king of the bongo, king of the bongo bong

Ahh duh!To keep the beat going while he rocks the other instruments....A lot of U on here so clueless. Just like my other thread on Morris Day playing uncredited drums on Prince's early tracks. Prince can't do everything! He needs a beat first. Which is why he started using drum machines earlier..

bigd74 said:

robertgeorgeakabob said:

bigd74 said:

Like I said someone said he was a better rock drummer than Dave, no one said funk or jazz

None of Prince's early drumming is pure rock. He plays with the feel of a pocket drumming funkster, and it makes the music better for it. Million Days is absolute shite drumming and ruins what could have been his strongest song in years. Prince's puny little arms could never blast out a riff as dynamic as Teen Spirit, Territorial Pissings, No one Knows...

excuse me but what is shit about Million Days song? drums are in the pocket,no mistakes

Superconductor said:

I am not convinced that drums is Prince's best instrument. Why did he hire for example drummers like Michael B, CC Dunham and J Blackwell for recordings? I think because they play the drums the way he can't.

maybe to add variation to his sound

Morris Day and John blackwellcomplimented Prince in Modern Drummer magazine in 2005 so while Morris Day might have played the drums on the time albums......Prince has played the drumz on most of his albums and when you consider how many albums released (and side projects ala The Family)and as for the NIrvana drummer......please listen to the Madhouse albums to realize how great a drummer Prince is .........Listen to Crystal ball there are nuances in his drumming that a rock track like teen spirt can't compete with

thebanishedone said:

Superconductor said:

I am not convinced that drums is Prince's best instrument. Why did he hire for example drummers like Michael B, CC Dunham and J Blackwell for recordings? I think because they play the drums the way he can't.

Miles davis is another one who thought drums was Prince's best instrument.

wally19 said:

The whole Dave Grohl comparison was towards Prince's rock drumming. I can't imagine Prince being able to play rock like Dave but everything else goes to Prince. not dissing. Prince is not perfect. but he's damn good.

bigd74 said:

KCOOLMUZIQ said:

wally19 said:

I am referring to Crystal ball the song not to mention "Movie Star, Da Bang, Sexual Suicide, Make Yo Mama Happy" among some of those songs on that whole CD.......Dave Grohl even complimented Prince on various instruments on Vh-1 particularly the song "Darling Nikki"

Superconductor said:

KCOOLMUZIQ said:

Ahh duh!To keep the beat going while he rocks the other instruments....A lot of U on here so clueless. Just like my other thread on Morris Day playing uncredited drums on Prince's early tracks. Prince can't do everything! He needs a beat first. Which is why he started using drum machines earlier..

D'uh yourself. I said "recordings"! Prince can and did often record each instrument separately including drums. But for quite a lot of songs he hired drummers.

Eye know what U meant! Also know his recording process.

robertgeorgeakabob said:

thebanishedone said:

excuse me but what is shit about Million Days song? drums are in the pocket,no mistakes

The drumming is lifeless and clunky. Terrible drumming.

If you listen to the drum tracks isolated without the other instruments on classic 1970 / 1980s recordings they'll most likely sound "lifeless" and "clunky" to most ears used to today's production standards. The contemporary drum sound, the type that Dave Grohl favours, relies more on recording and production techniques than on what the drummer actually plays.

I prefer the first type of approach myself than the latter. What if some elements stick out in a "clunky" manner? That's exactly why they don't sound "lifeless" to my ears.

thebanishedone said:

novabrkr said:

robertgeorgeakabob said:

novabrkr said:

If you listen to the drum tracks isolated without the other instruments on classic 1970 / 1980s recordings they'll most likely sound "lifeless" and "clunky" to most ears used to today's production standards. The contemporary drum sound, the type that Dave Grohl favours, relies more on recording and production techniques than on what the drummer actually plays.

I prefer the first type of approach myself than the latter. What if some elements stick out in a "clunky" manner? That's exactly why they don't sound "lifeless" to my ears.

Wrong. Prince's drumming on his early albums is nothing but tight and crisp. Million Days is awful.

Your comments simply reflect your own ideals on how drums should sound on a record.

I'm glad Prince has left the drums sound as raw as they do on that song. Otherwise it would have been in danger of sounding overproduced. It fits the rest of the material on that record especially with the snare and the toms sounding that way. I far prefer a sound like that over anything I've heard by the Foo Fighters (which is not a raw-sounding band by any means).

Not that I'd myself either use "A Million Days" as an example of him being a great drummer. I'm just saying I like the end-result as a whole.

novabrkr said:

Oh, I thought he's at least played on some of those tracks.

robertgeorgeakabob said:

bigd74 said:

I just wanted to point out that he plays drums in different types of music like the Funk of Let's Work or Musicology or the rock of The Cross or Fury.....or the Jazz sound of The Family or Madhouse albums and the pop sounds of Cinnamon Girl.....that being said the he would be the better drummer than Alex Hahn thinks he is who is not a drummer himself

Superconductor said:

KCOOLMUZIQ said:

Either way Prince still came up with the beat........

Careful. Don't make statements you can't back up Prince certainly wrote the song and programmed, played the instruments, arranged it etc. There's a comment on the youtube video of John Blackwell drumming this beat claiming that the beat is based on a sample of David Garibaldi / Tower of Power. I have no idea if that is true. Always worth listening to funky Garibaldi though. [Edited 1/3/14 6:36am]

Maybe u're referring to Release It: the (awesome) rhythm pattern on that song is indeed based on a TOP track (like, a coupla seconds long break, that P had the brilliant idea of turning into a whole track).

KCOOLMUZIQ said:

Ahh duh!To keep the beat going while he rocks the other instruments....A lot of U on here so clueless. Just like my other thread on Morris Day playing uncredited drums on Prince's early tracks. Prince can't do everything! He needs a beat first. Which is why he started using drum machines earlier..

Nah, u speak nonsense here. U know perfectly how P works, recording every instrument one after the other, starting w/ drumz, he doesn't need anyone and if Morris had been playing on his albums we'd know it (+ why Morris? It would have been Bobby if anyone).

As for drum machines it had nothing to do with simplicity (it woulda been simpler to record the drums live in one take than to program the Linn anyway), it was (and still is when he uses them) a esthetic choice: the Linn (or other drum machines for that matter) has a sound of its own, that sounds quite different from live drums. Musicians in the 80's didn't embrace drum machines because it was simpler than drums (it wasn't!), they did it for esthetic reasons.

databank said:

KCOOLMUZIQ said:

Ahh duh!To keep the beat going while he rocks the other instruments....A lot of U on here so clueless. Just like my other thread on Morris Day playing uncredited drums on Prince's early tracks. Prince can't do everything! He needs a beat first. Which is why he started using drum machines earlier..

Nah, u speak nonsense here. U know perfectly how P works, recording every instrument one after the other, starting w/ drumz, he doesn't need anyone and if Morris had been playing on his albums we'd know it (+ why Morris? It would have been Bobby if anyone).

As for drum machines it had nothing to do with simplicity (it woulda been simpler to record the drums live in one take than to program the Linn anyway), it was (and still is when he uses them) a esthetic choice: the Linn (or other drum machines for that matter) has a sound of its own, that sounds quite different from live drums. Musicians in the 80's didn't embrace drum machines because it was simpler than drums (it wasn't!), they did it for esthetic reasons.

U totally misunderstood what I was saying DUDE! It was a BIG debate on my other thread about Morris playing uncredited drums on Prince's earlier 80's songs. Which Eye debated strongly! Eye know EXACTLY how Prince lays down tracks in the studio! Eye know good & dog on well he can do it all by himself!. But what Eye was saying is sometimes it may have been easier 4 him too record faster with another drummer while he layed down bass,keyboards etc. It could have been any other drummer he used also; like U mentioned Bobby..

But the drum machine versus a live drummer, Eye don't need 2 b schooled on the reasons both are used. Eye already know..