It just angers me to see how "Parade" gets unfairly criticized for being too artsy-fartsy" or whatever. But when you look at the tour though, you'd be witnessing the biggest James Brown tribute show. The Parade tour is one of my favorites and still to this very day kicks my ass. The funkiness and soulful sounds of it all is amazing! Yeah, there may be elements of Classical, Jazz, Rock, Pop, etc. But the band was so tight and fused all those genres with the funk and soul of Prince. So those naysayers who didn't think that Parade wasn't funky enough have obviously not considered the tour behind the album. This was the Revolution at its peak if you ask me.

i personally think parade is a fantastic album. i'd rather listen to that than TRC any day. beautifully crafted songs, fantastic musicianship.

i bought it on gatefold 12" vinyl as well a few years back, and it sits in pride of place in my bedroom

Parade
[Edited 7/27/07 7:55am]

Parade is my favorite album

It's amazingly tight, yet flaundery. I love it for being two opposite things at the same time. It's slightly schizo, multilayered funk.

To this day, Parade is one of my favorite albums! It's probably one of the most diverse, immaculate, and crafted albums he ever produced. It doesn't even seem like a soundtrack to a movie. The band covered so much groud and a myriad of styles within the twelve songs on the album and they did it effortlessly. My favorite cut on here will have to be Anotherloverholenyohead. Prince and The Revolution was definitely at their creative peak and it is one of P's greatest achievements. I always consider it to be the calm before the storm that would be Sign "O" The Times.

My favourite album of all time - and the tour was the first concert I ever went to - and since then only Lovesexy has topped it.

vivid said:

Mine too!

But even though I loooove Lovesexy, I like long versions over medleys, so SOTT-tour it is for me.

I was SO wow-ed by the SOTT shows @ the Galgenwaard in Utrecht that year that i did not realise it was one of my best concert experiences ever.

But SO glad I had decided to never miss a Prince show in Holland after Parade... I wish someone would have told me about aftershows in 87, though, so I would have been prepared in '88

I Love Parade, but in an interview even Prince says he wasn't satisfied with it.

silverchild said:

You mean storm in a good way right? I love Parade and my Fav track is Girls & Boys...

I have never seen Parade as artsy-fartsy

(I know, Vainandy, i know.....)

He experiments more with his arrangements, with the sound of his music, with incorporating new styles, but on most songs the funk-element is there in the beats and rhythems, it just that he 'colours' the arrangements in a different way.

When i think of the term artsy-fartsy i think of artists who are DELIBERATELY trying too sound like they are saying: look how experimental i am! Listen to my great virtuosity! Its a forced manner of experession: pretentiousness for the sake of being pretentious.

I dont really hear that on Parade, i hear foremost a musician and his band who are widening their musical horizons in a playfull way, too me it sounds mostly as a band who is ENJOYING itselve while trying out new things and new arrangements. Its not forced, but a natural development.

I sometimes have the idea that some earlier 'fans' label that album as artsy-fartsy, JUST because their are new styles to be heard on, just because it has jazz- and classical elements, just because it sounds more european. And maybe even because it sounds too 'white' for some black people, i know, its an edgy subject, but i dont see why Prince as a MUSICIAN in the first place should keep himselve within certain stylistic boundaries, especially when he and his band sound that they are enjoying themselves playing this new music.

In short, Parade IMO is unjustifially seen by some people as an artsy-fartsy album, while it is just a new and logical phase in the creative development of Prince and the Revolution.

RenHoek said:

most definitely, because I've considered SOTT to be a "short-lived" comeback for him
[Edited 7/27/07 11:25am]

NWF said:

I love them during this period (which inspired my username, haha), so creative and poetic but still totally funky and upbeat. I love the words as well as the music, "there's nothing greater than U and me" from Mountains is so simple, yet so powerful. Its one of my favourites, I like seeing them play this song at the end of UTCM up in the sky.

The B-sides and outtakes from this period are brilliant too. Good times!

Riverpoet31 said:

Honey, that album sounds too "white" for some white people too.

vainandy said:

Naw, it sounded too "european" for some white people too.

To ad something:

I think Prince musical career during the second halve of the eighties wasnt evolving as 'strange' as some make it out to be.

I mean, i think we can agree on the development of The Minneapolis Sound, from Dirty Mind unto Purple Rain, but IMO his development during the period 1985 - 1988 was as logical and gradually as during the period 1981-1985.

Listen to the following albums from Prince and his side-musicians and you hear a gradually and logic development of the music.

Around the world in a day (focussing on the pop-elements of Purple Rain, with the help of Wendy and Lisa adding more colour to the arrangements, but still using that typical Linnmachine beats)

-->

The Family (Using the Minneapolis-sound of The Time, mixing it with orchestrations and some jazz-elements on a couple of songs)

-->

Parade (using elements of both ATWIAD and The Family-album, putting some different accents in the arrangements, changing the drumsound, building with different sounds, instrumental colours and styles around those beats)

-->

Dream Factory (Building further on elements of Parade, but focussing more on pop / rock-compositions, mixed with some more experimental 'suites')

-->

Camille (a sharp reaction on Dream Factory, after he disbanded the Revolution, going for a more sober, almost demo-like funksound, aking to 1999).

-->

Sign of the Times (is a mixture between Dream Factory, Camille material, and some other more sober tracks, but without the Camille-voice).

-->

8 (Madhouse) / The Black album (Prince was allready exploring jazz on Parade and Sign of the Times, but it seems - with the help of i guess mostly Eric Leeds - he did get the vibe to produce more jazz-influenced music. 8 is more jazz, with funky elements, while The Black album is funk with jazzy aspects, and also builts further on the Camille material.

-->

Lovesexy (mixing all musical styles he has tried out during the eighties, funk, rock, psychedelic pop, dance and world-music, and trying to integrate them with aone single unified (band)-sound. In that sense its his most cohevise album since Purple Rain, i think. The songs share a mixture of real drums and programmed beats, synth strings (instead of Clare Fisher orchestrations), lots of instrumental and vocal harmonies, and a jazz-element (using horns on every song, often using countermelodies and breaks) that derives from his work on The Black album and The Madhouse album.)

NWF said:

Note to such morons: music is supposed to = art.
[Edited 7/27/07 11:39am]

Riverpoet, your description of those albums pretty much hit the nail dead on the head. I've never heard the "Dream Factory" or "Camille" albums since they are unreleased but you probably are dead on those also, considering that your other descriptions are so accurate.

Yeah, Prince was definately expanding musically during the late 80s. However, most folks were not happy with that expansion and were more into the artists' albums that had completely left the Prince camp such as Andre Cymone, Jesse Johnson, and Morris Day, who all three still had that early 80s signature Minneapolis Sound (the sound that people wanted to hear without all the other artsy/fartsy instruments added).

I eventually grew to love the late 80s Prince and protegees albums (most of them) but would I rather have some more of that hard ass, cold Minneapolis funk with no artsy/fartsy instruments whatsoever.....hell yeah!

Also, funk as a whole by all artists was dying real quick in the late 80s. If Shitney Houston had not come along, slowed down and fucked up R&B as a whole, and everyone else was still jamming hard like they previously had....I probably would have kicked Prince's ass to the curb during the late 80s.
.
.
[Edited 7/27/07 12:02pm]

It's a classic album.

I can't get enough of this record lately.

I dont like this album. Why? No oomph. All skitsy horns and so-so crooning that boarders on warbeling(w/ a few great exceptions: mountains, sometimes it snows, anotherlover..). But everytime theres mention of it on this board, I try to listen again and see what Im missing. So, here goes again. I do agree with the statement that this material is awesome LIVE, but on record it annoys me.


**preparing to be annoyed...again***

GangstaFam said:

I know THAT feeling...

I have been updating my Parade playlist, started as a completist (heh) compilation with the album, b-sides, extended and edits, but I have been slipping more stuff onto the playlist.

HamsterHuey said:

I've been working on a companion disc of outtakes...sorta an updated "Charade".

Oh and I still owe you something!

GangstaFam said:

Oh, you can keep your firstborn.



plays George Michael's I Want Your Sex

GangstaFam said:

It's a bit hard, to get a good Parade playlist without turning it into a Dream Factory or pre-Crystal Ball.

Just a few songs apply;
Old Friends 4 Sale
Neon Telephone
that instrumental version of An Honest Man
All My Dreams
In A Large Room With No Lights
Others Here With Us

And it already gets too messy with those chaotic(but yet brilliant) last three. I understand why they got cut.

Maybe some demo's of songs he did better on the album; Wendy's Parade, I Wonder U and Love Or Money.

Re-instate Wendy's '4 God's Sake!'

To me; no Dream Factory or tracks like Train or Wonderul Ass, that are more Dream Factory to me than Parade.


Am I missing tracks?

HamsterHuey said:

Sure. I wouldn't include "In A Large Room with No Light" though. Definitely Dream Factory or "Crucial" if you stick with the old bootleg.

But "Splash" fits in there nicely. "Heaven" too. And the rehearsal of "Go".

I'll dig out my comp.

GangstaFam said:

Large Room is PERFECT! It's got the layering, even if it is FULL, know what I mean? Splash I tried, but found too flat, compared to the rest.

Heaven I left out for quality reasons, even if it is one of my FAVEST outtakes; if you only knew how often that track stretched time for me in my darkened room, lit only by my candles and crystal ball. That trackis TOTALLY on it's own, so beautiful, but not, literally, from this world.

Hehehe, Crucial is too much Crystal Ball to me. I'd rather gowith Power Fantastic, come to think of it.