i remember the first time i heard a prince song for the first time,i was 15 it was 85 listening to the american top twenty charts on radio 2 with paul gambacinni and he played pasiley park,that was it i was hooked,that song was so different from anything i had heard before,for weeks after that i saved up my pocket money and went out and bought all his past albums,as we only had a record player downstairs in the living room my parents had to listen to his music and they where abit shocked at some of the lyrics lol,my parents hunted high and low for a video copy of purple rain when it was released and later told me they had to pay about 60 pound and about the same for u.t.c.m,my mum begged me to take her to a prince concert so in the end i gave in and took her too one,i cant remember which one it was but i remember staring at her in disbeleaf when i heard her singing to sexy m.f lol,well there is some of my early memories of becoming and being a prince fan,id love to hear yours?

I'm not sure if it's the same, but there was a thread very, very recently about "when did you first start listening to Prince".

But I'll answer anyway.

I asked my mom to buy me a K-Tel album from Target in 1980. It was called Soundwaves. (It was never issued on CD, but I have 2 vinyl copies). It had great hits like "Upside Down" from Diana Ross, "Let's Get Serious" from Jermaine Jackson, "Funkytown" from Lipps, Inc and a load of others. But on side one, it had "I Wanna Be Your Lover" from some weird dude named Prince. The album cover to PRINCE was even on the back of the record jacket. I fell in love with the song. I hated that it was so short (under 3 minutes for the radio edit). I've been a fan since.

And over the years, since Napster and iTunes, I've collected all those songs and made a playlist on my iPod of the same track listing as the album.

Prince influenced me a lot in high school. With my parents VERY ugly separation and divorce (1980), music truly became an escape. I started reading lyric sheets, producer credits, musician credits, all the "Thank You's", etc. (I knew who Randy Jackson was way before he even joined Journey in the 80's, simply because he was on every record I had it seemed.) Prince was just in that mix of escapism. And the fact that he released an album a year didn't hurt either. I had a purple trench coat, round glasses, etc etc. I don't regret any of it, despite of how crazy I might have looked. It was the 80's and I was a teenager. (UTCM was out when I graduated high school in 1986). It was a fun time growing up with Prince. I'm only 10 years younger than him.

When I was 9 yrs old. My brother owned a copy of 'Purple Rain' on audio cassette (remember those?), we both shared a walkman (remember those?), so one time I decided to listen to the album since he wasn't using it. For weeks on end, I used it, played it, loved it. So much that is annoyed and frustrated my brother because he couldn't use the walkman (i was always listening to it) and he was tired of hearing me talk about how much I loved "Baby, I'm a Star'. So one day, when he'd had enough, he took the tape out of the walkman (while I was listening to it) and chucked it out the window into the street where it got run over by a car and smashed into a thousand pieces....

I almost caught whiplash at my first Prince concert. It was during the encore, after he had already incited complete mayhem throughout the night, beat slamming, never missing a lick Prince reached deep down into the front of his sweaty thong, and the chick behind me took my head with one side of her hand, and went... "MOVE!!!" as she swept my head sharply to the left! YEOW!!! She almost snapped my neck! DAYUM!!! The crowd was screaming even wilder as I recovered and re-focused my attention back to the stage, where Prince was currently beating-off a microphone while wiping imaginary nutt from his eye! I shit you not, I'm lucky to have survived! LOL.

---

Sometimes I find it hard to believe that I have to go back 30 years to remember falling in love with Prince, and the "Prince," album. I've spent so many hours of my life thinking about where Prince was and what he was doing. Every step I have taken ...I walked wanting Prince beside me. Life took me in other directions with 2 failed marriages yet I still walk toward giving him an eternal hug. There's so much on my mind to say any more than that.

The first time I ever heard Prince I was 9 years old laying in bed one night listening to my record player/radio with some huge ass head phones on so as not to wake my Granny A DJ named Mojo in Detroit played Do Me Baby that night and I heard it and instantly became a fan. I fell in love with the voice first and when I finally saw Prince I knew I was a fan for life.

uh, playing head in front of my mother's friend

ernestsewell said:

I rememeber going over my friend Steve's house after school in 1980 and going into his bathroom and going down on each other while listening to the "Dirty Mind" album". We had to "Gett Off" before his Mom came home at 4:00pm. It was very innocent, just boys exploring each other and discovering our sexuality. Good times! I haven't spoken to him since 1988, and I have no doubt that he wouldn't rememeber giving/getting head on side 2 from "Dirty Mind". It continued throughout high school listening to the "1999" album and hearing the line "...I just wanna fuck the taste out of your mouth..." Can U relate?

I was about 8 years old at a skating rink in Augusta, Georgia (home of James Brown). "CONTOVERSY" came on. I was instantly addicted to the beat. I wondered who was singing. I started hearing the song on the radio and discovered the artist's name was Prince. I wondered who Prince was. My friend's big sister had a Prince poster on her closet door. He had on bikini briefs posing in a shower. I remembered looking up at it and falling in love! I was EIGHT! Twenty years later, I purchased the poster at Prince Fest in Toledo, Ohio. That was 10 years ago. I'm still in LOVE....

I enjoy telling these two stories:

--I first saw Prince on the MTV Music Awards when I was 5. I had no clue in hell who he was. I was just flippinf the channels on the TV in my room and saw this little painted dude in a bright yellow outfit shouting into a microphone. It caught my eye because of the loud color. I didn't really notice the orgy going on onstage. So I'm standing there, holding a baby doll and watching this man, and then he swung around with his booty hanging out. <--that was me.
I didn't really understand it and was wondering if I was doing something wrong seeing this man's booty, and I changed the channel because I didn't want to get in trouble. LOL.
--When I was 12, I had a friend that was OBSESSED, hear me OBSESSED with Prince. Coming and going she was always talking about Prince..Prince...PRINCE. So she kept telling me "Tiff, you gotta see Purple Rain" I had heard of Purple Rain vaugely and after much urging, I finally went to the video store and rented it. Blew my mind out my damn skull. I had never seen anything like it, the club scene, the cursing, And Prince slapping the taste out Apollonia's mouth.
I was mortified and also strangely titilated by this moody little man.

It's kind of the same way now. He scare the hell outta me, but I just wanna also pick him up and tickle him with a feather.

I was 9 when I first heard "Raspberry Beret" on the radio and seeing the video on our video show in New Zealand at the time called Ready to Roll (Later RTR countdown, they used to play Machine Gun by the Commodores as an opening track). Being 2 young to consume music at the time, I just heard songs until late 1989, when I bought (Like Ernestsewell), a cheap ass compilation album of "hits" that had just dropped off the charts called "Pump up the Hits 89". On it was the hit by Technotronic featuring Felly (A belgian, zairiean dance group!!!!) called Pump up the Jam hence the name. It also had Electric Youth, Especially for you, Ride on Time and Personal Jesus by Depeche Mode, and a really good song by Neneh Cherry called Kisses in the Wind. But it had Partyman by Prince (I thought that weird Michael Jackson like guy who wears purple). Listened to it and thought it was really funky. But it wasn't late 1991 that Cream got me hooked into Prince. It was then I decided to devote my life to Prince. I promptly scrimped my allowance together and bought a cassette copy of Diamonds and Pearls, and all the cassingles for it. (Remember those).
[Edited 5/6/09 19:45pm]

I love these threads!

Anywho, I truly can't remember the very first song I ever heard of his but I remember specifically two times that got me hooked on him for the long haul. I was maybe 10 or so (maybe a little younger) when my deaf cousin drove a group of us to Santa Cruz (CA). She was blasting the radio while we drove through the hills so she could feel the vibration. That's how she 'listened' to music. I remember I Wanna Be Your Lover blowing my eardrums out, hahahhah! I loved it! As kids, we all listened to the 1999 album and some of his other songs that we heard on the radio but one day I heard Do Me Baby for the first time and wondered what the woman's name was that sang the nasty song. I didn't even understand what it meant, the sentences, etc. but the overall 'sound' was just kinky to me. I didn't even know what 'kinky' meant but that's sure what it sounded like nevertheless. I later found out it was Prince and for some reason just thought that was so cool!! hahah! I don't know why, maybe just because he was different and embraced it.

I heard Soft & Wet on the radio. Loved it immediatly! They never back annouced it, so I kept wondering who is this girl group, this song is jammin!!
i would frequent the local record stores often. i saw these book covers by the door with pictures of Prince. A lot of kids in my 8th grade class also had these book covers. I was like, who the hell is Prince. When I made the connection, I was hooked. When I bought the album "For You" and I read the inner sleeve and saw that he did EVERYTHING, I knew I was going to be a fan for life.
(well, at least until 1993/94)

I was 8 years old. And I heard "Sexuality" playing on the tv - the video was cool and i just loved that funk groove. So I took my week's pocket money and went off to by the 7" single.

I had a chance to tell Prince this story that my first introduction to him was "Sexuality" and I was 8 years old, and he looked a bit shocked. He laughed and said "man your parents were pretty cool".

I can even still remember creating my own 12" mix playing the track and recording and pausing my tape deck to create extended and repeated parts.

From there I was hooked.

Swa

I was about 6 years old. My mom always cleaned house on Saturday, and she would put on a record while she cleaned. The first time I remember hearing "Little Red Corvette" I almost danced myself to death. I was 6, dancing around the living room like I was a mad child. haha.
Anyway, from the first time I heard it I made mom play ONLY Prince records when she cleaned. As I grew older and was able to go to the "wrecka stow" alone, I bought ALL the Prince music I could buy. And here I am at age 31 and still buying all the Prince music I can buy...plus other items.
His music is the best to me. It speaks to me in a way no other music, or musical artist has. I like other music, but Prince music is the best to me!

Swa said:

You had the chance to tell Prince???? How, please tell!!

npggirl77 said:

It was back in 2003 during his Australian tour and you could get a limited number of On Stage Xperience tickets that included a meet and greet. About 12 of us got to meet Prince in a room backstage before the show and have a very relaxed, humorous and enlightening chat with him for about an hour and twenty minutes. And one of the things I got to talk to him about was his music and thank him for introducing me to music - and I told him how his was the first 7" I bought.

Swa

The earliest memory I have of Prince was around Christmas 1983. There was this video show that was showing all the hit videos/songs of 83 and in the middle of the show was Prince. I remember them showing a clip of Prince doing his dance in the Little Red Corvette video and then they showed the video to 1999. I was 4 at the time and I remember looking at him and thinking "Wow, he's a weirdo who kinda looks like Michael Jackson." Then I asked my Mom "Who's the man in the high heeled boots?" and she said and I remember it verbatim, I think that's how it's spelled, "Oh that's Prince." and she said it like it was nothing. I really thought he was strange after that but as I was looking at the video and seeing him perform 1999, I knew in the back of my head that I would remember that man. 26 years later, he's my favorite artist. I've told this story on the org many times in the last 10 years and I never get tired of telling it again and again. I had no idea that it would change my life forever but I'm glad that it did.