there is a person on the org that says:
If you dont wanna see something that might shatter the illusion of Princes god-like staus then dont wath the livesexy video during 'lets go crazy'.
He mimes the guitar solo. Don't argue, go watch it.
He kneels down with his right hand on the floor, yet his guitar manages to rip into a roaring solo. Don't argue that he was simply 'hammering on' the notes with his left hand
because i have studied the clip and it is'nt the case. besides,
His face says it all when he realises that he has missed his 'cue'. want,
further proof?
my dad works on concert rigs and his best friend worked the lovesexy shows - he claimed that prince often mimed over pre-recorded guitar solo's in the show. Albiet, it was prince playing on the pre-recording. I got a Lovesexy Crew T-shirt too! -can this be? prince not playing guitar live sometimes?

thebanishedone said:

okay i have to see this.... what a dissappointment! Not that he didn't play it all right in front (4-5 feet)? of me at the ONA tour...

I once bought these strawberries that looked so good
but one had a little worm in it.

I threw that one away and ate the rest

'tis true. I recommend that doubters go check out the particular performance. it has been discussed here before. WARNING: this topic has been known to split opinion as well as families! Personally, i would put all i own on it being true that he wasn't playing live.

disappointing




maybe thats why lovesexy is not a DVD

this is the most ridiculous thing i have heard in a long time.
Prince has never mimed a guitar solo in concert,come on people!

im checking this out right now!!!

Tis True.

femijiya said:

the entirety of the sott concert vid was mimed (tightly so, but mimed nonetheless).

the Lovesexy Live solo was not synched,it was played live.
Sott was a movie,the dubbing there is understandible,in concert,his guitar is ALWAYS live.

femijiya said:

seems to me that people would have to really sit down and watch multiple shows and compare the solo in each in order to see if this is so.

femijiya said:

My brother said that his guitar instructor said that Prince was miming during
the Musicology TV special during the accoustic set but he did admit that it could just have been how it was edited.

muirdo said:

okay, now that's just wonky right there...

Handclapsfingasnapz said:

trust me,I have seen(and heard)more Prince vids than i could shake a stick at.
his guitar in concert is always live,you do not need to compare any live performances -in concert,his guitar is live.
can you give an example of when his guitar was pantomimed in concert?
what you hear on the lovesexy live show is a mix-combination of miko and princes guitar channels,this was mixed for broadcast sound,hence,you hear miko's guitar squealing while prince is seemingly not even playing his guitar at that point.that doesn't mean that prince was playing to a tape!remember,he had a 2nd guitarist on stage with him.
if you want to insist that i am wrong about this,produce an example of prince not playing guitar live in concert.
television performances do not count.

femijiya said:

no, i totally agree with ya and have always known that p's stuff is live, but you'll run into some folks here who'll think that this is so.

Handclapsfingasnapz said:

FOLKS? u mean frogs

It appears that people ar adament that prince didnt mime the end solo on the specified song. there are those who won't have a bad thing said about prince. man, i love prince but at least i am not so totally in awe of the man that i will at least check the evidence before screaming back with "prince never mimes etc...etc..'.

I notice that some users i.e 'muirdo' have taken the time to go away and observed the moment caught on tape, in full living colour. Then returned and state that it was indeed true.

handclapz, u dissapoint me, i thought if anybody was going to be level headed in balancing the argument it would have been you. This is not a case of me just saying, its true so nergh! i am offering solid evidence which is availible for all to go and watch. Although most will refuse in a bid to preserve their preserved image of Prince, i really reccomend that people check it out.


I would like to state that the pre-recorded guitar solo is undeniably prince. And this solo usually cahnged from show to show. I don't think he used the same pre-recorded solo more than once. Why he did this i do not know, perhaps it gave him greater sonic and production control over the sound he wanted to produce for that particular part of the track
[Edited 3/17/05 6:31am]

im not bottling out here but i have watched it a few times since
and it could be Miko overlapping.

im so confused now.

But there is a bit when he is playing that wee tune(he plays it and everybody shouts "Lets Go" ) when he pics up the
mic stand and walks with it while still playing the tune.

femijiya said:

This is all very true. Prince did indeed share the stage with a 2nd guitarist - Miko. Furthermore, the argument you put across has been stated before. However, Prince's And Miko's guitar tonality and individual style are easily distinguisable from each other. The guitar line you hear is undeniably Princes work, not Mikos. Moreover, even when Princes body language and facial expression clearly reveal that he has missed his cue and he begins to mime the overall sound remains the same. Now, if two guitarists were playing the same line and one came in late then surely a change in the overall sound could be heard in comparison to just miko Playing alone. This is not the case. The sound remains constant. Some may say that prince was using a guitar techniqe called 'mammering on/pulling off'. This method allows a highly distorted guitar to be played single handedly. But, again, the sound of someone employing these techniques sounds different than the same person playin using both hands. Yet, in the clip, the sound remains constant. Can Prince hammer on and still sound the same as if he is picking the instrument? I would say no.Also, i dont think that the actually line being played at the time would have been achievable through mere hammering on.

If nothing else, just check the look on his face when he misses his cue. Its there for all to see.

As i have stated before, i love princes work, he is a great guitarist and the pre-recorded track over which he mimes IS of himself. However, i fear that some people have got purple haze across their eyes when it comes to anything prince - HE IS HUMAN. Check the evidence, please. Counter argue with valid points - in doing so, perhaps you will find an explanation for this that has been over looked. But please dont just argue that 'prince hasn't mimed'. i have no doubt in my mind that this is just a very rare occurence, prince 99.9% plays live.
[Edited 3/17/05 6:54am]

muirdo said:

yes, certain sections ARE undeniably played LIVE - a good instance being the 'lets go!' section which you mention. However, this break down in the music provides the opportunity for the cresendo which follows (the mimed guitar part) to be cued in simply.

howcomeudontcallme said:

what i meant there is that he is playing the tune with his left hand and carrying a mic stand at the same time with his right but still that tune is being played "perfectly".

muirdo said:

oh, i see, got ya. This, too is easily explained for two reasons 1) the line is extremely simply 2) his guitar is so distorted/overdriven and so loud that such an easy 'hammer on' phrase (playing with one hand) is easily achieved. The difficulty with the mimed part that follows is that the actually sound of it is not acievable from hammering on technique alone and if it were his hand is clearly not moving anyway.

muirdo said:

Hate to break it to you, but I was there when he played it. Didn't seem mimed to me. He was the only one on stage and ummm, kinda hard to do that in an intimate setting.

Try to mime an *acoustic* set when there are no other musicians near you and the audience is about ten to twenty feet away from you...

Alasseon said:

thats what i thought.

During the acoustic portion of the Musicology tour, the rhythm guitarist was positioned in a dark spot of the stage. He played the root part of "Little Red Corvette" while Prince did the singing and solos. That was the only song on which the rhythm guitarist played (it was usually the first song of that portion); after it was over, he left the stage.

I'm not sure about the other tours, but the Lovesexy tour gets a free pass from me. Other than that Miko is more than capable of cover prince's ass while he dances around.
This isn't a F'n milli vanilli situation.

Sorry, I don't know what you're talking about! What miming?

I was intrigued, so I dug out my copy of lovesexy live and checked for myself
(3 times to be sure), and I can't see any point in the guitar solo playing that
doesn't match with what you see on screen.