It has been said that with the release of Dirty Mind, is when Prince felt he was getting closer to his real image. It took two records and a lot of experimentation for him to get to that point. After that, he was consistent with his writing and sexual themes. What would we have thought if Dirty Mind was the first note we heard from Prince? If the first image was that cover? Were we prepared to except it more by the release of For You and Prince?
Thank God for the industry of the 70's and letting artists develop and not dropping them if the first album bombs!!!!

Prince became Prince with this album

technically, the prince as we knew/know 'im came out on the 2nd album. most people tend to forget the innuendo was pretty thick on that joint as well.

Handclapsfingasnapz said:

I agree. "For You" is thought of as a cool little "keepsake", but it's still fun to pull it out and say, "man this little cat was 19/20 years old when he did this ish!"

but we Prince

I read that Prince worked a year on For You, because he was such a perfectionist at the time. Because of that the records did cost two times as much as the budget that WB would 'give' to him to produce hirst first 3 records!

Prince said about this album: "I am very proud about this album, technically its perfect, but it isnt me youre hearing, half of the time during the making of this record i almost fell asleep"

The "Prince"-cd was produced in three weeks. Prince did work quick to keep the production-costs low. He said about this record: "with Prince i tried to make a commercial sounding album, because the first turned out being so expensive, i needed to give the record company some money back"

When it comes to Dirty Mind, the story goes that most of the songs on the record are demo's. Prince managers at that time heard those demo's and considered them good enough to release as an album. Because of the explicit lyrics of this material it did take the managers some time convince WB to release Dirty Mind.

Prince said about this record: "This is the first time youre really hearing ME, its who i am. On my first records, i had smart managers who tried to tone me down a bit".

Source: Prince, a musicial biography, Alfred Bos and Tom van Engelshoven (a dutch biography from 1988 / 1989)

Riverpoet31 said:

1) we know this already.

2) no matter the information, that's really not what this thread's about.

Handclapsfingasnapz said:

Always so dry and cutting, but true!

If "Dirty Mind" had been Prince's first album, Rick James would have been his opening act.

...And critics say the 1999 album was a sign of things to come. Nope, that was really Dirty Mind. The songs, the album cover, and, and right down to the packaging-- this was the "true first record.

Actually I think "Controversy" is his real "first" album, not because it would be necessarily of higher quality but because it really defines the prince sound to come for the first time. "Dirty Mind" is still somewhere in-between.

Hmmmmm.... let me see...

1) For You
2) Prince


No, it's definitely his THIRD album.... what kind of fan are you...

Handclapsfingasnapz said:

I agree with that. That album was every bit as Prince like as any other Prince record with the sexy themes, and his persona was androgonus as well.

I must admit that the songwriting on the Prince-album is probably better then that on Dirty Mind.

But Dirty Mind gave him that more rough, elemental sound. I especially dig that dry, telecaster guitarsound.

And, When You were Mine, is Princes really first classic song. Shame it was never released as a single.

Come on now... Prince is about smooth sexy ballads and those are all on Prince, the album before Dirty Mind.

Snap said:

but that's not the point.

Actually, it was the B-Side to the 45 of "Controversy" but I don't think that officially counts as being a single.
[Edited 4/11/05 23:04pm]