Prince's influence on early Detroit house and the birth of techno
As mentioned by Militant in the Sampler Set Thread:
I think some people fail to recognise the influence that Prince had on the electronic and Detroit House scenes. Ever heard of Juan Atkins (Model 500)? He, and many other 80's electronic pioneers cite Prince as one of their main influences.
If you look at the history of Detroit House/Techno you will see the names of 3 blokes Juan Atkins, Kevin Saunderson and Derrick May who were better known as the Belleville Three. Basically they went to school together and made electronic music in the garage and eventually started playing in clubs after getting the attention of a local DJ called the Electrifying Mojo.
They cite their influences from the likes of Prince, Kraftwerk, Paliament, Depeche Mode etc and have been quoted as saying that the sound they created was simply a "mistake".
Here is an interesting read about how Prince had influence on the genre. I actually didnt realise how much of a part he played in influencing the music.
Detroit dance music became defiantly do-it-yourself in part because Detroit is a DIY town, and partly because as the '80s progressed, synthesizers and drum machines became cheaper and easier to access. But Prince's example – and his grooves – played a major role as well. As Brendan M. Gillen (BMG) put it in his 2003 Red Bull Music Academy lecture in Cape Town, Prince became Detroit's "patron saint of the auteur, the guy who did everything, the total control freak – one man who could make an orchestra of music." When Juan Atkins split from his Cybotron partner, Rick Davis, and began recording as Model 500 in 1985, he codified techno as solo auteur music in the Prince mold.
House architect Vince Lawrence, who co-founded Trax Records and its song-oriented sibling label Precision, bought a LinnDrum in order to emulate Prince's sound. In 1985, Precision issued a 12-inch, "Funny Love," by a local act called Dezz 7 – so named because its leader, Sidney Winters, "looked so much like Dez Dickerson it wasn’t even funny," according to Lawrence. (Dickerson was the lead guitarist for Prince's band the Revolution from 1979 to 1983, when Wendy Melvoin replaced him; he played the solo on "Little Red Corvette," Prince's first pop top ten hit in '83.)
Not long after Emancipation, Prince's dance music legacy swelled yet again. In a way similar to Dirty Mind and Controversy's rewriting of R&B in leaner, nastier terms than disco's, the swelling sound of arena trance and filter house incurred a backlash in the form of electro and mash-ups – song-oriented forms that kept a floor's pulse going. A big progenitor of this was Basement Jaxx, a Brixton duo who explicitly worshipped Prince. Their first three albums, Remedy, Rooty and Kish Kash, incorporated a punk-funk vibe that recalled the pre-Purple Rain years, outright aping him with the help of Meshell Ndegeocello on Kish Kash's "Right Here's the Spot."
Thank you. Now I can shove this piece of material in my friends face and say that indeed Prince came in the right era. He claims the other. He LOVES Basement Jaxx and is aware of the Detroit legacy that layed ground for the house movement. But in his head Prince had no influences whatsoever on housemusic. Only Michael and Madonna.
Thank you. Now I can shove this piece of material in my friends face and say that indeed Prince came in the right era. He claims the other. He LOVES Basement Jaxx and is aware of the Detroit legacy that layed ground for the house movement. But in his head Prince had no influences whatsoever on housemusic. Only Michael and Madonna.
Im surprised him being a Basement Jaxx fan and not hearing the obvious Prince influence, especially on the album Rooty which is a fantastic homage to purple music. I could be wrong, but I think they also did a remix of All the Critics. Either way, a fantastic band.
A personal favourite of mine too actually. On the other hand, all groups that were into the club scene around 1997-2003 are amazing, the sound was just unstoppable. Red Alert, Rendez-vu are great tracks. His problem though was that in spite, he just wanted to dislike Prince because I adored him. And his argument was that because MJ and Madonna outsold Prince during the 80's, he never stayed relevant .
Note that Basement Jaxx turned down a request to remix TGRES because they thought it was shite.
.
Also note that there are some more examples of Prince influencing various individuals (check Felix Da Housecat), but all in all his influence on the genre is fairly limited.
SO PSYCHED someone made a thread about this! My hubby is a dj/producer (I dj'd extensively as well) and we were talking about this at length last night...I dont have time rt now to dig some things out but..I posted this another thread here somewhere...
Note that Basement Jaxx turned down a request to remix TGRES because they thought it was shite.
.
Also note that there are some more examples of Prince influencing various individuals (check Felix Da Housecat), but all in all his influence on the genre is fairly limited.
Also note examples of orgers minimizing Prince's influence whenever possible.
Just for kicks, his influence on the genre is fairly limited based on what?
Note that Basement Jaxx turned down a request to remix TGRES because they thought it was shite.
.
Also note that there are some more examples of Prince influencing various individuals (check Felix Da Housecat), but all in all his influence on the genre is fairly limited.
Also note examples of orgers minimizing Prince's influence whenever possible.
Just for kicks, his influence on the genre is fairly limited based on what?
....next up: examples of having your cake and eating it?
Note that Basement Jaxx turned down a request to remix TGRES because they thought it was shite.
.
Also note that there are some more examples of Prince influencing various individuals (check Felix Da Housecat), but all in all his influence on the genre is fairly limited.
Whilst his influence on certain individuals is true (as can be said for artists in other genres) I think you underplay his influence on the genre. If he influenced some of the core pioneers of the genre then I would argue his overall influence is more than limited. I grant you, once the genre took off and fragmented into the many sub genres (mainly in Europe) then his influence was very much taken out of the equation by and large. But the original pioneering house music coming out of Detroit and Chicago was pioneered by several individuals who were very much influenced by early Prince.... Amongst other things, it must be said.
As for Basement Jaxx turning down TGRES, all I can say is they did good. That song was not worthy of their creative touch.
Note that Basement Jaxx turned down a request to remix TGRES because they thought it was shite.
.
Also note that there are some more examples of Prince influencing various individuals (check Felix Da Housecat), but all in all his influence on the genre is fairly limited.
Please... If you think that, then you are disconnected. Prince not only influenced the sound of a whole decade in the first phase of his career, but went on to be named as an influence by dozens of artists in the following decades. It goes way beyond Felix Da Housecat and a "fairly limited" influence.
Just this year, D'Angelo and Bruno Mars are heavily influenced by Prince -- not just a sprinkle of his style, heavily inspired, in one case hiring many former Prince associates. That's decades after he supposedly had a "fairly limited" influence, according to you.
Just this year, D'Angelo and Bruno Mars are heavily influenced by Prince -- not just a sprinkle of his style, heavily inspired, in one case hiring many former Prince associates. That's decades after he supposedly had a "fairly limited" influence, according to you.
Note that Basement Jaxx turned down a request to remix TGRES because they thought it was shite.
.
Also note that there are some more examples of Prince influencing various individuals (check Felix Da Housecat), but all in all his influence on the genre is fairly limited.
Also note examples of orgers minimizing Prince's influence whenever possible.
Just for kicks, his influence on the genre is fairly limited based on what?
.
Just look at this thread: a mere handful of names instead of an overwhelming amount of evidence.
Note that Basement Jaxx turned down a request to remix TGRES because they thought it was shite.
.
Also note that there are some more examples of Prince influencing various individuals (check Felix Da Housecat), but all in all his influence on the genre is fairly limited.
Also note examples of orgers minimizing Prince's influence whenever possible.
Just for kicks, his influence on the genre is fairly limited based on what?
.
Just look at this thread: a mere handful of names instead of an overwhelming amount of evidence.
Who else was there? The hotmix 5 is a given. Ten City, Byron sings house in falsetto. Cajmere. If any of them were influenced by Prince then they all were. They were influenced by each other, right..?
I read somewhere in this post that people say MJ & Madonna had more influence than Prince on house / techno... How has Madonna influenced house music? And Michael Jackson? I don't even think Prince had very much to do with it.
Madonna's early sound was closer to freestyle/pop. Don't start with "madonna had Voque and that was a house record in 1990" House was around long before 1990. She just jumped on the house bandwagon, and did it again in the mid/late 90's.
Michael Jackson? I guess people will bring up his late 70's disco sound. Since disco is partly where house came from. But disco can't be credited to Michael Jackson.
Prince: The song Controversy from 1981 is definitely a house record. Prince's other dance songs from that era 81-82 lean more towards new wave / electro. I don't think it's enough to say he influenced a genre but he did way more than Madonna and Michael Jackson in my opinion.
I think he has influenced people that made house and techno, but not really the genre itself.
I read somewhere in this post that people say MJ & Madonna had more influence than Prince on house / techno... How has Madonna influenced house music? And Michael Jackson? I don't even think Prince had very much to do with it.
Madonna's early sound was closer to freestyle/pop. Don't start with "madonna had Voque and that was a house record in 1990" House was around long before 1990. She just jumped on the house bandwagon, and did it again in the mid/late 90's.
Michael Jackson? I guess people will bring up his late 70's disco sound. Since disco is partly where house came from. But disco can't be credited to Michael Jackson.
Prince: The song Controversy from 1981 is definitely a house record. Prince's other dance songs from that era 81-82 lean more towards new wave / electro. I don't think it's enough to say he influenced a genre but he did way more than Madonna and Michael Jackson in my opinion.
I think he has influenced people that made house and techno, but not really the genre itself.
If 3 org members, quite obviously inspired by Prince, got together and created a new genre of music that exploded onto the scene, would you say Prince had an influence on the genre? Or would you say he influenced the 3 org pineers of the genre but not the genre itself?
The pioneers of the scene cite Prince as one of their main influences. It's clearly obvious in the music.
Yet Bart wants to come in here and say Prince's influence is "limited". What nonsense.
Mobeen's documentary made it to the front page of Reddit last week leading the subject of Prince's vault to be exposed to thousands of music fans. Guess who showed up in that conversation to say that Prince has done nothing good in 20 years?
Bart, your shtick is beyond old now. It's incredibly tiresome and effectively cancels out the decent information that you do provide at times. Try a little positivity sometimes.
Great news about Mobeen. The thing I liked about the mini video teaser is how cool looking he is (Mobeen) and a class act in general. But that's not the discussion. What is the deal with Bart? I've been reading this board about two years now and I'm not kidding when I say that Bart never ever even mentioned something good or positive about Prince.
New topic
Printable
Report post to moderator
. 
moderator
