist Shelby Johnson con "Love is a losing game", Prince, con grande magnanimità, ha aperto poi il palco al pubblico e fra mille citazioni, tributi costanti e non nascosti a James Brown, passaggi di testimone ideali da Sly (definito dai giornalisti del posto "grottesco e caricaturale" e solo pochi giorni fa anche qui) a se stesso, infilando una sequenza bestiale di funky iperteso : "Play That Funky Music" dei Wild Cherry è diventata addirittura "Controversy" che è stata poi travasata dalla band con nonchalanche in "I Feel for You" ( il successo donato da Prince a Chaka Khan nei primi ottanta ). La lunga sequenza si è conclusa con una versione piu' bella dell'originale di "Crazy" di Gnars Barkley, seguita, per smorzare gli ardori da "Nothing Compares to you" cantata proprio da tutti.
A quel punto è stato fatto posto ai classiconi ma il nostro ha saputo ficcare con maestria nel mezzo "Guitar", il nuovo singolo dall'album "Planet Earth", facendo contento tutti.

Ci si aspettava da Prince il concerto dell'anno e cosi' è stato. Classe, eleganza e passione mista a sudore restano il segreto della grande musica nera. Impossibile tirarsi indietro se si vuol perseguire
quella missione.
Prince ci si è buttato dentro a capofitto, ripetendo un miracolo che unisce passato e presente, tradizione e contemporaneità della scrittura in un solo piccolo grande uomo.

This one says, more or less, that P is a REAL artist.

http://www.lastampa.it/_w...the%20road


Prince funk&jazz a Montreux
(esce Planet Heart: senza titoli)

E poi dicono la Svizzera. Sembrava tutto meno che svizzero l'Auditorium Stravinsky, torrido di entusiasmi salti e urla, ieri sera per il concerto improvviso che Prince ha regalato al Montreux Jazz Festival. La sua band è arrivata dalla platea suonando "When the Saints", in un omaggio alla tradizione del Festival che è durato tutta la prima parte del concerto: strepitosi i musicisti, indimenticabili i fiati, scatenati in una saga impeccabile di improvvisazione e ostentazione di bravuta; un portento la cantante che si alternava con Prince, Shelby Johnson; un'altra batterista, Cora Dunham, ha sostituito Sheila E.
Quando lui è salito sul palco, tutto vestito di rosso, cappello e occhiali neri, s'è capito subito che si stava divertendo; atmosfera rilassata, un sacco di cover - da "Down By the Riverside" a "What a Wonderful World", da "I feel for You" a "Come Together", omaggio ai Beatles nel finale - e una sola canzone del nuovo album, "Guitar". Nella seconda parte, un sabba indiavolato di funk, e ballads. Si sono sentite "Nothing Compares to You", "Purple Rain", "Musicology". Un concerto unico, che non avrà ripetizioni. Non c'era uno schermo, non una ripresa. A Londra, nei concerti d'agosto già sold out, la musica sarà del tutto diversa. Ma quel che colpisce è la volontà di Prince di scardinare i ruoli prefissati, le scalette, i rituali dell'onemanshow. Il suo set evoca la libertà che solo un vero artista può avere. La notte, non contento, ha continuato con una jam nel locale sotto la sede del Festival.
Tra l'altro "Planet Earth", il nuovo disco, esce in Italia venerd prossimo 20 luglio. Non c'è dentro un titolo di canzone, non un foglietto, non i crediti, nulla. Sono dieci brani. Segnatevi, se volete, i titoli in sequenza: Planet Earth, Guitar, Somewhere Here on Earth, The One U Wanna C, Future Baby Mama, Mr.Goodnight, All the Midnights in the World, Chelsea Rodgers, Lion of Judah, Resolution.

Flowerz said:

wow! great pictures! mine are all crapy :-S please post more !!

i think the show was a good match for montreux!

here is what the local music mag 'vibrations' had to say:

dayzofwyld said:

Man I've been wanting some new pictures! Thank you so much! He looks

Uhmmm

Am I the only that thinks that a somewhat more JAZZY setlist would have been more fun? I mean, this is the famous Montreux Jazz Festival, fcs!

He could have been jamming to Miles Davis tunes, soloing into the night. Girls & Boys? Oh my... missed chance.

Flowerz said:

LOVE this.

HamsterHuey said:

I am with you man !! I have been waiting for years for prince to abandon the cheesy pop / pop rap sound and push forward the jazzy side that was always in his music. And now, with such a jazzy groovy band ... and think of all the jazz musician that would have loved joining him for a jam.
but thats agains his ego i would guess ...
still sounds like an amazing concert i wish i was at. counting the days for london ...

my translation:

2 hours and a half of a very special show yesterday at the montreux jazz festival: Prince and his "special unit" revisited 50 years of great black & white music.

Little flash lights lighting the right side of the stage. Greg boyer, mike phillips and william lee hogan, strolling through the audience, all horns on, before climbing onto the stage to the sound of a marching band.

It is 9:45pm in montreux, and the audience is slowly taking seats in the stavinsky auditorium, sold out tonight (the 4000 seats found takers within 15 minutes) The direction is given from the start. "when the saints go marching in" opens the show, tied to a standard miles davis, a long lecture of "world is a ghetto" from singer Donny Hathaway, then "it don't mean a thing" from duke ellington.

Subliminal message: if it ain't got a swing, don't even bother! Within only 30 minutes, before the master's entrance, the group travelled through 50 years of black music. and it's not done yet.

Roger "prince" nelson arrives "nonchalent" onstage, a good half hour after the begining of the show. It is not a star in search of conquest. Gangsta hat twisted on his head, he observes his band, moves in little by little into the groove, first with brief saturated guitar solos, then singing. He is elegant within each of his moves, whether orchestrating or guitar hero.

And when he invites a handful of spectators to invest to the stage, he respectfully places them in the middle of the musicians, before retrieving himself on the top of an amp., Music and dance before anything else.

In the way of miles davis in the 90's, Prince gives his musical direction, to his invite, the 3 horns follow in force, morris hayes and the brazilian renato neto, come regurlarly out of the lines. the drummer cora dunham and her husband josh on the bass are the latest recruits of this new power generation, rebaptized "special unit". Prince hired them last year during jam sessions and unofficial after parties. When he heard cora, he bought her a brand new drum kit. she was hired. this is a beautiful orchestra, probably the best Prince has had in a long time.

"would you like to hear old pieces or new pieces?" asks the singer. the response is indecisive. "Ok we will then play old and new". The public will get "purple rain", "controversy", "nothing compares to you",(and at the end "little red corvette"). But it is the new single "guitar" that takes off. Proof that, hit wise, this powerful song has nothing to shy away from those of the 80's. The covers are legions, but not thrown in as beacons into the sea. Still reminded of miles davis who would appropriate himself melodies of the moment. tonight gnarl barkley's "crazy" works out, as well as the "come together" from the beatles, the grooviest piece of the fab four.

There was a lot of talk backstage of the aftershow prince gave at 3 or 4 in the morning at montreux jazz cafe. That went on later. At the auditorium stravinsky, cleaned of video monitors, the musician delivered 2 and a half hours of great black & white music, Without interruption.

It is true what the song says: Prince loves his guitar.
[Edited 7/17/07 11:25am]