Whilst listening to a Radio station at work called ‘Real Radio’ based in central Scotland, there is a section of the morning programme called the ‘golden hour’. What happens during the golden hour is quite simple, the DJ will play selected songs from a particular year and you have to guess what year it is! Simple one would assume, not today! One of the firsts songs played was ‘I Would Die 4 U’, now straight away I said “1984”, easy peasy. Wrong! The year was 1991! “No way”, I said in a bemused state. So a friend phoned up Real Radio to enquire about the release date. I Would Die 4 U was released in 1984 in the UK but only got to number 58! Apparently a slightly different version was released in 1991, which I can find no record of!

Can someone please verify if Real Radio’s information is accurate or are they talking nonsense?

Much obliged.

probab;y WB released it 4 tha dosh...

might be that version of "iwd4u" that wuz on that cd single, with the "erotic city" extended ish...not sure.

They're talking crap!

I Would Die 4 U was NOT re-released in 1991 in the UK.
It was released once in 1984, and I'm pretty sure it
did better than number 58! (though not as well as the
other Purple Rain singles).

It got a sort of re-release in 1989
When WB issued a set of 5 back to back
3" CD Singles with the following tracks;

Little Red Corvette (Dance Mix) / 1999

Erotic City (Dance Mix) / I Would Die 4 U (Extended version)

When Doves Cry / Purple Rain

Let's Go Crazy / Take Me With U

Kiss (Extended version) / Girls & Boys / Under The Cherry Moon

But these CD singles weren't promoted and didn't chart.

BorisFishpaw said:

the proof is in the puddin...

the folks who said '91

Well, I just checked, and they were right
about it only getting to number 58 in 1984.

But they're definitely wrong about the re-release,
and the only 'different version' is the original
'extended version' from 1984.

The only Prince singles to be properly re-released
were..

Gotta Stop (Messin' About) : which was re-issued
a few weeks after it's initial release in 1981
in a different picture sleeve with a different
b-side.

Little Red Corvette : which was again re-issued
in a different sleeve with a different b-side in the
same year.

1999 : this was re-released with Little Red Corvette
on the b-side during the success of Purple Rain in 1984

Kiss : this was re-issued in 1988 after Tom Jones
had a hit with his cover version. I don't think it
charted, and wasn't so much re-released as just made
available to buy again (the only difference between this
issue and the original is the removal of Wendy's picture
from the back cover).
[This message was edited Fri Mar 14 12:08:11 PST 2003 by BorisFishpaw]

Controversy was re-issued in the UK in (i think) 1993 and made the top5.

i'm pretty sure 1999 was released, strangely enough, in 1999 and also charted quite high too.

Marrk said:

You're correct. Controversy made number 5 (re-issued to promote The Hits/The B' Sides) and 1999 was re-issued and got to number 10 at the end of 1998.

Marrk said:

Yeah, you're right, I'd forgotten about those.

Controversy was released as a single to support the Hits albums in the UK instead of Pink Cashmere.

and 1999 was re-released in 1999 (for the obvious reason) with a different sleeve, but the same tracklisting as the original release.

Thank you people, much obliged. This caused quite a stir where I work, people know how passionate I am about Prince so they all had a good time winding me up. I'll kick some serious ass on Monday!