Source: Cracked.com

#4. "Kiss" - Prince

Love him or hate him, we can't deny that Prince conquered pop music in the mid-80s, slapped its ass, pulled its hair and convinced it to do more than a few things it would regret later.

In 1986, Prince was at the top of his game and had started taking other bands under his dainty, bedazzled wing, like Morris Day's band The Time and the "chick who's humping Prince" project Appolynia 6. Also this band Mazarati but, as you'll soon see, no one really gives a damn about Mazarati.

Prince was diverse and talented enough to realize when he was writing a song that wasn't a Prince song. Such was the case, at the time, with "Kiss" which, believe it or not, was composed as a folksy/country song. Unable to finish it, he brought the demo track to his pet project du jour, Mazarati.


Who were obviously waiting for that perfect country/folk track to make it big time.

Unimpressed and kinda pissed, the band spent an entire day in the Paisley Park studio with engineer David Z completely rebuilding the track from the ground up. They retired for the night not believing the track was good enough. Or so they thought.

David Z returned the next morning to find Prince in the studio, tightening up his own freshly-recorded guitar and vocal tracks to the song. Reacting to Z's stunned confusion, Prince retorted that "This song is too good for you guys. I'm taking it back." This decision is likely the reason you had probably never heard of Mazarati before today.

Prince started cutting. He dropped the bass guitar off the track, along with all instruments but voice, guitar, drum machine and backing vocals. The result was shockingly sparse; only nine tracks were included in the mix down (most modern pop songs include roughly that many tracks for the vocals alone).


Prince is crazy!

When the people at Warner heard it, they kind of wondered where, you know, all the instruments and stuff were (they said it sounded like a demo). So if you're keeping score, the song was rejected by Prince, rejected by a shitty almost-Prince funk band and then reimagined as a sparse, bass-less song which was then almost rejected by the label.

Prince, probably after crossing his arms and whimpering in falsetto, told them that was the track they were getting and they better just deal with it. After a massive fight, the label reluctantly released it.

"Kiss" hit #1, and proved a triumph for a musician who was given more artistic freedom than pretty much any since. As for Mazarati, well, Prince later provided them with an outtake song by The Time called "Jerk Out" that made it nowhere until The Time took it back and made another # 1 hit off of it.

Seriously, after doing the research for this, we here at Cracked have been sending Mazarati friend requests on their official Myspace page, possibly one of the saddest official Myspace ...ages ever. In-house Cracked band DIKCHOKE has only been around as long as this article, and we've already accumulated twice as many friends.

I know it's a pretty well known story but I think Cracked's writing gives it a new enough edge to be worth posting!

nice article. thanks

Prince always gets 100% credit for writing and producing ‘Kiss’ …. But David Z seems to be the one who really set the track on fire with its production…. He’s the person behind the drum programming and the gated acoustic guitar that gave the track that real punch.

The team of musicians and producers Prince worked with in the 1980’s took his music to another level.

johnny2000 said:

In the liner notes for Parade, "Kiss" is clearly marked as being arranged by David Z.

So there's a link to Mazarati's Myspace in the article, which has their version of Kiss on it.

This is news, yes? I didn't think their version had ever been released.

It's terrible, by the way.

billymeade said:

But that's a lie. It's Prince giving crumbs to the guy who MADE "Kiss".

TwiliteKid said:

IT'S THE SAME FRIKKING RECORDING. Just a different mix.

BartVanHemelen said:

God you're a dick. Have you ever heard this version? With Terry Casey singing lead and the extra elements?

BartVanHemelen said:

Bart's right you know. Even Mazarati's backing vocals have been left as is.
Obviously, the song is sung with less gusto than P., but to say that it sucks is a bit off the mark.

Thanks for posting this

I've heard a few different versions of this story, but this is the first time I'm hearing about Bobby Z's brother's involvement
And I thought he and Prince hadn't collaborated since the beginning of his career

@ the fact I learned something new

MartyMcFly said:

I'm fully aware that it's the same basic tracks. But there are several BIG differences between the two versions (the bassline, the drum track, the weak ass guitar break, not to mention the dreadful vocals) that I think lead one to safely say that Mazarati's version is terrible.
[Edited 4/23/09 12:51pm]

TwiliteKid said:

TwiliteKid said:

I just listened to it and I fully agree. It's shit and it was far from being a potential hit.

BartVanHemelen said:

So by this logic, everyone who gets up at a karaoke bar and sings 'Summer Lovin' off-key, might just as well be Olivia Newton-John & John Travolta.

You seriously hear their version as anything less than terrible? It amazes me that Prince heard this, and saw a song it it. I barely made it through the whole thing.

It might be time for you to take a break, I remember a time your posts raised legitimate questions, were at least thought provoking, but lately it seems the more posts like this you make, the less credible you appear.

Nice article, thanks for posting. And obviously one of his best songs!

TwiliteKid said:

Not released, but circulating.

PEJ said:

OK I just listened to the Mazarati version on their Myspace and I have to say their version is pathetic, only now I realize that Prince's vocals were needed to make the song, the melody was not enough for hit potential.

BriaVelveeta said:

Not the same thing. Prince used Mazarati's recording. it's a different mix.

BriaVelveeta said:

You're going by an mp3 from a bootlegged recording from a tape that likely had the wrong pitch, and comparing it to a studio recording. I'm not saying theirs is as good or better, all I'm pointing out is that IT'S THE SAME FRIKKING RECORDING. Those guys on backup on Prince's "Kiss"? MAZARATI. Because he used THEIR RECORDING.

This is no secret. "Kiss" is probably one of the best documented Prince tracks, I've seen several articles online from major publications that discuss it, and Uptown did a one page article on it 15 years ago.

Mazarati's version = Prince's version, except that he added his vocals and did a different mix.

BartVanHemelen said:[quote]

BriaVelveeta said:

and a whole new guitar track.

vinx98 said:

Right.

BartVanHemelen said:[quote]

BriaVelveeta said:

Then that means it's not the same frikking record.

BartVanHemelen said:

No BART its not the same song. The mix may be the same and the backround vocals. But the lead vocals is horrendous. There there is NO chicken scratch guitar on the original. These two factors make a HUGE difference in the song. If Mazarati would have released it, it would have sung faster than a boner after a long nite of drinking Hennessey

either way, this article missed some stuff:

- paisley park studios didn't exist in 1986. the track was recorded at sunset sound in los angeles.

- prince didn't make the song for himself at all. susan rogers said that mazarati was at the studio at the same time and pestered him for a song, so he disappeared with his acoustic guitar and a boombox tape recorder and came back ten minutes later with the (circulating) acoustic version of the song. he literally just made it up off the top of his head. david z gated prince's guitar playing to create the basic drum track. then they finished it. prince came into the studio, heard what they had done, and snatched it back away from them, saying "this is too good for you guys!"

stanleylieber said:

can i add that prince was so enchanted by the David Z mix that he took his ghettoblaster outside with a tape of the song and played it over and over again whilst shooting a few hoops.

Maybe only us die-hard fans have ever heard of Mazarati. I thought that was a pretty unfair and harsh description of them. I loved them!

i bought mazaratis album when it first came out and it sucked major....well, you know. their version of kiss stinks worse than my cat rebel's fecal matter

Rebelution said:

its still better than the tom jones version

vinx98 said:

I must disagree on this. When I was a kid, before I even knew who Prince was, I loved Tom Jones' version haha. I have to admit it!

A cool discussion of this has also been happening over here
http://prince.org/msg/8/305958


Swa