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What's the Story: Miss Understood? Sounds like Vanity and Prince. Presumably a Vanity 6 song? I don't want you to think like me. I just want you to think. | |
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Handy Wiki . . .
The band's origins started with the disintegration of The Time in 1984. Lead singer Morris Day had left the band to pursue a solo career. At this point, guitarist Jesse Johnson became the de facto band leader. Prince suggested restructuring the band with new member Paul Peterson to head the group, but Johnson opposed. However, like Day, Johnson soon left the band to pursue his own solo career. A few of The Time's newer members followed Johnson to join his backing band (called Jesse Johnson's Revue (band)). The Time had served as an outlet for Prince to release more music. Prince invited the remaining members of The Time: Jellybean Johnson, Jerome Benton and Paul Peterson to his home and presented them with his new project. They agreed to become a new band called "The Family", with Peterson (renamed St. Paul) as the new frontman and bassist. Johnson and Benton reprised their familiar roles from The Time. To the mix, Prince added his then girlfriend Susannah Melvoin, the twin sister of Revolution guitarist Wendy Melvoin, as a backing singer and keyboardist. The fifth member was Eric Leeds, the brother of Prince's tour manager Alan Leeds, who provided saxophone and flute. Guitarist Miko Weaver was credited in the album's booklet but for some reason he wasn't officially a member of the band (his name was probably added only to justify guitar being played on the album, Prince not wanting to be credited at all.) The band's name, "The Family." Much like The Time, the band's material was composed nearly entirely by Prince, with the exception of "River Run Dry", which was written by Revolution drummer, Bobby Z. Prince wrote and performed all the other tracks and simply overdubbed Peterson's and Melvoin's vocals and added saxophone and flute by Leeds. Indeed, on several tracks, Prince's vocals can be clearly heard. Some of the original demos are circulating amongst fans with Prince's lead vocals (as well as two outtakes: the instrumental "Feline" and the pop song "Miss Understood".) As on other associates' albums, Prince falsely gave credit to the various band members for writing credits, though he kept his name on "Nothing Compares 2 U." The tracks were all recorded in a few weeks' span, at the end of the year 1984, after Prince had finished sessions for Around The World In A Day and just before he started to record music for Sheila E.'s Romance 1600 and his own Parade. The album itself is a surprising mix of uptempo funk songs ("High Fashion", "Mutiny"), unconventional soul ballads ("Nothing Compares 2 u", "Desire"), jazz-funk instrumental tracks ("Yes", "Susannah's Pajamas") and new wave songs ("The Screams Of Passion", "River Run Dry".) An extended version of "The Screams Of Passion" was released on the eponymous and only single from the album. For several months in 2002, St. Paul broadcast an alternate version of "Nothing Compares 2 U" on his website, thus making it an "official" release of sorts (though it's unknown if Prince -presumably the legal owner of this version's tape- was consulted about it.) [Edited 8/2/08 22:29pm] I don't want you to think like me. I just want you to think. | |
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Yes, it is Susannah on lead vocals for miss understood. It is an OKish song. | |
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since when was Susannah on keyboards?? | |
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