Efan said:

SoulAlive said:

here's another example of where Paisley Park went wrong....

"Simon,Simon" by Dale Bozzio (1988)

I actually like the music to this song but those vocals are horrendous

This just gets harder and harder to stomach as the years pass....

They should have given this groove to a decent singer and they might have had a hit record,lol

^Says the guy who loves Joss Stone.

I don't get the hate for Dale. It's just not your standard boring sanitized pop vocals. It's got character--which for some folks is a good thing.

sosgemini said:

^Says the guy who loves Joss Stone.

I don't get the hate for Dale. It's just not your standard boring sanitized pop vocals. It's got character--which for some folks is a good thing.

I love Dale's work with Missing Persons...

SoulAlive said:

-Paisley Park records, sounds too good to be true.

-How much money was invested but more than that, all that time it could of build so much interest.

-Kinda like a Martha stewart type feeling to it, but no, not yet.

SoulAlive said:

Here are some things that Prince could have done to make Paisley Park Records a successful label:

***Utlilize the talents of Andre Cymone---Paisley Park Records needed some great in-house producers/songwriters.Andre should have been offered a position like this.We all saw what he did with Jody Watley...imagine if he had been allowed to produce Jill Jones? Her album might have had a few hits.

***Keep up with what's going on in the industry---In the early 90s,R&B boy groups were a big deal.Groups like Boys II Men and Jodeci were selling millions.Where was Paisley Park's boy group?

***Sign truly talented,interesting artists---Great artists like Tony Toni Tone! and Meshell Ndegeocello came very close to being signed to Paisley.Instead,Paisley signed artists like T.C.Ellis,Carmen Elektra and Good Question

Andre Cymone?!?

Boy groups?!?

I wish Paisley Park did get Ndegeocello - the attempt was made so it is not as if they were oblivious. Lets not forget that while there was TC ELlis and Good Question, there were legends George Clinton and Mavis Staples; solid in-house talent like Tony LeMans, Eric Leeds, SHeila E, and Mazarati (what did Prince do to hold them back?), and some current stylish trends like the nice spoken word material from Ingrid Chavez and or the hip hop from Carmen Electra's album (which she did use to launch her supernova career) or the dance pop/rock from Dale Bozzio.

[Edited 8/15/11 11:38am]

Yes,Andre Cymone If you look at the success of a label like Philadelphia International,you would see that Gamble and Huff didn't dominate everything.They didn't spread themselves too thin....they hired some talented songwriters and producers like McFadden and Whitehead and Bunny Sigler to contribute to those albums by the O'Jays,Teddy Pendergrass and others.This is exacly what Prince needed to do.Since Andre was a childhood buddy who had a real talent for writing and producing,I think he would have been perfect for a job like this.Many of the Paisley artists suffered from a lack of strong hit singles.Imagine if a Paisley artist had gotten their hands on a hot groove like "Still A Thrill".Things might turned out quite differently,dontcha think?

And yes,boy groups were needed In the early 90s,boy groups were unavoidable.For many record labels,that's where the money was.Why do you think we had so many of them in the 90s? To be a successful record label,you gotta keep up with what's happening in the industry but unfortunately,Paisley Park didn't keep up with trends.Imagine if Prince had come out with a boy band,given them a sexy slow jam like "Shhhh",released their album in 1993...it surely would have done better than Carmen Elektra! lol

SoulAlive said:

Yes,Andre Cymone If you look at the success of a label like Philadelphia International,you would see that Gamble and Huff didn't dominate everything.They didn't spread themselves too thin....they hired some talented songwriters and producers like McFadden and Whitehead and Bunny Sigler to contribute to those albums by the O'Jays,Teddy Pendergrass and others.This is exacly what Prince needed to do.Since Andre was a childhood buddy who had a real talent for writing and producing,I think he would have been perfect for a job like this.Many of the Paisley artists suffered from a lack of strong hit singles.Imagine if a Paisley artist had gotten their hands on a hot groove like "Still A Thrill".Things might turned out quite differently,dontcha think?

And yes,boy groups were needed In the early 90s,boy groups were unavoidable.For many record labels,that's where the money was.Why do you think we had so many of them in the 90s? To be a successful record label,you gotta keep up with what's happening in the industry but unfortunately,Paisley Park didn't keep up with trends.Imagine if Prince had come out with a boy band,given them a sexy slow jam like "Shhhh",released their album in 1993...it surely would have done better than Carmen Elektra! lol

I like that family studio concept you are talking about as applied to the Park - it seems to have been Forest to some Trees for Prince. Andre's work standing alone would be enough, but if they had collaborated on one now and then...

He changed not only his own musical style when he got his own label, but the musical style of his protegee acts also. I mean, the first act on his own label, The Family, which was hyped up to be a reincarnation of The Time since Morris and Jesse had left the group, was the furthest thing from it. Yes, it was a good album and yes it was creative but it no longer the Prince people had either just discovered with "Purple Rain", nor was it the same Prince that the longtime fans had grown up with. Not only was Prince like an entirely different person altogether, but every act he was bringing out was just "artsy/fartsy" and out there except for Mazarati which Brown Mark had a hand in. A Jill Jones album during the "Purple Rain" era that sounded something like was Prince was doing with Sheena Easton at the time such as "Sugar Walls" would have been a hit. But a Jill Jones album with strings and an artsy/fartsy feel to it was destined to flop. And Madhouse. Other than the singles "Six" or "Ten", the whole rest of the entire album had a jazz feel to it so that sure as hell wasn't going to get no airplay. And when it came to Prince himself, other than a few hit and misses such as "Kiss" and "Adore", Prince himself had become a joke to a lot of the mainstream world as someone who became "far out" and "out there", not from his looks, but from the way his music sounded. It sounded very retro at the time with a few elements of his previous style mixed in the songs. It's like the rest of the world had moved further into the 1980s but Prince was trying to bring the 1960s and 1970s back.

His own label could have been a huge success if he had kept The Time together, even if it was only the 1984 version of the group without Jimmy and Terry, and had them on his label. If Morris and Jesse wanted to do solo albums, they could have done them on his new label. We've heard what both Morris and Jesse was releasing in the mid to late 1980s after they left the group and that's the type of stuff people were wanting during that time, not stuff like The Family. More albums from Vanity or Apollonia 6 in the same style as their previous albums. More stuff like Sheila E.'s first album. More stuff like "Sugar Walls" with Sheena Easton. Jimmy and Terry could have produced groups and had them on the label. They were red hot at the time. Andre Cymone could have done some of his own albums as well as producing his acts on the label. Dez Dickerson and The Modernairres could have released their album and recorded more albums on the label. These are the type of the things that droves of people were wanting from the label. Not the artsy/fartsy stuff of Prince in a "new space" and "challenging himself creatively".

That's exactly what I'm talking about,Vainandy! Prince had all these talented people around him,there is no reason why he couldn't have utlilized all that talent and turned Paisley Park into the Motown of the 80s.BrownMark,Andre Cymone,Jam and Lewis should have been offered jobs as in-house producers.The Time and The Revolution could have been offered record deals,which would have kept both bands together.The Mazarati project showed alot of promise.I would have liked to have seen them stay together and release several albums.There was so much potential and so many ways for the label to succeed!

SoulAlive said:

That's exactly what I'm talking about,Vainandy! Prince had all these talented people around him,there is no reason why he couldn't have utlilized all that talent and turned Paisley Park into the Motown of the 80s.BrownMark,Andre Cymone,Jam and Lewis should have been offered jobs as in-house producers.The Time and The Revolution could have been offered record deals,which would have kept both bands together.The Mazarati project showed alot of promise.I would have liked to have seen them stay together and release several albums.There was so much potential and so many ways for the label to succeed!

Yeah, he had all those talented people around him at the time, and what did he do? He controlled them. He made sure that almost every note on their albums came from him. Everything started and ended with him when it came to them. The way they sang his songs, the video, their wardrobe. Do you think it would be any different for them if they were to work for HIS record label?? Most of those guys were already fed up with how controlling he was in the studio, and they wouldn't have subjected themselves to being limited and controlled while working for him at his label. They wouldn't be able to stand it, and would've STILL left to get from under his thumb. I mean, in his mind, heaven forbid that someone else besides Prince would end up being the powerhouse for the label or a huge part of its success because of production work they were now doing, and not Prince. Prince wouldn't be havin' that shit.

alexnvrmnd777 said:

SoulAlive said:

That's exactly what I'm talking about,Vainandy! Prince had all these talented people around him,there is no reason why he couldn't have utlilized all that talent and turned Paisley Park into the Motown of the 80s.BrownMark,Andre Cymone,Jam and Lewis should have been offered jobs as in-house producers.The Time and The Revolution could have been offered record deals,which would have kept both bands together.The Mazarati project showed alot of promise.I would have liked to have seen them stay together and release several albums.There was so much potential and so many ways for the label to succeed!

Yeah, he had all those talented people around him at the time, and what did he do? He controlled them. He made sure that almost every note on their albums came from him. Everything started and ended with him when it came to them. The way they sang his songs, the video, their wardrobe. Do you think it would be any different for them if they were to work for HIS record label?? Most of those guys were already fed up with how controlling he was in the studio, and they wouldn't have subjected themselves to being limited and controlled while working for him at his label. They wouldn't be able to stand it, and would've STILL left to get from under his thumb. I mean, in his mind, heaven forbid that someone else besides Prince would end up being the powerhouse for the label or a huge part of its success because of production work they were now doing, and not Prince. Prince wouldn't be havin' that shit.

^ right!