I came across this thread on thefenderforum.com about the Leno "Dreamer" performance.

http://www.thefenderforum...hp?t=42180

It's interesting to see what (mostly) non-fans (and musicians at that) think of Prince, his new music, his homage/ripoff of Jimi, his performance skills, his all around talent, etc.

They are not all praising him, but it's mostly positive.

It's especially refreshing because there is clearly not the same level of expectation as you see here "it's not as good as the Undertaker," "Larry's mind control overshadows anything positive Prince does," "meh," "Prince sued me."

It's more or less fresh reactions to music. And interesting to see more than one person say they might have to buy the cd after seeing it. Personally it was my least favorite of the three performances (I wish they'd shown all of Feel Better, that one looked the hottest IMO)

This is old news, I know, from 2009, I hope I'm not duplicating a thread.

I can really appreciate this post: And totally agree with him.

Wow! Great video! What's not to like?

Kickin' backup up band cutting a groove deep as the Snake River Canyon.

Solid performance from a singer/guitar player who can sing the off-time stuff while keeping the guitar on-time and never faultered through the echo parts either. That's tough to do live.

The guitar solos were not blazing note-fests either. He took the time to let notes scream and then developed the sonic palette with judicious and expert use of effects that both thrilled and entertained the audience.

Combine all that with a pro stage, huge sound, awesome lighting, and you have a commercially excellent perfomance that accomplished exactly what it set out to do. Incite & Entertain!

Letting the guitar scream into feedback and then handing to someone in the audience was just pure, old school, rock n' roll genius.

Some people may not care for the music, but if they can't appreciate the level of professionalism and sheer talent embodied in that performance, they might want to consider getting a little more fiber in their diet.

I'm so intrigued by that cut, I may actually buy the album!
.....

Yeah that was a good one!

I think I would go with the poster that said...

'Kinda boring and predictable playing IMO from Prince'

I can't think of anything more uninspiring than having to listen to Prince pretend to be channeling another artist ....
Jimi Hendrix, Ray Charles, Sly, James Brown etc... give it a rest it's so dull to listen to.

Performance wise, it missed some much needed angst- which was fullly recovered on the studio version

As a blues/hard rock n roll guitarrist & Prince advocate, Dreamer is an answered prayer
He nails it.

It's a tune built to be blasted through 100 watt Bose speakers in your car

johnny2000 said:

Or maybe you can enjoy the music for what it's worth and stop comparing it to what it's not. People don't go around moping about how John Mayer can't compare to George Van Eps. It's the quality, the merit of one's work that should be focused purely on.

I can't see why some are so bent on what artists Prince has barely fragmented on, I if anything just think of it as a celebration of those influences
[Edited 3/29/10 19:54pm]

JesusFreak said:

Does John Mayer pretend to channel George Van Eps then? .... I don't think so.

johnny2000 said:

It wasn't my favorite of the three performances, and none of the responses seemed to be totally wowed by Prince's guitar playing. But their perspective is one that is more respectful of the fact that a superstar pop guy can also play guitar pretty respectably.

It's a sort of barometer of how prince is perceived in the world outside prince.org. These are not 14 year olds, of course, but still the perspective is interesting. Even the negative responses are not saying "time to retire" they generally say "he's very talented" or "boring & predictable" at worst.

But boring & predictable comes from comparing him to Robin Trower, Hendrix, and Santana. That still says a lot about his talent--purely as a guitar player, totally ignoring the other aspects of his art.

Mostly I felt the responses here were much more even tempered than we read here on a daily basis. Nobody was praising him as if he were a god in lipstick, nobody was saying it was utterly worthless.

On the whole I felt it represented my feelings about current Prince very well. Still a very talented performer, if not blowing my mind anymore. But just one aspect of his talent is comparable (even if it's infavorably) to the all time greats on the instrument!

Add to that the other two performances which were nothing like this one, and Prince is still way more versatile than just about anyone out there.

Someone actually said he out did Lenny Kravitz!?!?!?!
What? Why the heck is that even a comparison?

NDRU said:

What I liked was even when they disagreed there was name name calling or arguements.
Just different opinions, and people would just accept that.

mostbeautifulboy said:

I guess you mean 'there was NOT name calling... '.

This site is full of 'Prince can do no wrong' fans. You get labeled as a 'hater' if you say anything against his music here (especially the new music !!). I saw Prince live back in the early 1980's but if I suggest that his last 15 years have been mostly uninspired music then I'm a 'hater'....it makes no sense.

The reason why the guitar players site discussion is better is because there are no blinded fans on there.

ronnwinter said:

Because they are black rock stars who have the Jimi Hendrix tag hung on them for no reason oter than their race - which makes it an uninformed and dumb comparison

ronnwinter said:

I think they meant that that type of music is the area that Lenny specializes in, and Prince with this one song outdid Lenny's whole career, basically
[Edited 3/31/10 10:29am]

johnny2000 said:

There were none of either extreme. There was no fan worship, and there was not the disillusioned fan with personal disappointment.