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Thread started 11/24/10 7:30am

skywalker

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Rollingstone: ?uestlove's Top 10 Prince Songs

http://rollingstoneextras.com/playlists/view/questlove

"New Power slide...."
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Reply #1 posted 11/24/10 7:57am

squirrelgrease

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The Roots drummer converted to the Purple side at age 11 listening to "Lady Cab Driver." "He pulls off a snare battle with himself — you can hear the wood chips hit the floor," ?uestlove says. "It was there that I first felt the passion in his musicianship."

  1. "Baby I'm a Star" (Live from Landover, Maryland,Purple Rain tour) 1984

    His "James Brown on The T.A.M.I. Show doing 'Night Train' " moment. He's the best bandleader of his generation — and if I ever need to prove that to someone, this is my surefire crash course.

  2. "Movie Star" 1986

    Prince's best display of humor, quirkiness, self-mockery and a dash of funk. This was originally a demo intended for the Time, but I can't see Morris Day waxing poetic about potato chips like this.

  3. "Irresistible Bitch" 1983 "Tricky" 1984 "Cloreen Bacon Skin" 1983

    A three-way tie between songs that share DNA: funky drums and a bass line in the key of A. No way I could separate 'em.

  4. "Little Red Corvette" (12-inch extended version) 1983

    A major face-lift: Prince transforms the song into this sweaty funk-out and — sorry, Diddy! — invents the remix.

  5. "Lady Cab Driver" 1982


    1999 was the kind of album where you couldn't just bite one chip, and this was the mightiest chip.

  6. "The Bird" (Rehearsal demo) 1983

    I'm certain Prince would be chagrined by this list of hard-to-find classics (in his eyes: illegal), but practicing and absorbing this song has shaped many a musician's life, including mine — it was all the college I needed. He builds a groove here from the ground up, note by note. This one shows that even the smallest detail is crucial to a song.

  7. "The Ballad of Dorothy Parker" 1987

    If Graham Central Station's Release Yourself and Joni Mitchell's Hissing of Summer Lawns fell in love, got married and had a baby.

  8. "The Sex of It" (Demo for Kid Creole and the Coconuts) 1987

    Our hero reflects on his dead-end relationship, feeling like a used piece of meat — but don't cue the strings, because we'd all love for women to just want us "for the sex!" This brings his vulnerability to light.

  9. "How Come U Don't Call Me Anymore" 1983

    A bare-bones song that shows off his gospel side (the piano), his soul side (the falsetto) and his jazz side (the way he phrases his ad-libs toward the song's fade-out). This song has wound up on every mope/breakup mix I ever made.

  10. "Erotic City" 1984

    This is one of his most popular B sides. It's his ode to P-Funk, and it makes for the perfect counterbalance to its A side, "Let's Go Crazy." It also marks the beginning of him singing as a helium-voiced female character named Camille.

[Edited 11/24/10 7:59am]

If prince.org were to be made idiot proof, someone would just invent a better idiot.
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Reply #2 posted 11/24/10 8:07am

Efan

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That's a helluva good list.

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Reply #3 posted 11/24/10 8:30am

2freaky4church
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Cloreen Baconskin is the worst song he ever did, sorry.

All you others say Hell Yea!! woot!
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Reply #4 posted 11/24/10 9:17am

PurpleHigh

I thought ?uestlove was a huge "Computer Blue" fan. Odd that he'd leave it off this list.

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Reply #5 posted 11/24/10 9:34am

Mintchip

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I don't think i've ever heard "Tricky". Anyone know offhand what boot/collection it's on?

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Reply #6 posted 11/24/10 10:44am

datdude

i think Tricky was the b-side to 777-9311. not 100% sure though, but its more of a tongue and cheek vamp with Morris Day goin' on about nothing to a psuedo-interviewer named "Grace". its the funky track over which it all takes place. the twin cousin to Irresistible & CBS which is why ?Love mentions it. its all about the funky drums on these three.

i like Quest's list. couple of surprises. great list tho

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Reply #7 posted 11/24/10 10:56am

Rhyging

^^ Tricky was a b-side for Ice Cream Castles and some versions of Jungle Love.

Read more at Princevault.com.

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Reply #8 posted 11/24/10 11:41am

Shango

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datdude said:

i think Tricky was the b-side to 777-9311. not 100% sure though, but its more of a tongue and cheek vamp with Morris Day goin' on about nothing to a psuedo-interviewer named "Grace". its the funky track over which it all takes place. the twin cousin to Irresistible & CBS which is why ?Love mentions it. its all about the funky drums on these three.

That b-side is just called "Grace". The female interviewer introduces herself with her real name though Morris keeps calling her "Grace".

At first she objects, but when Morris asks her phone number, she finally gives in and falls for Mr. Cool's charms.

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Reply #9 posted 11/24/10 12:50pm

Rinluv

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  1. "Erotic City" 1984

    This is one of his most popular B sides. It's his ode to P-Funk, and it makes for the perfect counterbalance to its A side, "Let's Go Crazy." It also marks the beginning of him singing as a helium-voiced female character named Camille.

He called Camille Prince's heluim-voiced "female" character..Well Erotic city wasnt a Camille song and Camille is not a "female"lol

Some people think I'm kinda cute
But that don't compute when it comes 2 Y-O-U.
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Reply #10 posted 11/24/10 1:01pm

Spinlight

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Rinluv said:

He called Camille Prince's heluim-voiced "female" character..Well Erotic city wasnt a Camille song and Camille is not a "female"lol

To be fair, the Camille character took on a lot of female properties and himself dabbled in gender ambiguity in his journey to be a better lover to his woman. So I can get where ?uest was going with that small mistake.

An additionally, it has been hotly debated for decades whether or not "Erotic City" counts as a Camille song or not. It was not explicitly mentioned to be Camille as the Camille idea, to a finer extent, didn't exist at the time as far as anyone knows. However, the -production values- of Camille certainly existed if at a merely conceptual level.

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Reply #11 posted 11/24/10 1:02pm

ufoclub

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2freaky4church1 said:

Cloreen Baconskin is the worst song he ever did, sorry.

I loved that track on first listen, and loved the humor in just releasing it in that length on an album. It is so funky and funny.

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Reply #12 posted 11/24/10 3:07pm

NouveauDance

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Nice list.

Did we expect anything else? I woulda been shocked to see 'Cream, MBGITW, Gett Off' wink

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Reply #13 posted 11/24/10 3:55pm

KCOOLMUZIQ

Now that's a real fan!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

eye will ALWAYS think of prince like a "ACT OF GOD"! N another realm. eye mean of all people who might of been aliens or angels.if found out that prince wasn't of this earth, eye would not have been that surprised. R.I.P. prince
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Reply #14 posted 11/24/10 4:12pm

smoothcriminal
12

KCOOLMUZIQ said:

Now that's a real fan!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Amen.

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Reply #15 posted 11/24/10 5:14pm

Militant

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moderator

I talked to Quest on Twitter about it. He said he had picked 50 songs originally but it was trimmed to 10.

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Reply #16 posted 11/24/10 7:00pm

greyhoodiegirl

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the songs are all from the 80s... confused

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Reply #17 posted 11/24/10 7:25pm

lotusboy

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2freaky4church1 said:

Cloreen Baconskin is the worst song he ever did, sorry.

its not a song..its a jam.

"Its flier to B hungry than fat"
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Reply #18 posted 11/24/10 7:37pm

johnart

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lotusboy said:

2freaky4church1 said:

Cloreen Baconskin is the worst song he ever did, sorry.

its not a song..its a jam.

I have to agree there.

I wish there were no words to it. lol

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Reply #19 posted 11/24/10 8:49pm

StonedImmacula
te

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greyhoodiegirl said:

the songs are all from the 80s... confused

Because thats when Prince was a trendsetter, not a follower.

blunt music She has robes and she has monkeys, lazy diamond studded flunkies.... music blunt
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Reply #20 posted 11/24/10 8:56pm

hhhhdmt

StonedImmaculate said:

greyhoodiegirl said:

the songs are all from the 80s... confused

Because thats when Prince was a trendsetter, not a follower.

you surely cannot expect one man to set trends forever, its virtually impossible. He still did some fantastic work in the 90's.

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Reply #21 posted 11/24/10 10:16pm

kewlschool

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I'm kewl with this list. cool

99.9% of everything I say is strictly for my own entertainment
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Reply #22 posted 11/25/10 1:10am

xenophobia2002

Rhyging said:

^^ Tricky was a b-side for Ice Cream Castles and some versions of Jungle Love.

Read more at Princevault.com.

Releases with Tricky :

The Time 7” UK W9247 Ice Cream Castles (edit) / Tricky
The Time 7” USA 7-29247 Ice Cream Castles (3:37) / Tricky (3:12)
The Time 7” PS Germany Promo 929144-7 Jungle Love (3:27) / Tricky (3:12) - with promo info sheet -
The Time 7” PS Germany 929144-7 Jungle Love (3:27) / Tricky (3:12) - black WB logo -
The Time 7” PS Germany 929144-7 Jungle Love (3:27) / Tricky (3:12) - silver WB logo -
The Time 12” UK W9247T Ice Cream Castles (full length version) / Get It Up / Tricky
The Time 12” Australia 0-920254 Jungle Love (5:29) / Tricky (3:12)
The Time 12” Canada 0-920254 Jungle Love (5:29) / Tricky (3:12)
The Time 12” PS Germany 920254-0 Jungle Love (5:29) / Tricky (3:12)
The Time 12” PS USA Promo 0-920254 Jungle Love (5:29) / Tricky (3:12) - gold promo stamp -
The Time 12” PS USA 0-920254 Jungle Love (5:29) / Tricky (3:12)
I AM LOOKING FOR USED PRINCE CONCERT TICKETS ... https://www.facebook.com/...erttickets
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Reply #23 posted 11/25/10 1:34am

abigail05

hhhhdmt said:

StonedImmaculate said:

Because thats when Prince was a trendsetter, not a follower.

you surely cannot expect one man to set trends forever, its virtually impossible. He still did some fantastic work in the 90's.

if you were a fan in the 80s, you'd understand why his 90s work just...doesn't matter, really

I wouldn't say he's ever been surpassed. It's just that he taught the world to think like he does. It's been a drag ever since neutral

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Reply #24 posted 11/25/10 1:37am

hhhhdmt

abigail05 said:

hhhhdmt said:

you surely cannot expect one man to set trends forever, its virtually impossible. He still did some fantastic work in the 90's.

if you were a fan in the 80s, you'd understand why his 90s work just...doesn't matter, really

I wouldn't say he's ever been surpassed. It's just that he taught the world to think like he does. It's been a drag ever since neutral

No i wasnt a fan in the 80s, heck i wasnt even alive in the 80's. But i think he has many 80's fans who still enjoy alot of his 90's work. The expectations that many of his fans have for him are simply unrealistic. every artist has a musical peak.

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Reply #25 posted 11/25/10 1:54am

abigail05

hhhhdmt said:

abigail05 said:

if you were a fan in the 80s, you'd understand why his 90s work just...doesn't matter, really

I wouldn't say he's ever been surpassed. It's just that he taught the world to think like he does. It's been a drag ever since neutral

No i wasnt a fan in the 80s, heck i wasnt even alive in the 80's. But i think he has many 80's fans who still enjoy alot of his 90's work. The expectations that many of his fans have for him are simply unrealistic. every artist has a musical peak.

Many of us are still holding out for what we used to get every year. It used to be that we would check for his latest 45rpm single (yes, vinyl!) and quite often one would appear - with an unheard b-side (Erotic City, God, Another Lonely Christmas, etc etc) and more often than not they were FANTASTIC. It did create an expectation of excellence. I gave up on it in the early 90s, but it was fun while it lasted. You kids born in the 90s, you have no idea how spectacular the dude really was, compared to everything else that was coming out smile

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Reply #26 posted 11/25/10 2:16am

StonedImmacula
te

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I dug some of his 90s stuff...but after 88 he went downhill pretty fast.

The rap thing was atrocious.

We've been thru this a million times.

In the 80s, if a Prince album had 10 songs, 8 were the BOMB and 2 were okay/good.

After 88, a 10 song album would have maybe 2 really good songs, 2 or 3 okay songs, and the rest garbage.

And thats being nice!

blunt music She has robes and she has monkeys, lazy diamond studded flunkies.... music blunt
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Reply #27 posted 11/25/10 2:24am

errant

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it's nice to know that ?uestlove can actually string a sentence together, when pressed, as opposed to that inarticulate crap he posts on his own website (or used to -- whatever, haven't been there in years).

"does my cock look fat in these jeans?"
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Reply #28 posted 11/25/10 2:26am

errant

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Rinluv said:

He called Camille Prince's heluim-voiced "female" character..Well Erotic city wasnt a Camille song and Camille is not a "female"lol

whatever Prince might have had you believe in 1986-1988, Camille is a a studio trick that was applied to a batch of songs, including ones before and after that era. he just gave it a name during that period because it was a project and just one more pseudonym in an every-growing list at the time.

"does my cock look fat in these jeans?"
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Reply #29 posted 11/25/10 3:27am

Shango

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Rinluv said: ..Well Erotic city wasnt a Camille song

He didn't write that it was a Camille-song. Just that he started to use that voice : "... It also marks the beginning of him singing as ..."


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