This woman has a great singing voice, furthermore, she can sing her ASS OFF!!! She has a lot of power and soul to her voice. It's ashame that she and Prince didn't do an album together, but who knows, maybe they were planning to do one, and it fell through for whatever reason. This woman is mega talented, and I wish I could sing the way she does.

Awesome thread. I so agree, psychodelicide. Margie has great vocals, very talented and all of the other things that we can say about her. Thanks for giving her a shout out.

JellyBean said:

Not a problem, you're very welcome.

psychodelicide said:

i think there is quite a story about prince and margie working together. a lot of bitterness on her part over something like, what? an album that he refused to let her release? reportedly, her album liner said something like "no thanks to prince".

point is, i doubt any more collabarations will happen ever
[Edited 5/11/10 9:51am]

"Standing At The Altar" is a classic It's a shame that it wasn't given a proper single release,with lots of promotion.It sounds like a "hit" to me.

SoulAlive said:

So was this after TaMara & the Seen?

phunkdaddy said:

yes

XxAxX said:

Thanks for the scoop. I figured there was a story behind why Prince and Margie did not work on an album together.

ernestsewell said:

I remember this song. Isn't that the song that Jesse Johnson wrote?

SoulAlive said:

I agree.

Rhastus said:

psychodelicide said:

Yes...she (well tamara and the seen) actually did two albums with Jesse.

Sowhat said:

I thought so.

The album they did together was ok some good guitar work on there, not listened to it in a few years now but it was far better than most of the associated artist albums he did in the 1990's.

I always really liked Curious Blue and Bed of Roses, but can't stand Whistlin' Kenny.

In the summer of 1989,Prince worked with Margie on an album.She was paired with a band called Flash,but the album was never released.Here's the tracklist:


Flash featuring Margie Cox (recorded in July 1989)


R U There
Brand New Boy
Warden In The Prison Of Love
Bed Of Roses
Good Man
Whistlin’ Kenny
We Can Hang
Curious Blue
Girls Will Be Girls
Good Body Every Evening

phunkdaddy said:

Tamara and The Seen recorded two albums for A&M Records,both produced by Jesse Johnson.After the second album,'Blueberry Gossip' (1988),Tamara (Margie) began working with Prince on a project known as MC Flash featuring Margie Cox.That project was never released and in 1991,she started work on a solo album,also produced by Prince."Standing At The Altar" is from those sessions.It's such a great song.Very Old School-sounding....almost Motown-ish.It appears on the '1-800 New Funk' compilation CD from 1994,but it really deserved to be a hit single.

StarTribune.com
Margaret's time: Singer Cox finally puts together first solo CD

By Jon Bream, Star Tribune

April 5, 2003

Jesse Johnson dubbed her TaMara. Prince billed her as Margie Cox. Now, after more than 25 years of singing in Twin Cities bars, the singer generally known as Margaret Cox has released her first solo album, "Margie's Little Demo."

"I wanted to call it 'Demo' because it's the first time I've ever done anything that's completely mine," Cox said.

She recorded an album with Raggs circa 1980, then sang on a local "Bar Wars" compilation LP and on the final Lipps, Inc. album. In 1985, she was lead vocalist of TaMara & the Seen, produced by former Time guitarist Johnson. It yielded the hit "Everybody Dance," which went to No. 3 on Billboard's R&B chart. In the early '90s, she recorded more than 25 songs with Prince for a band to be called M.C. Flash. An album never was released, but one Margie Cox track, "Standing at the Altar," was featured on a Paisley Park compilation CD, "1-800-NEW-FUNK" in '94.

The 13 songs on "Margie's Little Demo" have been written and recorded over the past dozen years at nine different Twin Cities studios. The music is mostly full-throated funk, augmented by soulful balladry and Cox's flair for pop melodies. There are shades of Chaka Khan and Prince all over the CD, but the disc also will remind listeners of Cox's longtime group, the Legendary Combo, which plays Mondays at Bunkers in Minneapolis.

On Saturday, backed by the Combo, she will stage a CD-release party at, of course, Bunkers. The album actually came out in September (thanks to a loan from her mother, Nancy, a vocal teacher) but Cox never got around to having a CD-release gig because almost all the members of the Combo perform in other bands on weekends. (She fronts Vanguard, which plays weddings and other private functions.) Moreover, the musicians had to learn several new songs.

Cox, 40ish, made her Twin Cities nightclub debut in ninth grade, singing at Bootlegger Sam's in Dinkytown (where she lived and attended Marshall-University High School). She graduated to other bands, including Raggs, the Doug Maynard Band, the T.C. Jammers, the Peterson-Cox Band (with Patty Peterson), Rupert's Orchestra and, in 1987, Dr. Mambo's Combo (now just the Legendary Combo). She has never had a "day job."

She was "a star for a minute" with TaMara & the Seen, though she said she didn't see royalties -- just a salary and $10,000 when she signed with A&M Records. With Johnson, she cowrote a tune, "I Need You," that ended up on Paula Abdul's blockbuster album "Forever Your Girl," but Cox said she never got a penny from it. Starting in 1990, she worked with Prince for a couple of years but remained under contract until '96 -- and didn't see much in the way of royalties.

When it came to business, she said she naive; her lawyer was also Johnson's lawyer. "I didn't know about conflict of interest then," said Cox, who now handles the Combo's payouts and tax statements.

As for her Prince experience, she said, "it's a sob story again, but at the same time I feel strong. It didn't get me down; it didn't make me quit."

On the liner notes to "Margie's Little Demo," she says "Thanks but no thanks to Jesse and Prince." The CD's graphic designer encouraged her to keep that left-handed compliment.

"I regret it," she says of the shot at her two former bosses. She said when she presses the next batch of CDs, she'll remove that comment from the liner notes.

Cox, who plays keyboards in the studio but not onstage, already has a bunch of songs for a second CD. But to the chagrin of Michael Bland, her frequent studio collaborator and the Combo's drummer, none of them is dark or depressing.

"I'm too happy right now," she said late Monday night after the Combo's gig. "I just bought my first house and put out my first CD. Man, I'm in heaven."

SoulAlive said:

She will always be TaMara to me and Jesse.

LOVE HER... favorite Margie moment might be "Electric Chair" on SNL... and where can I find Blueberry Gossip or the Demo release these days? HELP

Dred said:

I'm currently downloading the first album from 1985, and the "Blueberry Gossip" maxi single, which has 3 other tracks with it.

I think this is the first time I read about 'more than 25 songs' being made by Prince for her.

Would need a more reliable source than Jon Bream to believe it.

psychodelicide said:

I pray she will have other outstanding opportunities, she is a wonderful singer with a interesting style that would and still can be especially successful. Thank you for sharing her gifts and I pray new blessings

SoulAlive said:

I have listened to this album over and over and I absolutlely LOVE it. Kind of has a blues/rock thing going on and Margie's voice is phenomenal.Especially Brand New Boy, We Can Hang, Warden in the Prison of Love and Good Body Every Evening. This is one gem that should been released as opposed to some of the garbage Prince has been known to release to an unsuspecting public.

Dred said:

Blueberry Gossip was super cheap on CD when I bought it, Amazon sellers.

She is the Greatest!!
Beautiful and very talented

Anyone know which tracks Margie sang lead on for the Lipps Inc. album 4?

SoulAlive said:

In the early '90s, she recorded more than 25 songs with Prince for a band to be called M.C. Flash. An album never was released, but one Margie Cox track, "Standing at the Altar," was featured on a Paisley Park compilation CD, "1-800-NEW-FUNK" in '94.

25? So we only have heard about half of those songs.

Starting in 1990, she worked with Prince for a couple of years but remained under contract until '96 -- and didn't see much in the way of royalties. When it came to business, she said she naive; her lawyer was also Johnson's lawyer. "I didn't know about conflict of interest then," said Cox, who now handles the Combo's payouts and tax statements. As for her Prince experience, she said, "it's a sob story again, but at the same time I feel strong. It didn't get me down; it didn't make me quit." On the liner notes to "Margie's Little Demo," she says "Thanks but no thanks to Jesse and Prince." The CD's graphic designer encouraged her to keep that left-handed compliment. "I regret it," she says of the shot at her two former bosses. She said when she presses the next batch of CDs, she'll remove that comment from the liner notes.

Please note the time period: back when Prince was bitching about "being free" and "contracts", he was holding Margie hostage.