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Thread started 06/05/12 8:10pm

rdhull

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just saw Dolphin on Letterman performance

I know it's purple blasphemy it took so long..maybe I did seee it previously but didn't remember . I never really liked the song as it seems childish sounding and I know it's a "must see" of Prince television, but..

Mayte all over the place was weird..it would have worked better if she wasn't doing her ballet all over the place but she is crucial to the ending death in arms scene..but lmao at the bodyguard carrying him out.

That ending took some cajones (balls for the rosetta stone inpaired).

The song reminds me of a passage in Three Chains Of Gold.

He doesn't look healthy here. I'm reminded of that because of how healthy and strong he looks now

almost 20 years later. As this was the slave era, I'm sure it was taking a toll on him physically and mentally, which I did read somewhere.

His voice wasn't too hot on this live cut but overall the experience is B+/-A-.

Again the suicide and being carried out is "like whoah"-(c)Mya

"Climb in my fur."
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Reply #1 posted 06/05/12 8:45pm

jayARDAHB

rdhull said:

I know it's purple blasphemy it took so long..maybe I did seee it previously but didn't remember . I never really liked the song as it seems childish sounding and I know it's a "must see" of prince television, but..



Mayte all over the place was weird..it would have worked better if she wasnt doing her ballet all over the place but she is crucial to the ending death in arms scene..but lmao at the bodyguard carrying him out.



That ending took some cajones (balls for the rosetta stone inpaired)...



The song reminds me of a passage in Three Chains Of Gold.



He doesn't look healthy here. Im reminded of that because if how healthy and strong he looks now


almost 20 years later. As this was the slave era Im sure it was taking a toll on him physically and mentally which I did read somewhere.



His voice wasn't to hot on this live cut but overall the experience is B+/-A-.



Again the suicide and being carried out is "like whoah"-(c)Mya




Listen man, prince was on fire just after he changed his name! The music was fresh to death and his live performances were killer! The dolphin performance was off the chain in my opinion... That guitar intro was gorgeous and his solo rips hard!

The whole band plays the shitnout of that song like they did everything! Michael B told me that prince was super driven at that time in his career as he says that prince had something to prove and the proof is in the high quality music he released at the time! It was a golden and exciting tJerk, jerk, jerkedy jerk jerkime to be a fan.

Here's hoping he gets back to this in the near future!

Jay
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Reply #2 posted 06/05/12 9:29pm

imago

I LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE that performance.

I mean, I love everything about it--the sound, the makeup, everything. Even Mayte's pointless presence was cool.

I love how David Letterman, after having made a bunch of symbol jokes during the evening, yells out an emphatic, "yeah!" at the end, then comes out and asks the other band members, "Is he alright?" falloff

I just loved that performance.

One of my ignorant-of-Prince non-Prince-fan friends watched it with me (he was a Letterman fan), and he said, "Damn...This guy should play guitar like that more often...that was hot."

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Reply #3 posted 06/05/12 11:07pm

SDNafka

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The Letterman performance was the first time I ever heard Dolphin. I absolutely loved it and was looking forward to hearing the recorded version when I got my copy of The Gold Experience. I was so disappointed when I heard it, everything was drowned in reverb and so washed out. The Letterman version is a thousand times better than the album cut.

"Don't hate me cos I'm beautiful"
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Reply #4 posted 06/05/12 11:31pm

chewymusic

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I always loved this performance. I know it's super cheesey, but the performance

quite simply ROCKS. The band, the guitar playing, the layered sampled Prince b-up vocals,

the shorter percise version of the song. And you really feel as though he means it.

It's one spot-on Prince TV performance.

And yeah LOL @David Letterman after the comercial break he was asking Paul Shafer

"Is he OK?" and Paul saying "yes Dave I think he's alright" and then Dave says something

like "Paul.. the man was carried off of the stage!" lol

I can't remember now how I knew about it, but somehow I was tipped off that Prince

was performing that night on Letterman and if you couldn't get in for the filming (which I didn't),

you could still catch him coming out the side door of the theater after the filming.

So I went to check it out. There was also some kind of rumor going around that he

wanted peeps to write "slave" on their face to show support for T.A.F.K.A.P. so some of

the people waiting out by the side door had "slave" decoratively written on their faces.

There were a couple of police barricades set up on the sidewalk and quite a crowd had

shown up to see Prince come out after the filming. After a while a couple of NPG

members would pop up in the small window by the door and wave and everyone in the

crowd would get more revved for Prince to come out.

And then the funniest thing happened. Prince eventually came out of the side door and

of course everyone went total apeshit the second he appered. He had Maytae right next to him

still in her angel costume and they only had to walk the width of one city sidewalk with police barriers

on either side of them to reach the street curb and waiting limo, but in the few seconds it took

them to get to the curb, the crowd totally rushed them and Prince dove in to the limo and it sped off

leaving Mayte standing right there on the sidewalk while a second limo pulled up to get her! lol

We were all like: daaaaammn he was like FUCK THIS and left her on the curb! lol lol

"Hyperactive when I was small, Hyperactive now I'm grown, Hyperactive 'till I'm dead and gone"
__ __ __ __ __ __ __ __ __ __ __ __ ___

"Midnight is where the day begins"
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Reply #5 posted 06/06/12 12:05am

artist76

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chewymusic said:

I always loved this performance. I know it's super cheesey, but the performance

quite simply ROCKS. The band, the guitar playing, the layered sampled Prince b-up vocals,

the shorter percise version of the song. And you really feel as though he means it.

It's one spot-on Prince TV performance.

And yeah LOL @David Letterman after the comercial break he was asking Paul Shafer

"Is he OK?" and Paul saying "yes Dave I think he's alright" and then Dave says something

like "Paul.. the man was carried off of the stage!" lol

I can't remember now how I knew about it, but somehow I was tipped off that Prince

was performing that night on Letterman and if you couldn't get in for the filming (which I didn't),

you could still catch him coming out the side door of the theater after the filming.

So I went to check it out. There was also some kind of rumor going around that he

wanted peeps to write "slave" on their face to show support for T.A.F.K.A.P. so some of

the people waiting out by the side door had "slave" decoratively written on their faces.

There were a couple of police barricades set up on the sidewalk and quite a crowd had

shown up to see Prince come out after the filming. After a while a couple of NPG

members would pop up in the small window by the door and wave and everyone in the

crowd would get more revved for Prince to come out.

And then the funniest thing happened. Prince eventually came out of the side door and

of course everyone went total apeshit the second he appered. He had Maytae right next to him

still in her angel costume and they only had to walk the width of one city sidewalk with police barriers

on either side of them to reach the street curb and waiting limo, but in the few seconds it took

them to get to the curb, the crowd totally rushed them and Prince dove in to the limo and it sped off

leaving Mayte standing right there on the sidewalk while a second limo pulled up to get her! lol

We were all like: daaaaammn he was like FUCK THIS and left her on the curb! lol lol

falloff

Did you see Mayte's reaction? Did she look upset by that? Did she get rushed? Maybe she was supposed to go in the 2nd limo?

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Reply #6 posted 06/06/12 12:07am

artist76

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SDNafka said:

The Letterman performance was the first time I ever heard Dolphin. I absolutely loved it and was looking forward to hearing the recorded version when I got my copy of The Gold Experience. I was so disappointed when I heard it, everything was drowned in reverb and so washed out. The Letterman version is a thousand times better than the album cut.

^^ I've said that to myself many a-time about different songs. "The ______ (SNL, Lopez Tonight, bootleg, etc.) version is a thousand times better than the album cut."

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Reply #7 posted 06/06/12 1:51am

perdido

rdhull said:

That ending took some cajones (balls for the rosetta stone inpaired).

Actually "cajones" means drawers (in a piece of furniture). confused

(that rosetta stone sentence had some cojones, by the way)

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Reply #8 posted 06/06/12 2:14am

rialb

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I loved afterwards how Dave was mocking Mayte's use of the ribbon and suggested to Paul that he should incorporate that into the band. At least that's how I remember it.

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Reply #9 posted 06/06/12 5:42am

frazetta

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Ridiculous ending, ridiculous look.

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Reply #10 posted 06/06/12 6:02am

thedance

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Fantastic.. I loooove this performance. heart

I even saw a short mention in the danish paper B.T. (IIRC),

about Prince has "died" on the Letterman talkshow.

I can't remember if the clip was aired on danish tv back then in the fall of 94,

but I soon got the clip on VHS video tape - from another danish Prince fan,

damn clips were so rare back then, long before the internet...

Excellent performance,

and I have always loved the song "Dolphin" deeply.

Prince 4Ever. heart
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Reply #11 posted 06/06/12 6:58am

callimnate

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That performance cracks me up everythime I see it. lol

Letterman makes it even more special. lol lol

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Reply #12 posted 06/06/12 10:40am

chellemac

lol lol lol
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Reply #13 posted 06/06/12 10:44am

chellemac

chellemac said:

lol lol lol

I always giggle when I see this performance. It was also funny how David said something about how you couldn't purchase the CD (Gold) and he wasn't sure why Prince was promoting it. My 13 year-old daughter thinks the song is stupid. "A dolphin mom?.........he wants to be a dolphin?" Followed by an eye roll.

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Reply #14 posted 06/06/12 10:55am

excited

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i love this song, but the 1st time i saw this performance i was like wft??!!!!?.. his laboured breathing at the end made me wanna jump on his chest & give mouth to mouth. i'm glad he wasn't really dead.

angel

[img:$uid]http://i901.photobucket.com/albums/ac215/doffieparker/excited/427461_294056530648994_132691213452194_747471_1112320636_n.jpg[/img:$uid]

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Reply #15 posted 06/06/12 11:15am

rdhull

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There is something about the way he 'comes' to the stage too whoch is shown for a few seconds. He seems like he is mad or had amped himself up to be mad for the performance (and why not, it's a diatribe against Warn-A-Brotha). Or he seems very preoccupied for this performance to come off as planned. It's weird that they would begin the performance with him entering and grabbing his geetar instead of already being on stage in front of the mic ready to go.

"Climb in my fur."
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Reply #16 posted 06/06/12 1:04pm

Bohemian67

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Thanks for the tip. Dolphin is definitely better live than on the album. I guess this was around 1994? There are some good lyrics in this song but I do not understood why he chose the Dolphin as a symbol. The message seems to be ' I can't do what I want, I'm dictated to but no matter how much you destroy me I will not bend.'

I understand this must have been probably one of the worst periods of his life. Loving what you do but spiritually almost having sold your soul (unknowingly) and feeling betrayed, hopeless, enraged, disappointed and full of negative emotions. Yet symbolically the dolphin is one of peace, friendship, beauty, naturalness etc etc..... So I find 'if I came back as a dolphin' puzzling. Is he saying 'I'm peaceful, kind, beautiful and you can kill me but I'll come back?'

It seems he was unable to truely show the anger he felt. He supressed it by putting himself in a powerless position in the song. A harmless beautiful creature. Yes he felt powerless and probably was.

I think he did himself short, but at that time it was probably hard to come up with something where he could fulfil the contract and put on a face. So he laid down and died. i.e. Prince -----> Symbol. They killed his soul. (temporarily)

When MJ was angry it came out in 'Leave me alone' (media) 'they don't care about us' and Morphine. Maybe some others too.

Has Prince ever made a really angry song? He's done sarcasm really well, distaste and a bit of hard rap 'I'll tell you' stuff.....But has he ever written and released an angry track? Really releasing the negative emotions? If not...what does he do with all. Synthesize it all to goodness?

"Free URself, B the best that U can B, 3rd Apartment from the Sun, nothing left to fear" Prince Rogers Nelson - Forever in my Life -
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Reply #17 posted 06/06/12 2:22pm

rialb

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Bohemian67 said:

Thanks for the tip. Dolphin is definitely better live than on the album. I guess this was around 1994? There are some good lyrics in this song but I do not understood why he chose the Dolphin as a symbol. The message seems to be ' I can't do what I want, I'm dictated to but no matter how much you destroy me I will not bend.'

I understand this must have been probably one of the worst periods of his life. Loving what you do but spiritually almost having sold your soul (unknowingly) and feeling betrayed, hopeless, enraged, disappointed and full of negative emotions. Yet symbolically the dolphin is one of peace, friendship, beauty, naturalness etc etc..... So I find 'if I came back as a dolphin' puzzling. Is he saying 'I'm peaceful, kind, beautiful and you can kill me but I'll come back?'

It seems he was unable to truely show the anger he felt. He supressed it by putting himself in a powerless position in the song. A harmless beautiful creature. Yes he felt powerless and probably was.

I think he did himself short, but at that time it was probably hard to come up with something where he could fulfil the contract and put on a face. So he laid down and died. i.e. Prince -----> Symbol. They killed his soul. (temporarily)

When MJ was angry it came out in 'Leave me alone' (media) 'they don't care about us' and Morphine. Maybe some others too.

Has Prince ever made a really angry song? He's done sarcasm really well, distaste and a bit of hard rap 'I'll tell you' stuff.....But has he ever written and released an angry track? Really releasing the negative emotions? If not...what does he do with all. Synthesize it all to goodness?

"I Hate U?"

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Reply #18 posted 06/06/12 3:29pm

chopingard

Bohemian67 said:

Has Prince ever made a really angry song?

Face Down

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Reply #19 posted 06/06/12 4:24pm

klick2me

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rdhull said:

There is something about the way he 'comes' to the stage too whoch is shown for a few seconds. He seems like he is mad or had amped himself up to be mad for the performance (and why not, it's a diatribe against Warn-A-Brotha). Or he seems very preoccupied for this performance to come off as planned. It's weird that they would begin the performance with him entering and grabbing his geetar instead of already being on stage in front of the mic ready to go.





I noticed the same mad look. I think Prince was a bit pissed with David Letterman for poking fun at his name change during his introduction before his performance. Notice P never appeared on his show again?
I remember Prince doing The Vibe Show with Sinbad and telling Sinbad that he or Arsenio never disrespected him when it came to his name change. I immediately thought of David Letterman when he made that comment. We all know David can be a jerk but he did look impressed with P's performance once Prince left the stage or dragged off, I should say.

klick
klick
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Reply #20 posted 06/06/12 4:25pm

klick2me

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chopingard said:



Bohemian67 said:


Has Prince ever made a really angry song?


Face Down

[Edited 6/6/12 15:29pm]




PFUNK

klick
klick
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Reply #21 posted 06/06/12 9:16pm

SDNafka

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klick2me said:

rdhull said:

There is something about the way he 'comes' to the stage too whoch is shown for a few seconds. He seems like he is mad or had amped himself up to be mad for the performance (and why not, it's a diatribe against Warn-A-Brotha). Or he seems very preoccupied for this performance to come off as planned. It's weird that they would begin the performance with him entering and grabbing his geetar instead of already being on stage in front of the mic ready to go.

I noticed the same mad look. I think Prince was a bit pissed with David Letterman for poking fun at his name change during his introduction before his performance. Notice P never appeared on his show again? I remember Prince doing The Vibe Show with Sinbad and telling Sinbad that he or Arsenio never disrespected him when it came to his name change. I immediately thought of David Letterman when he made that comment. We all know David can be a jerk but he did look impressed with P's performance once Prince left the stage or dragged off, I should say. klick

I remember reading somewhere that Prince was annoyed at Letterman making jokes about the symbol. But, Prince DID appear on Letterman again after that. He played Dinner With Delores about two years later. So I'm not sure what was really going on there. Prince does seem to prefer Leno though. Its unfortunate because I think Prince has more in common with Letterman - they're both grumpy disturbed loners.

"Don't hate me cos I'm beautiful"
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Reply #22 posted 06/06/12 9:17pm

SDNafka

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klick2me said:

chopingard said:

Face Down

[Edited 6/6/12 15:29pm]

PFUNK klick

Billy Jack Bitch

"Don't hate me cos I'm beautiful"
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Reply #23 posted 06/06/12 9:35pm

rdhull

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Bohemian67 said:

Has Prince ever made a really angry song?

Lady Cab Driver

"Climb in my fur."
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Reply #24 posted 06/06/12 9:46pm

klick2me

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SDNafka said:



klick2me said:


rdhull said:

There is something about the way he 'comes' to the stage too whoch is shown for a few seconds. He seems like he is mad or had amped himself up to be mad for the performance (and why not, it's a diatribe against Warn-A-Brotha). Or he seems very preoccupied for this performance to come off as planned. It's weird that they would begin the performance with him entering and grabbing his geetar instead of already being on stage in front of the mic ready to go.



I noticed the same mad look. I think Prince was a bit pissed with David Letterman for poking fun at his name change during his introduction before his performance. Notice P never appeared on his show again? I remember Prince doing The Vibe Show with Sinbad and telling Sinbad that he or Arsenio never disrespected him when it came to his name change. I immediately thought of David Letterman when he made that comment. We all know David can be a jerk but he did look impressed with P's performance once Prince left the stage or dragged off, I should say. klick

I remember reading somewhere that Prince was annoyed at Letterman making jokes about the symbol. But, Prince DID appear on Letterman again after that. He played Dinner With Delores about two years later. So I'm not sure what was really going on there. Prince does seem to prefer Leno though. Its unfortunate because I think Prince has more in common with Letterman - they're both grumpy disturbed loners.




You are right. What was I thinking? For some reason I thought Dinner With Dolores came before The Gold Experience. It must be the bath salt. I need a face to chew on!


klick
klick
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Reply #25 posted 06/07/12 12:01am

muirdo

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I remember The Sun reporting that he had actually collapsed for real at the end of the performance.

Bloody tabloids!!!

mad

Fuck the funk - it's time to ditch the worn-out Vegas horns fills, pick up the geee-tar and finally ROCK THE MUTHA-FUCKER!! He hinted at this on Chaos, now it's time to step up and fully DELIVER!!
woot!
KrystleEyes 22/03/05
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Reply #26 posted 06/07/12 9:44am

inovio

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I loved that performance when I first saw it back then and love it even more now.

Eye wanna make Love to U,
2 times maybe 3,
If u want to go 4 or 5,
Baby that's alright with me,
eye will be your little baby,
eye can be your big strong man....
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Reply #27 posted 06/07/12 12:58pm

Bohemian67

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chopingard said:

Bohemian67 said:

Has Prince ever made a really angry song?

Face Down

Lady cab driver -hardly sounds angry

P-Funk - nope no anger there - a funky comical response to a sticky situation

Facedown - more satirical

Billy Jack Bitch - more pop tune with sarcasm nothing else

I hate u - a sad love song with an ambiguous title

Any other suggestions?

"Free URself, B the best that U can B, 3rd Apartment from the Sun, nothing left to fear" Prince Rogers Nelson - Forever in my Life -
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Reply #28 posted 06/07/12 1:06pm

rdhull

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Bohemian67 said:

chopingard said:

Face Down

Lady cab driver -hardly sounds angry

Oh it doesn't?..there's only a sex stroke breakdown tying in the ills of the world with each pump and a battle royale between the synth and geetar.

.

[Edited 6/7/12 13:34pm]

"Climb in my fur."
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Reply #29 posted 06/07/12 1:12pm

Bohemian67

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rdhull said:

Bohemian67 said:

Lady cab driver -hardly sounds angry

Oh it doesn't?..there's only a rex stroke breakdown tying in the ills of the world with each pump and a battle royale between the synth and geetar.

The tune is friendly sounding (the version I'm listening to) and the lyrics are about disappointment, confusion with the world and lonliness but sorry no anger there. Irritation yes.

[Edited 6/7/12 13:13pm]

"Free URself, B the best that U can B, 3rd Apartment from the Sun, nothing left to fear" Prince Rogers Nelson - Forever in my Life -
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