hollywooddove said:

Nonsense

Prince isn't Madonna (with all due respect for her)

i think he needs to step away from the pro-tools, listen to how raw some of his old stuff was, pick up a guitar, get a band together in a room, and hit the record button.

NoVideo said:

Naw, if there were pro-tools back in the 80's he would have used it.
Its not about the tools, its about the mind, and just like he worked the linn to create some cool stuff, he would have done the same with pro-tools or anything else at his disposal. He was just a badass

That would be a huge mistake. Prince just needs to get in where he fits in. He's gotta buncha fans that hang on his every breath.He oughta work on appreciating and pleasing those people, and stop trying to prove his worth. Prince was a trailblazer, and trailblazers don't follow.

I think these ideas seem to be more about people's egos wanting Prince to be 'out there' & successful to justify their own support of prince. ...Basically to somehow be proved 'right'.

A more fashionable, mainstream acceptable Prince = A more fashionable, mainstream acceptable Prince fan.

WetDream said:

I understand your confusion with my question when you look at it through your perspective... so let me say it like this...

Why isn't Prince doing music that is salable to the masses. And I do feel that most of the present dance hits have common sound... and this is what I call modern... no matter what it is rooted in.... modern is defined by what is going on now.

ufoclub said:

i'm thinking more along the lines of "the truth", produced by
nigel godrich and alva noto.

Nah,he doesn't need to collaborate with Lil Wayne bad idea

Though it is tempting to say 'yes' I will refrain from doing so;
I love Prince for being Prince; I do not want him to sound like
any one out there; when he gets on musical trend, it does not always
work for him. his music is unique..it is nothing like anything out
there. It's strange, because each time I listen to a Prince track,
I pick up little nuances that are truly his, and his alone.

hollywooddove said:

That's Prince's problem for the past 20 years. He's been chasing trends instead of creating them. It started in 1990 when he started putting rap, and the typical hollow cow-bell/percussion sounds into his songs (especially the maxi singles). That doesn't mean he didn't have incredibly forward-thinking music at times, especially from 1992-1995.

Anyone who'd want Prince to do a song with a gutter snipe like Lil Wayne should never own a Prince album in the first place.

Great question. Here's my spin on it. When Sheila E did the football spoof video , the track she had playing was pure 100% kick ass 80's purple freak music. A lot us loved this and had us wishing he'd get back to that sound. Since then I have changed my opinion. The man is 51 - he cannot do waht the yung ones do, music just don't work like that, it's having your dad try to rap i.e. a very bad idea!!. So what I want simply is for him to find new and original ways to express his ideas.Also I want there to be some actual craft and effort put in and NOT the slap dash 'it'll do' attitude that punctuates so much of his music over the last 15 years or so.
By the way Madonna really sticks with trends now i.e. modern producers, up to the minute beats etc BUT it's starting to look and sound embarrassing [IMHO!]

purpledoveuk said:

Prince has used drum machines from the early 1980's and a lot of time has proven himself to be a great drum programmer. I love some of the drum machine programming on MPLSound. So when he uses them is he chasing trends or just using something he enjoys using and is very good at.

modern.....?

whaddya think he WAS doing 30 years ago with synths and the Linn

and for the record-colonised mind has to be one of the most modern-forward thinking tunes he's done in ages

he does not need to copy any trends

fair enough-these days he hardly sets many trends

but once upon a time

HE PRETTY MUCH SET EM ALL


PS-why do folk think gaga invented cool pop

she/he may be creative clothing wise

but she has a huge team to produce her stuff

which is hardly as original as one guy doing it pretty much alone

in 30 years-she'll be remembered for the costumes

not the tunes

polkadotbliss said:

Agree 100% about Prince....but you never know about Gaga, I think people look past her costumes and give her enough credit. She is pretty young and has her whole life ahead of her.

Guitar, Drums & Bass in a studio. Press record.

That is all.

I want Prince to go completely acoustic for an album. Just Prince and an acoustic guitar, and/or just Prince and a piano.

the truth.....
ona piano and voice.....

y'all need 2 stop trippin'

listen to the MUSIC on Lotus and take it back to 3121

if Prince said the kinds of thangs y'all wanted him 2 say,

y'all know that complaints would not be warrented;

remember back in the day when rock n roll friends dissed Prince?

well, there's no more of that, he has proved that, he has crossed that line

of ethnically approached music...he has crossed all borders

all hail the Purple King in town

There's no "modern" music, and probably there will never be again. The 00s decade (and, so far, 2010) has showed us that music is recycling itself, going around in circles, which is sad. Lady GaGa is playin' an over-the-top version of 1983's Madonna...no more and no less...

And the whole hard-synths pop of Timberlake, Rhianna, etc. is already gettin' old... just like late 80s hard-dance was a corpse by 1991...

JoeTyler said:

truth

JoeTyler said:

Only if you're sitting in the mainstream. In less popular genres, there is plenty of groundbreaking music that is still pushing the envelope and coming up with new styles.

Don't expect too much from Top 40 music - rarely have the groundbreakers also been popular like the Princes and Bowies of this world (as examples). And as music has become more and more commoditised and monetised, so has the diversity and innovation within popular music diminished.

Mindflux said:

I can't see a clear evolution in genres like funk, soul, metal, blues or even electronic music, and I wish I could...
[Edited 4/30/10 12:14pm]

JoeTyler said:

I could give you a whole ream of artists (particularly in electronic music) that are CRASHING barriers and taking music in to new realms.

And you really should check someone like Squarepusher (Tom Jenkinson) - the world's best bass player by some margin, making incredible experimental music that takes in funk, drum'n'bass and something uniquely him. Some of it is too much for some (high-tempo/frenetic) but there's no denying the incredible compositinal elements and musicianship. Sometimes he sounds like Weather Report on 78rpm, other times he's like Aphex Twin and in other tracks he's just his own thing entirely.

He uses a mix of electronics and real instruments - sometimes playing drum kit himself, sometimes straight, sometimes sampling his own playing and cutting it in to extreme rhythms, sometimes programming it all (and nobody can program beats like this man) and his bass playing.....OMG. Your jaw will just drop.

Want to hear him do a track that's funky, sounds retro, but completely modern at the same time? Check E8 Boogie from Hard Normal Daddy. Industrial funk with an almost Prince quality to it? Check out Phat Controller from the same album. Want to hear his take on modern garage and take it out of this universe (its also the mos "pop" he's gotten)? Check out "My Red Hot Car". As one reviewer noted, this track is like he invented a time machine, went forward and nicked all the best riffs to come, came back and whipped them all in to a track.

Anyway, hope that will open your ears and your mind

Mindflux said:

n e examples?

Mindflux said:

thanks for the recommendations ; maybe it's just that I've been out of the underground for some years now; in fact, I gave up on music (as a whole) a couple of years ago...

NelsonR said:

See above/below

Well it can happen!

skywalker said:

Dozens? As in 24+? I like a lot of Prince's post 1995 music but I don't think he had dozens of songs that should have been hits. Maybe about ten.

I still don't understand why "Black Sweat" was not, at least, a moderate top10 hit...