16 years old today (Feb. 19th) - Sheila E.'s third album, with five Prince-penned tracks (I forget which ones at the moment).
This is where her solo music started to develop into real solo music as opposed to just recording what Prince had for her. It was pretty good, too, I think.
What were the tracks on this? I'm drawing a total blank.

One Day (I'm Gonna Make You Mine)
Wednesday Like A River
Hold Me
Faded Photographs
Koo Koo
Pride & The Passion
Boy's Club
Soul Salsa
Hon E Man
Love On A Blue Train

fab.

Gooey puts on 12" of Kookoo.

Ouch.

And what about Paradise Gardens? Jeez.

Lazy, heavy, sexy, sweaty, hot.

Loving the album right now. Played it over and over and over one day last week. Which is why my signature now says what it does.


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gooeythehamster said:

never heard the 12" -- how is it?

and what's Paradise Gardens?

Fill me in! Thanks --


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madartista said:

The extended version of KooKoo is awfully wicked. Doper than the LP version. The b-side is Paradise Gardens, a song by Sheila and her band, no Prince involvement, I guess, but the song is BEAUTIFUL.
Must have.
Like Too Sexy.

gooeythehamster said:

Too Sexy, huh? Hmmm... Gonna has 2 find me this shiznit. Thanks 4 the info --
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Awww, ya'll. This album is sumthing. I am still so fond of this album.

Like Prince's work with Eric Leeds on Times Squared, this is an album where talents go hand in hand, instead of people just singing a Prince song.

Sheila's own contributions (like Hold Me and Wednesday Like A River) are as good as Prince's, making this a beautiful blend of Sheila's smoothness with that groovy Prince thang.

The album flows. It's velvet, then it gets nitty gritty with grooves like Boy's Club and KooKoo. The art design (Laura LiPuma once again) fits the music. The photography settled Sheila's image as Hot Thing.

My fave tracks here are Hold Me. Passinate and lingering.
KooKoo. Hot little Prince track.
Boy's Club. For the lyrics, the groove, the humour.

Just one track never works for me. HonE man. Skip, skip, skip!

And the 12"s were hot too. That cover of KooKoo. The b-side (Paradise Gradens is SO lush), the extended remix of KooKoo SO tight.

SIGH.

And then Prince wonders why we dream of pictures of the past...

Jeez.

I think I like this album more now than when it was released.

I've come to really love Hon E Man. And Wednesday... has grown on me as well. On the dark side, Faded Photographs sounds like the theme to a 80's Lifetime movie, and Pride & the Passion sucks donkey balls.

But what's left: KOO KOO, LOVE ON A BLUE TRAIN, BOYS CLUB, HOLD ME -- these are my favs and more than compensate for any other shortcomings.
.

I only just got into Koo Koo after all these years, in fact it took me a about the same to get into Hon E Man, Pride & Passion and Boys Club - I would always skip those.

I think this was the first time that we saw the real Sheila behind the character she used to play as the female Prince.

This is my favorite Sheila album, and I always wondered why she didn't promote it more. It's in my car right now, and I keep playing Pride and the Passion and Love on a Blue Train over and over. The album jams.

Madartista, sorry to be nitpicky, but the lyrics are "Funny when our eyes met/The walls around me turned wet/This is fun/Alone in number 14/A trip with you is foreseen/Baby, I will come"

Peace.

Hey,what happened,the other day I was the 2nd person to add a reply,now its gone.I wanna know what happened.

Yes!!! Love this album!

Its just so girly and silly.

The lyric which always stayed in my mind is from "Love On A Blue Train"...

Let me take your ticket and I'll show you where to stick it

A work of genius!

Efan said:

I agree.This is Sheila's strongest album EVER and it's a shame that she (and Warners/Paisley Park) didn't promote it more.The first single "Hold Me" became a sizable hit on R&B radio,all it needed was a video.Then,they should have released the songs "Faded Photographs","The Pride And The Passion" and "Love On A Blue Train" as follow-up singles.

I think what happened was,Sheila decided to become Prince's drummer and that's when they stopped promoting this album.It's a shame because on this album,Sheila finally came into her own,even though it's clear that Prince was heavily involved in the production.

BinaryJustin said:

The lyrics to "Love On A Blue Train" are outrageous!

I love the lines "Funny when our eyes met,the walls around me turned wet" and "Never mind the porter,we can hide it on the floor baby,I don't care".

Sheer brilliance!!