According to a Peach and Black broadcast, the vocal track for "Forever in My Life" was the result of an error made by Susan Rogers; I've also heard a similar story about "The Ballad of Dorothy Parker." Are both stories true? If so it's ironic two songs on the same album are the result of engineering mistakes -- or maybe this happens often and I simply wasn't aware.

Anyway does anyone have a link to the Susan Rogers interview where she discusses the "Forever in My Life" gaffe?

alphachannel said:

According to a Peach and Black broadcast, the vocal track for "Forever in My Life" was the result of an error made by Susan Rogers; I've also heard a similar story about "The Ballad of Dorothy Parker." Are both stories true? If so it's ironic two songs on the same album are the result of engineering mistakes -- or maybe this happens often and I simply wasn't aware.

Anyway does anyone have a link to the Susan Rogers interview where she discusses the "Forever in My Life" gaffe?

It's in Per's book DMSR. Pretty interesting.

Never heard BODP was anything but intentional.

Is it the backing vocal being before the main vocal?

I've always loved that.

She made a mistake with IIWYG too didn't she?

She must be pretty good looking for Prince to have put up with so many errors

As far as I'm aware the error with Forever In My Life was down to Prince, not Susan Rogers.

He decided to record his lead vocal with the backing vocals muted and simply miscounted the intro. So he ended up singing the lead vocal a bar too late instead of a bar earlier as was intended. Of course, the mistake was heard as soon as they listened back with the backing vocals up in the mix again, but after hearing it, he decided that he liked the unusual effect this had on the arrangement and kept it.

[Edited 5/25/11 13:56pm]

Spinlight said:

Never heard BODP was anything but intentional.

According to (I think) Alex Hahn's "Possessed" book, a thundrstorm during the recording of Ballad Of..... caused a power shortage on the board, which caused the songs "murky" sound or something.

I'm not at home, so I can't check for sure.

I don't recall this recording hiccup being noted in the DMSR book. I could be wrong.

As it's often said here, "Google is Your Friend" (actually this was posted on the Org):

From Alex Hahn's "Possessed": "The Ballad of Dorothy Parker, the first song recorded in his home studio, got its mid-range-dominated sound as the result of a technical glitch. While Prince and engineer Susan Rogers were working, a snowstorm caused a power outage.

When the lights came back on and work resumed, the playbacks seemed to Rogers dull and murky; Prince, in a creative trance, did not notice, and Rogers was hesitant to interrupt the session. But when she checked the equipment after he went to bed, Rogers found that, as a result of the blackout, the soundboard had been running on half its recommended wattage, robbing "Dorothy Parker" of its high end and giving the song a distant and subdued feel. Learning of the problem the next day, Prince treated it as serendipity, deciding that the offbeat sound added character."

alphachannel said:

As it's often said here, "Google is Your Friend" (actually this was posted on the Org):

From Alex Hahn's "Possessed": "The Ballad of Dorothy Parker, the first song recorded in his home studio, got its mid-range-dominated sound as the result of a technical glitch. While Prince and engineer Susan Rogers were working, a snowstorm caused a power outage.

When the lights came back on and work resumed, the playbacks seemed to Rogers dull and murky; Prince, in a creative trance, did not notice, and Rogers was hesitant to interrupt the session. But when she checked the equipment after he went to bed, Rogers found that, as a result of the blackout, the soundboard had been running on half its recommended wattage, robbing "Dorothy Parker" of its high end and giving the song a distant and subdued feel. Learning of the problem the next day, Prince treated it as serendipity, deciding that the offbeat sound added character."

That's it, thanks.

Spinlight said:

Never heard BODP was anything but intentional.

Yep....it was Mother Nature doing her thing.

Sounds like recording myths. Did he mention the manufacture of the mixing board that still functions at half power? And why it would have a half power setting to begin with? I have a better theory. How about they ran the original signal therough a compressor and then tweeked the eq on the overdubs.

TheDigitalGardener said:

Spinlight said:

Never heard BODP was anything but intentional.

According to (I think) Alex Hahn's "Possessed" book, a thundrstorm during the recording of Ballad Of..... caused a power shortage on the board, which caused the songs "murky" sound or something.

I'm not at home, so I can't check for sure.

I don't recall this recording hiccup being noted in the DMSR book. I could be wrong.

That'd be why I never picked up on it. I didn't read Possessed - only have read DMSR as far as the new breed of more accurate books are concerned.

Sounds strange to me. Never heard of a March 1986 Minneapolis snowstorm even happening. Interesting.

Spinlight said:

TheDigitalGardener said:

According to (I think) Alex Hahn's "Possessed" book, a thundrstorm during the recording of Ballad Of..... caused a power shortage on the board, which caused the songs "murky" sound or something.

I'm not at home, so I can't check for sure.

I don't recall this recording hiccup being noted in the DMSR book. I could be wrong.

That'd be why I never picked up on it. I didn't read Possessed - only have read DMSR as far as the new breed of more accurate books are concerned.

Sounds strange to me. Never heard of a March 1986 Minneapolis snowstorm even happening. Interesting.

Give that man a blue ribbon!!!

Spinlight said:

TheDigitalGardener said:

According to (I think) Alex Hahn's "Possessed" book, a thundrstorm during the recording of Ballad Of..... caused a power shortage on the board, which caused the songs "murky" sound or something.

I'm not at home, so I can't check for sure.

I don't recall this recording hiccup being noted in the DMSR book. I could be wrong.

That'd be why I never picked up on it. I didn't read Possessed - only have read DMSR as far as the new breed of more accurate books are concerned.

Sounds strange to me. Never heard of a March 1986 Minneapolis snowstorm even happening. Interesting.

Sometimes it even snows in April.

Add to this Sheena Easton messing up the vocals on U got the Look (not knowing when to come in, and exactly what Prince wanted), and Sign o the Times pretty much turns into a fuck up of an album.

Let's hope he starts making more mistakes like this soon

Spinlight said:

TheDigitalGardener said:

According to (I think) Alex Hahn's "Possessed" book, a thundrstorm during the recording of Ballad Of..... caused a power shortage on the board, which caused the songs "murky" sound or something.

I'm not at home, so I can't check for sure.

I don't recall this recording hiccup being noted in the DMSR book. I could be wrong.

That'd be why I never picked up on it. I didn't read Possessed - only have read DMSR as far as the new breed of more accurate books are concerned.

Sounds strange to me. Never heard of a March 1986 Minneapolis snowstorm even happening. Interesting.

u didn´t read possessed ? .. it´s a nice book ,if u like Prince it´s a must...

Spinlight said:

TheDigitalGardener said:

According to (I think) Alex Hahn's "Possessed" book, a thundrstorm during the recording of Ballad Of..... caused a power shortage on the board, which caused the songs "murky" sound or something.

I'm not at home, so I can't check for sure.

I don't recall this recording hiccup being noted in the DMSR book. I could be wrong.

That'd be why I never picked up on it. I didn't read Possessed - only have read DMSR as far as the new breed of more accurate books are concerned.

Sounds strange to me. Never heard of a March 1986 Minneapolis snowstorm even happening. Interesting.

Yes Possessed is defnately worth reading - I'm surprised you hadn't heard of this DODP story. I like that muted effect, makes it seem dreamy.

Susan Rogers also made a mistake on Little Red Corvette with the vocals being too high and distorted but Prince liked the effect and it was kept.

I notice however that the version released on Prince Ultimate has the vocals undistorted.

[Edited 5/26/11 2:55am]

My dad used to work at a place in Salford, England, called Amec Tak which used to build recording equipment. This was about 25-30 years back. According to my old man Prince was one of their customers and he built something that ended up at Paisley Park.

Nice to know my old man very probably had at least some level of involvement with those 80s albums - lol!!

Re. Possessed.

It's an ok read, not really essential imo, a bit gossipy, but better than some Prince books I have read.

This world needs more screwed up recordings. Perfection is often so boring!

Spinlight said:

TheDigitalGardener said:

According to (I think) Alex Hahn's "Possessed" book, a thundrstorm during the recording of Ballad Of..... caused a power shortage on the board, which caused the songs "murky" sound or something.

I'm not at home, so I can't check for sure.

I don't recall this recording hiccup being noted in the DMSR book. I could be wrong.

That'd be why I never picked up on it. I didn't read Possessed - only have read DMSR as far as the new breed of more accurate books are concerned.

Sounds strange to me. Never heard of a March 1986 Minneapolis snowstorm even happening. Interesting.

I don't know about the snowstorm bit, but I'm certain the shortage story is in DMSR.

Speaking of mistakes ending up on SOTT, didn't the Camille vocal on If I Was Your Girlfriend come about because of an error as well? Am I making that up?

Yes, the Camille vocal was running too hot, and is distorted. Susan hated was embarrassed by it and wanted to do it again, but Prince wanted to leave it as-is.

[Edited 5/26/11 9:58am]

Spinlight said:

TheDigitalGardener said:

According to (I think) Alex Hahn's "Possessed" book, a thundrstorm during the recording of Ballad Of..... caused a power shortage on the board, which caused the songs "murky" sound or something.

I'm not at home, so I can't check for sure.

I don't recall this recording hiccup being noted in the DMSR book. I could be wrong.

That'd be why I never picked up on it. I didn't read Possessed - only have read DMSR as far as the new breed of more accurate books are concerned.

Sounds strange to me. Never heard of a March 1986 Minneapolis snowstorm even happening. Interesting.

If you don't feel like buying Possessed, try finding it at the library. It is a great read with a lot of excellent research. There are some stupid errors (release information for U2, etc.) but it has some great interviews and insights and really round out the behind the scenes stories of him. I consider it to be a must read when it comes to Prince biographies and definitely in the top 3-4 books on Prince.

Hmmm. I recall the story on "The Ballad Of Dorothy Parker" being more along the lines of them recording it when the Paisley Park studies were still in an unfinished state. Half of the console wasn't working. I suppose they were referring to the individual channel strips, although I'm not quite sure why that would result in a "murkier" sound either. Could have been that they just weren't properly installed or something along those lines.

Power shortage resulting in less high-end on a recording? Can't say anything definitive about it, but it doesn't sound very convincing. Such things can sometimes produce unexpected results of course.

"Prince hired a guy named Frank Demedi to install one of his state-of-the-art consoles in Paisley Park, and it was taking forever. But one night Prince had dreamt a song, which turned out to be “The Ballad Of Dorothy Parker” and insisted on recording it. As we were laying it down, thought, I noticed there was something wrong with the console. There was no high end at all, but I figured I’d fix it in the mix. But Prince often records and mixes in the same session, and that’s what we did this night. Turned out one half of the consule wasn’t working, but when I played it back to him, he loved it. It’s a total mistake if you listen to it, but he likes good mistakes if they work.” Susan Rogers, Mojo (2/97)

things like this happen in the creative process. Flip the wrong switch and something weird happens. If they like it it stays or they might even do it more.

In the opening part of 'toy story 2' we see rocks floating and spinning above the ground as Buzz lands. That started as a mistake. The rocks were supposed to be on the ground but an error in programing put them floating in mid air. They liked it and then made them spin.

madhouseman said:

"Prince hired a guy named Frank Demedi to install one of his state-of-the-art consoles in Paisley Park, and it was taking forever. But one night Prince had dreamt a song, which turned out to be “The Ballad Of Dorothy Parker” and insisted on recording it. As we were laying it down, thought, I noticed there was something wrong with the console. There was no high end at all, but I figured I’d fix it in the mix. But Prince often records and mixes in the same session, and that’s what we did this night. Turned out one half of the consule wasn’t working, but when I played it back to him, he loved it. It’s a total mistake if you listen to it, but he likes good mistakes if they work.” Susan Rogers, Mojo (2/97)

Thanks, that clears that up nicely.

TheDigitalGardener said:

Re. Possessed.

It's an ok read, not really essential imo, a bit gossipy, but better than some Prince books I have read.

Looking to read one of his bios. What would you say is the best one?

ozone14 said:

TheDigitalGardener said:

Re. Possessed.

It's an ok read, not really essential imo, a bit gossipy, but better than some Prince books I have read.

Looking to read one of his bios. What would you say is the best one?

If you want in depth facts and details and what date did Prince do this and that then DMSR, although this only goes up to 1988 (wish Per Nilsen would finish it up until now!!), if you want a more general but enjoyable read then Possessed, this goes up to around 2002/3.

And if you want something more gossipy then Slave to the Rhythm/Purple Reign by Liz Jones.

[Edited 5/27/11 9:29am]

TheFreakerFantastic said:

ozone14 said:

Looking to read one of his bios. What would you say is the best one?

If you want in depth facts and details and what date did Prince do this and that then DMSR, if you want a more general but enjoyable read then Possessed.

And if you want something more gossipy then Slave to the Rhythm/Purple Reign by Liz Jones.

[Edited 5/27/11 9:10am]

Yea I'm not looking for anything sensationalized or gossipy. Thank You!