Before I forget: If Jake Brown's such a huge fan, then how come he can't spell Sheila E's name? Seriously: "Shelia" every-frikking-where.

I've been told that there wouldn't be much talk about his non-prince releases, which are sometimes even more interesting than his albums. A book about Prince's studio stuff that doesn't go into The Time, Madhouse, Sheila E., Vanity 6, Apollonia 6, The Family, NPG, etc. sounds like they are avoiding a good 30% of his studio story.

I am curious to read what he has discovered because I do know that he interviewed several Prince people, but most of the best stuff that he interviewed them about was late 80s/90s recordings.

BartVanHemelen said:

Before I forget: If Jake Brown's such a huge fan, then how come he can't spell Sheila E's name? Seriously: "Shelia" every-frikking-where.

I agree that is a dumb error but this sounds more like a spelling error that was duplicated thru the entire book as opposed to lack of knowledge. It sounds like an editor was needed!

madhouseman said:

BartVanHemelen said:

Before I forget: If Jake Brown's such a huge fan, then how come he can't spell Sheila E's name? Seriously: "Shelia" every-frikking-where.

I agree that is a dumb error but this sounds more like a spelling error that was duplicated thru the entire book as opposed to lack of knowledge. It sounds like an editor was needed!

I seriously don't get this. I've NEVER heard of anyone named "Shelia", but I know plenty of "Sheila"s. Why is that name so hard to write? If he'd done it once, OK -- but it's everywhere.

Equally annoying: often he refers to the album 1999, but he doesn't print it in italics or quotes, so then you read something like "we did this after 1999" and you just have to figure out he means the album and not the year. And because he copy-pastes from several sources, the same info gets repeated but in slightly different words.

And why does he quote reviews that have appeared years after the album was released? The book is kinda linear, and then suddenly you're reading a quote from such a review and it just breaks the flow (and there isn't that great a flow in the first place).

I seriously hope there's some new, original info to be found later on, because so far it's barely more than a rough draft of a potentially worthwhile book -- especially when he starts to have access to more information, and when there are multiple stories going on (PR is a mix of live recordings, studio tracks, stuff Prince did in his home studio etcetera), it just devolves into a rambling mess.

BartVanHemelen said:

madhouseman said:

I agree that is a dumb error but this sounds more like a spelling error that was duplicated thru the entire book as opposed to lack of knowledge. It sounds like an editor was needed!

I seriously don't get this. I've NEVER heard of anyone named "Shelia", but I know plenty of "Sheila"s. Why is that name so hard to write? If he'd done it once, OK -- but it's everywhere.

Equally annoying: often he refers to the album 1999, but he doesn't print it in italics or quotes, so then you read something like "we did this after 1999" and you just have to figure out he means the album and not the year. And because he copy-pastes from several sources, the same info gets repeated but in slightly different words.

And why does he quote reviews that have appeared years after the album was released? The book is kinda linear, and then suddenly you're reading a quote from such a review and it just breaks the flow (and there isn't that great a flow in the first place).

I seriously hope there's some new, original info to be found later on, because so far it's barely more than a rough draft of a potentially worthwhile book -- especially when he starts to have access to more information, and when there are multiple stories going on (PR is a mix of live recordings, studio tracks, stuff Prince did in his home studio etcetera), it just devolves into a rambling mess.

I haven't read the book Bart, but I think I'm probably going to agree. I have to disagree about the name 'Shelia'. It is an african american name. I have two friends by that name. If you are on facebook, type 'shelia' into it and you'll see hundreds.

Thanks for keeping the thread alive and thanks Bart for reading and giving us the 411 on it. I am really disappointed, but there's still some hope that the Eddie Miller /Matt Fink interviews will be interesting. I remember it said there are even unseen photos of the Vault downstairs at Paisley. Look forward to hearing more!

wahclavinet said:

I remember it said there are even unseen photos of the Vault downstairs at Paisley. Look forward to hearing more!

The only pics I've seen so far in the Kindle edition are unremarkable.

BartVanHemelen said:

wahclavinet said:

I remember it said there are even unseen photos of the Vault downstairs at Paisley. Look forward to hearing more!

The only pics I've seen so far in the Kindle edition are unremarkable.

Agreed.

Sorry I haven't been back to this thread - tbh, I haven't returned to the book either at this stage.

But I do remember flicking through to find those photos and they look pretty much like any storage room. Cool I guess to think, "yeah, that's the Vault", but unremarkable is a good description.

I do find it interesting that there are quite a few recent photos of him in the book, despite the fact that the timeline for content (or rather, the context for the content) stops over 15 years ago. Not that I mind any photos of Prince and it's not as bad as injecting more recent reviews into an otherwise linear discussion, but still doesn't really help set the 'scene', so to speak.

Are the photos color or black & white? Has anyone read any quotes from Eddie Miller yet?

wahclavinet said:

Are the photos color or black & white? Has anyone read any quotes from Eddie Miller yet?

Eddie's quotes will probably start in 87 on the Lovesexy stuff.

Chiquetet said:

BartVanHemelen said:

The only pics I've seen so far in the Kindle edition are unremarkable.

Agreed.

Sorry I haven't been back to this thread - tbh, I haven't returned to the book either at this stage.

But I do remember flicking through to find those photos and they look pretty much like any storage room. Cool I guess to think, "yeah, that's the Vault", but unremarkable is a good description.

So far I haven't sene any pics of the the vault in my Kindle edition. Only a couple of well-known promo pics (several fairly recent ones), etc.

FYI: 52% into the book and just started on the Parade chapter.

Which claims early on that there are rumors that Prince bought "Kiss" from Mazarati (i.e. they wrote it), but that this isn't true. I'm sorry, but what kind of dumbass fam did this guy talk to? The demo for "Kiss" has been circulating for ages, and the history of "Kiss" (Mazarati recording the track, David Z making it into the funk classic we know it as,...) was documented long ago and appears in plenty of books and magazines. I've never heard anyone claim that Mazarati wrote it.

.

[Edited 5/11/11 4:23am]

BartVanHemelen said:

So far I haven't sene any pics of the the vault in my Kindle edition. Only a couple of well-known promo pics (several fairly recent ones), etc.

You'll see it shortly - it's at the end of the Parade chapter, around 56%.

Thank you for the updates.

BartVanHemelen said:

FYI: 52% into the book and just started on the Parade chapter.

Which claims early on that there are rumors that Prince bought "Kiss" from Mazarati (i.e. they wrote it), but that this isn't true. I'm sorry, but what kind of dumbass fam did this guy talk to? The demo for "Kiss" has been circulating for ages, and the history of "Kiss" (Mazarati recording the track, David Z making it into the funk classic we know it as,...) was documented long ago and appears in plenty of books and magazines. I've never heard anyone claim that Mazarati wrote it.

.

[Edited 5/11/11 4:23am]

Wow. Co-sign. The Mix magazine interview/article with David Rivkin pretty much spelled it out in black and white, not to mention the Mazarati demo and voice/acoustic guitar demo. How could any serious fan (much less a biographer) not know this???

Chiquetet said:

BartVanHemelen said:

So far I haven't sene any pics of the the vault in my Kindle edition. Only a couple of well-known promo pics (several fairly recent ones), etc.

You'll see it shortly - it's at the end of the Parade chapter, around 56%.

Ah yes. Never saw that pic before, but it is unspectacular.

wahclavinet said:

BartVanHemelen said:

FYI: 52% into the book and just started on the Parade chapter.

Which claims early on that there are rumors that Prince bought "Kiss" from Mazarati (i.e. they wrote it), but that this isn't true. I'm sorry, but what kind of dumbass fam did this guy talk to? The demo for "Kiss" has been circulating for ages, and the history of "Kiss" (Mazarati recording the track, David Z making it into the funk classic we know it as,...) was documented long ago and appears in plenty of books and magazines. I've never heard anyone claim that Mazarati wrote it.

.

[Edited 5/11/11 4:23am]

Wow. Co-sign. The Mix magazine interview/article with David Rivkin pretty much spelled it out in black and white, not to mention the Mazarati demo and voice/acoustic guitar demo. How could any serious fan (much less a biographer) not know this???

I just don't get why he'd waste any space on talking about a phoney rumor that can only have been told by some idiot fam. The real story has been out there for at least a decade and a half, and I've read it in books etcetera.

So far this book is a serious letdown. And this guy is suppsoed to have written a bunch of these books?

FYI: I plan on continue reading the book, but right now there's abunch of other things I want to read first.

If Jake Brown's book had been better, no doubt I'd have finished it by now.

If this is a book you can lay aside when you're right in the middle of the Parade chapter, I think that says a great deal.

eyewishuheaven said:

If this is a book you can lay aside when you're right in the middle of the Parade chapter, I think that says a great deal.

I think I just started on the Lovesexy chapter.

BartVanHemelen said:

eyewishuheaven said:

If this is a book you can lay aside when you're right in the middle of the Parade chapter, I think that says a great deal.

I think I just started on the Lovesexy chapter.

So Bart, how is it now? Any further along?

The chapter on The Black Album was not great, with relatively few details. Kinda odd that he puts it in the "rigth" place, i.e. between SOTT and Lovesexy, but then it begs the question: why not mention other album projects that came inbetween released albums?

Because they weren't released? So what, the book is about Prince's studio work, and while I understand the need to split it up into chapters and organise that by (released) album, there's no reason not to report on unreleased projects. Camille for instance isn't mentioned, Dream Factory merely in passing,...

Lovesexy saw a lot of input by Eddie Miller, which is original content (if I understand correctly). However, it's a frustratingly uneven chapter that could use some significant editing since the same infor gets repeated several times. Equally annoying is that we get "general" information, but few specifics about certain songs. I'd have loved to see detailed info on each seperate song, liek the history, where was it recorded, what was altered during the recording...

There is some good info, like how Prince started the album by recording the band "live" while they were rehearsing (IIRC "Eye No" was a live take), and then worked with that recording -- at least for some tracks. But most of the chapter is Miller talking about the recording process in general and anecdotes about his experiences. But I'd expect the folks from Uptown to be far better interviewers in this case, and get far more concrete info from Miller.

is the book worth getting? how much more of the book is there?

FINALLY something in the book that's not just copied from somewhere else ... thanks for the info Bart!

i am still reading this on kindle from amazon...its very hit and miss....some good info on the recording of the albums from people who were there and some glaring mistakes...i think its worth getting for 5 quid if your interested in prince's recording history...but could have been far better...

I am paying attention to all of your reviews. Very interesting stuff and I may get it to see how someone else covers the subject.

Thanx

Anyone get any further in the book?

I would love to hear more from anyone too!

BartVanHemelen said:

FYI: 52% into the book and just started on the Parade chapter.

Which claims early on that there are rumors that Prince bought "Kiss" from Mazarati (i.e. they wrote it), but that this isn't true. I'm sorry, but what kind of dumbass fam did this guy talk to? The demo for "Kiss" has been circulating for ages, and the history of "Kiss" (Mazarati recording the track, David Z making it into the funk classic we know it as,...) was documented long ago and appears in plenty of books and magazines. I've never heard anyone claim that Mazarati wrote it.

.

[Edited 5/11/11 4:23am]

There's actually a story I heard from Shock G. during an interview with him...He told me one of Prince's band members (I'll leave out the name) said that "kiss" was one of the rare instances where he didn't write the song...He continues to tell me the story of how Prince met up with one of the members of Mazarati with a paper bag of money to buy "Kiss"...The demo we hear is Prince breaking down the actual track...Now I don't believe the story....But it is interesting...

[Edited 6/2/11 21:44pm]

.

.

still reading it...yes it has some good info in it...worth getting if your a big fan...i am up to parade...stories about how unique he is when it come to his recording technique..he really does try and do it all..when he was making parade..lisa coleman says that he recorded the drum track to the first 4 songs on parade in one sequence..she was in the next room or something...he pressed the record button himself then she said you could hear him tripping over wires and things as he ran over to the drum kit to record the drum track...amazing stuff...