AMA's American Music Awards

HELLO

"But if you just believe, there's no way we can fall."
4 the Tears In Your Eyes

Carlos & Charlie's on Sunset Boulevard
Big Chick

As God has shown us, by turning stone to bread...

...Change stone to bread with the touch of his hand
Madonna was not there either...

Prince apparently never wanted to sing at this session: he was willing to contribute a song to the USA for Africa album, or to send Sheila E. as the Paisley Park representative, or to play guitar on the track. When his manager Bob Cavallo called up Jones to lobby for Prince to do just that, he says that Q's angry response was "I don't need him to fucking play guitar!" Cavallo told Prince that if he was going to skip the session, he needed to claim illness, and that no matter what, he couldn't go out to party after the AMAs, because the publicity would be terrible if people knew he had blown off the charity gig. Prince did, in fact, head out to a club on Sunset Boulevard, where his bodyguard got into a fracas and ended up in jail; on a night where music's biggest stars were visibly selfless, Prince was the one who stood out as selfish. He ultimately told his side of the story in the song "Hello," the B-side to "Pop Life."

Poorlovelycomputer said:

I think the Prince contribution to the album only helped it's record sales as a whole the track 4 the tears in your eyes is far superior than we are the world in its message

I'm glad he did not sing on the song. I'm so glad we received a seperate song to enjoy.

the night of the We Are the World recording UPTOWN OWNED THE NIGHT

Prince had, of course, been approached to participate, but he passed and proposed a different kind of contribution to the project.

“I was with Prince one day at his home studio, just the two of us,” says Susan Rogers, who engineered Purple Rain and Prince’s next few albums, “and he got a call from Quincy Jones asking him to come be part of ‘We Are the World.’ I only hear Prince’s side of the conversation—I was in the control room waiting—but he declined it. It was a long conversation, and Prince said, ‘Can I play guitar on it?’ And they said no, and he ultimately said, ‘Okay, well, can I send Sheila?’ And he sent Sheila. Then he said, ‘If there’s going to be an album, can I do a song for the album?’ And evidently they said yes.”

At the awards show, it was a whirlwind of logistics and scheduling; everyone was buzzing about what was planned for later in the evening.

“They kept us so cloistered that a lot of information never would get to us,” says [Revolution keyboard player Lisa] Coleman, “so I don’t remember even knowing about ‘We Are the World’ until that day, when everybody was talking about it backstage. Like, ‘We’ll see you tonight, right?’ And I was like, ‘What are they talking about?’”

“Prince was pissed,” says Wendy Melvoin. “He was like, ‘I don’t want to see any of you there, you’re not allowed to go there.’”

Until the last minute, Prince’s managers were still trying to persuade him to show up for the session.

“At the American Music Awards, he keeps telling me the only thing he’ll do is play guitar,” says Bob Cavallo, one of Prince’s managers at the time and a producer of the Purple Rain movie. “So I call Quincy, and he says, ‘I don’t need him to f****** play guitar!’ and he got angry.

I said, ‘All right, I don’t know, he’s not feeling well’—I start this whole campaign that he’s getting the flu."

Conductor: Quincy Jones, Soloists: Lionel Richie, Stevie Wonder, Paul Simon, Kenny Rogers, James Ingram, Tina Turner, Billy Joel, Michael Jackson, Diana Ross, Dionne Warwick, Willie Nelson, Al Jarreau, Bruce Springsteen, Kenny Loggins, Steve Perry, Daryl Hall, Huey Lewis, Cyndi Lauper, Kim Carnes, Bob Dylan, Ray Charles, Chorus: Dan Aykroyd, Harry Belafonte, Lindsey Buckingham, Mario Cipollina, Johnny Colla, Sheila E., Bob Geldof, Bill Gibson, Chris Hayes, Sean Hopper, Jackie Jackson, La Toya Jackson, Marlon Jackson, Randy Jackson, Tito Jackson, Waylon Jennings, Bette Midler, John Oates, Jeffrey Osborne, Anita Pointer, June Pointer, Ruth Pointer, Smokey Robinson

Poorlovelycomputer said:

I think the Prince contribution to the album only helped it's record sales as a whole the track 4 the tears in your eyes is far superior than we are the world in its message

Far superior??? I don't think so. In fact, there's a bit of an answer to "4 The Tears" on the record, with Northen Lights (the Canadian version of USA for Africa) singing "Tears Are Not Enough". There's a lot of untruths in 4TTIYE, too.

The song never became anything substantial, and it certainly seemed very non-Prince to casual fans who knew 1999 and Purple Rain to that point. It barely had radio play and the play it did get was solely on the heels of the Purple Rain hysteria from the year before. (Remember, this was January 1985, and beyond.) It's a quirky, lightweight song that's unremarkable in most ways. Of course, fans love it but in general no one was buying We Are The World solely for the Prince song.

The ones who had much better success with their singles, and drove up sales, were Steve Perry, (especially) Bruce Springsteen, Chicago, and Kenny Rogers. Northern Lights released their own video and single from the album.

God this takes me back Prince's purple limo was the sh...t even back then.Everything was coming up roses til chick beat the crap outta that photog lol.Wendy and lisa tell the entire story online.They told him prince stay in dont go out.And he went out and the press went crazy.Backlash began hard then he wrote the song.

Thanks for the pics and great info. I remember watching this show being all excited and I think the awards shows were so much better back then! It would've been cool to see Prince at this recording session with all these other superstars, but I did enjoy "4 The Tears in Your Eyes", beautiful song and remember seeing the video played during the broadcast of Live Aid.

it really was a debacle. They tried to manipulate him, Prince didn't like being manipulated, I don't think anyone does. He was rife for a backlash though and he did everything to make it happen faster. The story in the Alan Light book is that cavallo told the media he had the flu and that he should stay in the hotel, Prince goes out and parties, cavallo sounded like his lie would have made the whole thing blow over, I don't think it would have. Prince was already being seen s strange and rude and wierd. They say at awards shows the people around him were told not to look at him. I'm sorry, that's just him being bigheaded. All this, along with the Enquirer story and his own desire to escape that much limelight pretty much ended that period of megastardom. Personally, i can understand wwhy he wouldn't want to do the stupid song, it was fake, it was written by his archrival and Mj probably wanted to turn it into a duel of some kind, just like he did with the James Brown show and like he tried to do with the bad video. Michael tried to appear innocent but he was quite devious about how competive he really was. As Quincy said recently, "that was some drama mama, but Michael loved that" about their face to face meeting.

Morningstarlet said:

I don't understand why he wouldn't do it. He supposedly was to stand next to Michael Jackson, so I wonder if he didn't want to stand next to the much taller Michael. I think he should have done it.

It just wasn't his thing.
the Purple Camp was too 'underground' still it just didn't fit Prince Dirty Mind The Time Controversy Vanity 6 What Time Is It? 1999 Sugar Walls Ice Cream Castles Sheila E Purple Rain

in 1996 though he end up on stage with 4 the WRTW resinging sucking on a lollypop

Big Chick taking care of Business the night of the We Are the World recording

OldFriends4Sale said:

Morningstarlet said:

I don't understand why he wouldn't do it. He supposedly was to stand next to Michael Jackson, so I wonder if he didn't want to stand next to the much taller Michael. I think he should have done it.

It just wasn't his thing.
the Purple Camp was too 'underground' still it just didn't fit Prince Dirty Mind The Time Controversy Vanity 6 What Time Is It? 1999 Sugar Walls Ice Cream Castles Sheila E Purple Rain

in 1996 though he end up on stage with 4 the WRTW resinging sucking on a lollypop

no it wasn't and of course it was unfair for Prince to be roundly criticized for it but those are the things that come with that kind of stardom. It's also a reason why prince eschewed it and just made the new fan alienating Around The World. I do think Michael was trying to cause some drama though, i'm sure of it. he was probably trying to turn it into a singfest, prince likely saw this and just offered to play guitar. None of it was fair, but like i say, that comes with the territory. Do you think Elvis wanted to join the Army? The Beatles even cracked under the pressure of John's Jesus statement. You know, it's true, be careful what you wish for.

PeteSilas said:

OldFriends4Sale said:

It just wasn't his thing.
the Purple Camp was too 'underground' still it just didn't fit Prince Dirty Mind The Time Controversy Vanity 6 What Time Is It? 1999 Sugar Walls Ice Cream Castles Sheila E Purple Rain

in 1996 though he end up on stage with 4 the WRTW resinging sucking on a lollypop

no it wasn't and of course it was unfair for Prince to be roundly criticized for it but those are the things that come with that kind of stardom. It's also a reason why prince eschewed it and just made the new fan alienating Around The World. I do think Michael was trying to cause some drama though, i'm sure of it. he was probably trying to turn it into a singfest, prince likely saw this and just offered to play guitar. None of it was fair, but like i say, that comes with the territory. Do you think Elvis wanted to join the Army? The Beatles even cracked under the pressure of John's Jesus statement. You know, it's true, be careful what you wish for.

Yes it was unfair, and yes it does go with the territory.

this was the line Prince was supposed to sing: "But if you just believe, there's no way we can fall."

I'm trying to image how he could have down it and take it to Uptown.

If he would have just stayed in the hotel, it would have all blown over...

But looking back at that night of the AMA's post # 3, that was a PURPLE NIGHT

They should have gotten on a Jet, flown around somewhere and partied in the air.
But that was a PURPLE NIGHT

OldFriends4Sale said:

Poorlovelycomputer said:

I think the Prince contribution to the album only helped it's record sales as a whole the track 4 the tears in your eyes is far superior than we are the world in its message

I'm glad he did not sing on the song. I'm so glad we received a seperate song to enjoy.

Me too. Although it was for a noble cause 'We are the world' is cheesy and outdated, as 4TTIYE (specially the B sides version) could have been released yesterday.

[Edited 10/29/16 13:15pm]

The song was fine 4 the time and actually to help aid africa um dont get lost in the story.But,he had every right not to do it.BUT SAID HE WAS SICK AND GOT CAUGHT LYING WHICH MADE HIM LOOK BAD.That night wendy even stayed awhile cause she said she had an idea he would go out lol.And bam there it was.Everyone included was a hitmaker at the time.

https://medium.com/cuepoi....fyi8z0lrp Here it is.

One of his better career moves. Fuck what the press and public thought. Prince was way too cool for that lame ass song. He was a cult artist since he was in his late teen years and he always had that 'dangerous/underground' vibe. Prince's whole attitude in the '80s was 'fuck today's pop music, I'll build my own empire." With baddies like Sheila E. and Apollonia, talented musicians like Wendy and Mark, and other very talented peers like JJ and Andre, why tf would Prince need Michael Jackson and his manufactured piece of shit song that was nothing more than a celebrity dick sucking contest? No disrespect to MJ whose music I LOVE but he missed the mark on this song and the whole time he was focused on making himself the center of attention (you can read online about how MJ wanted the song to start by focusing on his shoes). I think P sensed a feeling of fake-ness and Hollywood cheese in this session which is why he didn't go. Now the time P fucked up was by partying that same night but I can't really hold that against him considering he just dominated the AMAs and deserved to have a good night out. But again, fuck what the press and public thought. It's been revealed publicly that P was a secret philanthropist, probably 5x more than whatever fuckwad was criticizing him back then.

http://www.dailymotion.co...n-mr-t_fun still love this video

Interesting that Madonna didn't participate either. I don't remember one peep from the media about her at all back then in relationship to this project. I can remember being thoroughly sick of the over-played "We Are The World" by the end of the year...

also, it's been so long but another huge factor in the backlash was Prince's bodyguards beating up photographers with Prince bailing them out of jail. People often forget to mention that, i guess because it's been 30 years but it was a big part of the whole story.

purplethunder3121 said:

rogifan said:

purplethunder3121 said:

Interesting that Madonna didn't participate either. I don't remember one peep from the media about her at all back then in relationship to this project. I can remember being thoroughly sick of the over-played "We Are The World" by the end of the year...

I don't think Madonna was a big star at that point yet.

she wasn't mega star but she was well on her way, lets see, when purple rain was out, wasn't like a virgin out too? 1984, I think she was probably bigger in the next 2 or three years though.

PeteSilas said:

rogifan said:

purplethunder3121 said: I don't think Madonna was a big star at that point yet.

she wasn't mega star but she was well on her way, lets see, when purple rain was out, wasn't like a virgin out too? 1984, I think she was probably bigger in the next 2 or three years though.

Ironic that "Crazy For You" knocked WATW from the number one position on the charts.

rogifan said:

Good gawd what an awful song. Cheesy as hell. I can see why Prince would've wanted nothing to do with it.

Awful & Cheesy..........................................