It was on the radio where I lived, for sure, the same way radio picked up "Erotic City".

Alan Leeds said, in the liner notes for The Hits/The B-Sides that "17 Days" was the single always in search of its album. I am glad that he didn't leave it on Apollonia 6's album. Although, with the songs he originally intended for that album, it could have been a much better success. Prince obviously loved the song, too. It was the opening track they played at that birthday gig in 1984 at First Avenue. He played it often on the Parade Tour.

It's b-sidedness almost makes the whole thing cooler. As if only serious fans get to hear it, and Prince himself could care less.

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It's also from a time when a lot of Prince singles are reusing the same melody for the verse and chorus. Let's Go Crazy, Take Me With You, When Doves Cry, Erotic City, The Screams of Passion, The Dance Electric, and later on A Love Bizarre all have these repeating melodies, which seems to help the urgency and obsessive quality of the songs grow, like seance songs.

It must have been in Purple Rain, great song. The album could have been much better with 17 Days on it.

soladeo1 said:

Seriously. It's commercial appeal and HUGE hook is equal to any other of his monster hits. And it was a b-side...amazing.

#1 might be a stretch, but I agree it would have been a hit - at least a minor one.

Songs like this are what help drive the Prince legend. When relatively throwaway songs are this great, it helps drive the narrative that he was just the most talented artist of the day both in breadth and depth. In that sense, it was of greater value to him as a B-side than featured as an A-side where the expectations would be huge.

Mintchip said:

It's b-sidedness almost makes the whole thing cooler. As if only serious fans get to hear it, and Prince himself could care less.

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It's also from a time when a lot of Prince singles are reusing the same melody for the verse and chorus. Let's Go Crazy, Take Me With You, When Doves Cry, Erotic City, The Screams of Passion, The Dance Electric, and later on A Love Bizarre all have these repeating melodies, which seems to help the urgency and obsessive quality of the songs grow, like seance songs.

Prince has always been an environmentally friendly melody writer. I Wanna Be Your Lover, Raspberry Beret, The Most Beautiful Girl In The World...it's a testimony to his production and arrangement skills that he made often using pretty much the same melody for verse and chorus work.

It's a great song for us fans but i never think it would have been a nr 1 hit. A minor hit à la Take me with you probably.

I also dont think it would have fitted on the album and it couldn't have replaced any of the actual songs cause they're all better (except Baby i'm a star but that fitted the movie well)

Erotic City would have been a bigger hit than 17 Days, but also no nr 1 surely. Hey, even Purple Rain itself wasn't a nr 1 if i recall.

Wow! I totally agree!!

It might be my actual favourite ever prince song but I think it would have been a rubbish single, its not punchy enough. It would have just gotten lost on radio back then.

jjam said:

Mintchip said:

It's b-sidedness almost makes the whole thing cooler. As if only serious fans get to hear it, and Prince himself could care less.

.

It's also from a time when a lot of Prince singles are reusing the same melody for the verse and chorus. Let's Go Crazy, Take Me With You, When Doves Cry, Erotic City, The Screams of Passion, The Dance Electric, and later on A Love Bizarre all have these repeating melodies, which seems to help the urgency and obsessive quality of the songs grow, like seance songs.

Prince has always been an environmentally friendly melody writer. I Wanna Be Your Lover, Raspberry Beret, The Most Beautiful Girl In The World...it's a testimony to his production and arrangement skills that he made often using pretty much the same melody for verse and chorus work.

U like environmental records? Crickets chirping, water rushing, supposed 2 make u horny. Make me want 2 go 2 the bathroom.

Erotic City was picked up by radio and played a lot in clubs as well. 17 Days I never heard at the time. So people did listen to the b sides at that time, but 17Days simply wasn't interesting enough.

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In summary, no, 17 Days would not have been a hit. It is not even one of the better B sides.

Most definitely would have been a hit, although #1 might be pushing it.

I thought the same about She's Always In My Hair.

mediumdry said:

It is not even one of the better B sides

You may be on your own with that one.

lakerlaker52 said:

soladeo1 said:

Seriously. It's commercial appeal and HUGE hook is equal to any other of his monster hits. And it was a b-side...amazing.

#1 might be a stretch, but I agree it would have been a hit - at least a minor one.

Songs like this are what help drive the Prince legend. When relatively throwaway songs are this great, it helps drive the narrative that he was just the most talented artist of the day both in breadth and depth. In that sense, it was of greater value to him as a B-side than featured as an A-side where the expectations would be huge.

Well said. I agree.

Pokeno4Money said:

Most definitely would have been a hit, although #1 might be pushing it.

I thought the same about She's Always In My Hair.

If "Take Me WIth U" hit the top 40, then I definitely think 17 Days could have hit it. Maybe top 20. But as lakerlaker52 said well, "Days" has far more artistic cachet as a "Killer B" than a middling chart hit.

Had "Hair" been the lead single from the album, i.e., the first single after Purple Rain, then yeah, it would have had a shot.

Look, if WDC could be the monster that it was, any other one at that time could have been with the video and push behind it. Prince was ready to explode onto the zeitgeist in a major way at that time. He could have done Chopsticks with a beat and it wold have been huge.

namepeace said:

mediumdry said:

It is not even one of the better B sides

You may be on your own with that one.

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I may well be.

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I missed Irresistible Bitch and Horny Toad at release time, but after How Come You Don't Call Me Anymore, 17 Days simply seemed like a bit of a letdown. Erotic City hit the spot again though, for me, and then God was somewhat disturbing.

.

No accounting for taste, is there?

mediumdry said:

namepeace said:

You may be on your own with that one.

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I may well be.

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I missed Irresistible Bitch and Horny Toad at release time, but after How Come You Don't Call Me Anymore, 17 Days simply seemed like a bit of a letdown. Erotic City hit the spot again though, for me, and then God was somewhat disturbing.

.

No accounting for taste, is there?

No wrong answers.

To paraphrase Prince, whatever is your fave is a matter of taste.

What did you think of the other B-Sides during the "Golden Age" of the 80's?

Given that two months later "Let's Go Crazy" came out to pop radio (With Erotic City on it) that was going to be good enough. There would have been no room for 17 Days to come out like "Into The Groove" did whereas "Angel" was not the success of it's own b-side. Im sure if WDC tanked 17 Days would have made it.

Pokeno4Money said:

Most definitely would have been a hit, although #1 might be pushing it.

I thought the same about She's Always In My Hair.

Agreed. Maybe would've made it into top 10. LOVE 17 Days!

Wendy and Lisa co wrote the lyrics to 17 days.

TrivialPursuit said:

It was on the radio where I lived, for sure, the same way radio picked up "Erotic City".

Alan Leeds said, in the liner notes for The Hits/The B-Sides that "17 Days" was the single always in search of its album. I am glad that he didn't leave it on Apollonia 6's album. Although, with the songs he originally intended for that album, it could have been a much better success. Prince obviously loved the song, too. It was the opening track they played at that birthday gig in 1984 at First Avenue. He played it often on the Parade Tour.

Yep. "17 Days" got a lot of radio play back then, along with "Erotic City", especially on black radio stations. This was back when DJ's could pick their own playlists.

Pokeno4Money said:

luvgirl said:

Pokeno4Money said:

Most definitely would have been a hit, although #1 might be pushing it.

I thought the same about She's Always In My Hair.

Yes, I've always thought that 17 Days and She's Always In My hair could have been huge hits as well. "Wonderful A$$" too, but I don't know how they would have censored the word A$$.

"She's Always in my Hair" should have neen on ATWIAD. I'm not sure where i would put it in the sequence or what song I would take out to make room for it but it's the best track of all the officially released stuff from those sessions.

namepeace said:

What did you think of the other B-Sides during the "Golden Age" of the 80's?

To answer that question a bit broader than just listing songs...

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It started with Gotta Stop, which became an A side in the UK. The fascination with B-sides for Prince seems to really start in the 1999 era, which has some great songs in How Come and Irressistible Bitch. With the Purple Rain era, everything exploded for Prince and I'm sure he relished the fact that Erotic City became something of a club hit on it's own without being an "official" release. And while I don't care much for 17 Days or the Gods, those songs did seem to mean a lot to him. Telling in this regard is that when he lost interest and wanted to move on, there was no more B side to Take Me With U.

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Around The World In A Day is, without a doubt, the high point for B sides. Not only are all three songs among my favourite Prince songs, it seems that his fans and even Prince agrees by still playing Girl and She's Always in My Hair until almost the end. These song, I feel, did not fit on the album, but did complement it tremendously and made the anticipation for new singles much greater.

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By the Parade album, the B sides seem to get less important to him. The quality goes down (somewhat) and he seems to concentrate more on the 12" versions of songs, as Kiss, Mountains and Anotherloverholenyohead are some of the best mixes he put out, even better than what he did with ATWIAD. The mixes took over in creating anticipation for new singles.

.

After that it was mostly hit and miss with a lot of singles not getting proper B sides and 12" versions being mixed at times by external people without Prince involvement. The most interesting thing that happened, to me, is how he sometimes would remake a song in a mix by simply mixing another song through the first, or constructing something entirely new, such as Scandalous The Passion, Get Off Violet The Organgrinder or Space Universal Love.

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I've left out some B side gems like La La La He He Hee and Feel U Up in this, and it was nice to get something extra like Horny Pony and Call The Law later on, but by and large the era of the B side as relevant ended when Prince decided to not include one with Alphabet Street, the lead single of a new album he felt quite strong about (it had a great 12" though), but then, with Lovesexy it seems his entire approach to music and life changed. The end of an era.

[Edited 5/21/17 2:35am]

rdhull said: