[Edited 7/25/17 11:56am]

[Edited 7/25/17 11:56am]

soladeo1 said:

So The Kid's Clothes in Purple Rain???

Okay, so in Purple Rain The Kid is supposed to be this hungry, struggling musician but somehow he has this KILLER warbrobe of couture, tailor-made clothing?

And don't get me started on his purple motorcycle!

In the mid-80s, a rotational band at a decent-sized venue like First Ave., even if they were playing 5 nights a week, would only be netting around $300 a show TOPS. At the high end that would be around $1500 a week, or $6000 a month. Alright, The Kid is the bandleader so he probably gets 50% with the rest of The Revolution splitting the rest. So wer'e looking at $3000 a month in net revenue 1984 dollars.

So he's got of pay some taxes (even assuming that Billy pays the band 'under the table')...let's say The Kid's real taxable bracket allows him to bring home ~$2500 a month. We never see The Kid doing any additional/side gigs like working retail, babysitting, doing construction so let's assume that Billy's wads of greasy bills are his sole source of income...

Side Note: I bet Wendy, though, is an elementary school teacher on the side and Lisa teaches music lessons... Dr. Fink is an actual doctor - a dentist and Brown Mark is a part-time EMT driver. David Z sponsors Dungeons & Dragon tournaments in the Greater Minneapolis/St. Paul Area.

Now The Kid lives at home so that definately saves some $. But he still needs to pay the note on his bike, buy food and stuff like Doritos, his mascara budget, buy gas, etc.

What else do we know? Well, we know he doesn't have a lot of scratch cause he wants to buy the White Cloud Guitar he covets on the store window with Appolonia nia but doesn't have the money. The Kid is poor in money buy rich in personality, right?

Let's say - conservatively - that The Kid has around $1000 a month of disposable income.

How does he get his clothes???

His outfits are WORKS OF SARTORIAL ART, people. He's not buying them at Chess King!

The French lace and ruffles alone...

How is a young black man in the middle of Minnesota Circa 1984-85 going to find affordbale tailers and designers to make him his Spaceman Edwardian Outfits?

And how does he ask for clothes. "Make me look like a Perfumed Courtesian Dandy," he'd mutter in a soft, deep voice to his haberdashers. "That's The Look that's going to take get me out of Billy's Iron Grip..."???

This just strecthes credulity to the breaking point, folks.

I'm just not buying it...

[Edited 7/25/17 11:56am]

[Edited 7/25/17 11:56am]

He would have been in debt which most people were in the 80s. Even Prince had debt to WB for a good while I suspect from overspending. Remember the contract for a show in Houston in 80 were his whole band was paid $500.00. but some how they had money for Fredricks of Hollywood clothes?

He was a great thrift store shopper?






He was getting paid something, he had to maintain that bike with something

While we're picking apart the movie, it's truly incredible how a nightclub in Minneapolis can have such high quality bands performing in it. Not to mention that those bands are able to come up with several new and amazing songs a week.

laurarichardson said:

He would have been in debt which most people were in the 80s. Even Prince had debt to WB for a good while I suspect from overspending. Remember the contract for a show in Houston in 80 were his whole band was paid $500.00. but some how they had money for Fredricks of Hollywood clothes?

Way more true today than in the 80s.

The movie is a piece of fiction (with some parts drawn from Prince's life). Simple as that, I think. No need to look for any reasoning behind it all.

p.s. The moon we're under isn't really a cherry, either.

I know, right? It's not like these bands are playing Commodores covers?

Reminds of the new Twin Peaks. Every episode ends with a band playing at the Bang Bang Club, the local bar. One week, it was Nine Inch Nails playing... Twin Peaks is a town of around 55,000 people...

PurpleYoda3121 said:

While we're picking apart the movie, it's truly incredible how a nightclub in Minneapolis can have such high quality bands performing in it. Not to mention that those bands are able to come up with several new and amazing songs a week.

Simple explaination....

The Kid bought his motorcycle used, back in 84, $3,000.

Little did people know, the Kid took home ec. in high school, where he learned to make and sew his own clothes. He also went to hair dressing class too where he learned to perm and curl his hair.

Doozer said:

laurarichardson said:

He would have been in debt which most people were in the 80s. Even Prince had debt to WB for a good while I suspect from overspending. Remember the contract for a show in Houston in 80 were his whole band was paid $500.00. but some how they had money for Fredricks of Hollywood clothes?

Way more true today than in the 80s.

The movie is a piece of fiction (with some parts drawn from Prince's life). Simple as that, I think. No need to look for any reasoning behind it all.

p.s. The moon we're under isn't really a cherry, either.

Where did you live in the 80s.? The cost of living was going thru the roof and we start to see not bums who are homeless but whole families.

Did you not see my comment about his check from the Houston show or know that Sheila E ran over her budget for her band and show to almost a million dollars in the 80s.

People had champange wishes and cavier dreams on Budwiser budgets.

laurarichardson said:

Doozer said:

Way more true today than in the 80s.

The movie is a piece of fiction (with some parts drawn from Prince's life). Simple as that, I think. No need to look for any reasoning behind it all.

p.s. The moon we're under isn't really a cherry, either.

Where did you live in the 80s.? The cost of living was going thru the roof and we start to see not bums who are homeless but whole families.

Did you not see my comment about his check from the Houston show or know that Sheila E ran over her budget for her band and show to almost a million dollars in the 80s.

People had champange wishes and cavier dreams on Budwiser budgets.

US household debt relative to household income was 43% in 1982, and has increased to more than 65% today, if the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago's research holds any weight.

If you think people had a higher household debt in the 80s than they do today relative to their household income, you are wrong.

laurarichardson said:

Doozer said:

Way more true today than in the 80s.

The movie is a piece of fiction (with some parts drawn from Prince's life). Simple as that, I think. No need to look for any reasoning behind it all.

p.s. The moon we're under isn't really a cherry, either.

Where did you live in the 80s.? The cost of living was going thru the roof and we start to see not bums who are homeless but whole families.

Did you not see my comment about his check from the Houston show or know that Sheila E ran over her budget for her band and show to almost a million dollars in the 80s.

People had champange wishes and cavier dreams on Budwiser budgets.

yeah, I thought that was pretty much known in the movie? Morris in his crappy apartment but with his zoot suit and fresh clothes, talking about his chef and his brass water bed, --- faking it until they made it--- right?

Doozer said:

laurarichardson said:

Where did you live in the 80s.? The cost of living was going thru the roof and we start to see not bums who are homeless but whole families.

Did you not see my comment about his check from the Houston show or know that Sheila E ran over her budget for her band and show to almost a million dollars in the 80s.

People had champange wishes and cavier dreams on Budwiser budgets.

US household debt relative to household income was 43% in 1982, and has increased to more than 65% today, if the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago's research holds any weight.

If you think people had a higher household debt in the 80s than they do today relative to their household income, you are wrong.

What people were these? The people that answered the door when the govt came around to take a survey. I bet they did not survery people in the hoods of South Central L.A., D.C., Chicago, Detroit or

Oakland.

Do you not remember homelessness, crack, savings and loan crisis?

Superfan1984 said:

laurarichardson said:

Where did you live in the 80s.? The cost of living was going thru the roof and we start to see not bums who are homeless but whole families.

Did you not see my comment about his check from the Houston show or know that Sheila E ran over her budget for her band and show to almost a million dollars in the 80s.

People had champange wishes and cavier dreams on Budwiser budgets.

yeah, I thought that was pretty much known in the movie? Morris in his crappy apartment but with his zoot suit and fresh clothes, talking about his chef and his brass water bed, --- faking it until they made it--- right?

Yes, people were faking it to make it. Chicks use to buy clothes and tuck in the tags so they could take them back to the store. (LOL) Remember pleather?

laurarichardson said:

Superfan1984 said:

yeah, I thought that was pretty much known in the movie? Morris in his crappy apartment but with his zoot suit and fresh clothes, talking about his chef and his brass water bed, --- faking it until they made it--- right?

Yes, people were faking it to make it. Chicks use to buy clothes and tuck in the tags so they could take them back to the store. (LOL) Remember pleather?

haha...yes!

laurarichardson said:

Doozer said:

US household debt relative to household income was 43% in 1982, and has increased to more than 65% today, if the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago's research holds any weight.

If you think people had a higher household debt in the 80s than they do today relative to their household income, you are wrong.

What people were these? The people that answered the door when the govt came around to take a survey. I bet they did not survery people in the hoods of South Central L.A., D.C., Chicago, Detroit or

Oakland.

Do you not remember homelessness, crack, savings and loan crisis?

It's not about what I remember or what you bet might be the case, it's about financial reports from the biggest and most respected financial institutions in the US, which show debt is higher for everyone now than 35 years ago.

None of which is relevant to how a fictional character in a movie afforded his clothing, motorcycle, or guitar.

Doozer said:

laurarichardson said:

laurarichardson said:

He got them out of his mama's closet.....

Doozer said:

laurarichardson said: I don't know why you would argue that debt was more of a problem in the 80s than it is now in order to explain why a fictional character from a struggling fictional family could be well dressed and drive a cool bike, but okay. [Edited 7/25/17 19:56pm]

joyinrepetition said:

laurarichardson said:

laurarichardson said:

joyinrepetition said:

Simple explaination....

The Kid bought his motorcycle used, back in 84, $3,000.

Little did people know, the Kid took home ec. in high school, where he learned to make and sew his own clothes. He also went to hair dressing class too where he learned to perm and curl his hair.

Lol, yep, and he also took makeup classes, because remember he was lining his eyes with the eyeliner pencil in one clip.

Well, let's not forget that the 80s was also the era of all the John Hughs teeneger-coming-of-age movies where every "middle class" high school student drove a new car, wore tastefully understated but expensive jewelry, and lived in a house that had a huge gourmet kitchen, huge designer bedrooms, inground pool, and was supposed to be in a middle class neighbourhood, but if you researched the actual price of those houses in real life, they were mansions...The house and neighbourhood in Home Alone comes to mind...

.

And am I the only one who noticed that the parents were hardly ever around while the teenagers smoked, drank alcohol, lived glamorous, independant, highly sexual, uber partying, fashionably dressed, shopaholic lives...and the ones who worked had crappy minimum wage paying after school jobs yet still maintained their grades?...

.

Ahhh, those fictional 80s teenaged life memories...

Well this is out of left field

soladeo1 said:

David Z sponsors Dungeons & Dragon tournaments in the Greater Minneapolis/St. Paul Area.

Maybe The Kid made some money by selling James Brown bootlegs...

Lately i've been working on Purple rain, the song, on piano, getting it as close as i can to the movie version, it's a multilayered complex song, unlike most of p's hits. anyway, no way a band can just up and play a song to that degree of perfection, so, point made, it's just a movie. in fact, i've read prince would have the band work for hours and hours on one minute riff of the song, that sounds about right.

Doozer said:

laurarichardson said:

He would have been in debt which most people were in the 80s. Even Prince had debt to WB for a good while I suspect from overspending. Remember the contract for a show in Houston in 80 were his whole band was paid $500.00. but some how they had money for Fredricks of Hollywood clothes?

Way more true today than in the 80s.

The movie is a piece of fiction (with some parts drawn from Prince's life). Simple as that, I think. No need to look for any reasoning behind it all.

p.s. The moon we're under isn't really a cherry, either.

purplefam99 said:

laurarichardson said: Black people fake to make it???? All of them??? Your kidding right??

I can only speak on what I know and I lot of black people who might be struggling financially will make it appear that they are doing a little better then they are especially back in the 80s.

Everyone tried to look their best so you faked it until you made it. Now a days not so much because younger people just do not seem to give a shit about anything and appear to have no pride especially when it comes to appearance.

So while I do not know all 43 million African Americans I do know my culture and cultrually generations from Generation X on back in the African American community have faked it to make it. or just was "Fronting"

---

See the Urban dictionary.

laurarichardson said:

Like Under the Cherry Moon, Purple Rain is still fantasy with a little reality.

.

It's almost futuristic. I think in most cases when we look to hard to understand

every detail we take away the magic and wonder.

I know someone who cannot go to a movie without trying to figure out the plot and find all the wholes as soon as they are in the theater. No imagination loss of innocence no magic.

.

Francis L has a very good pension, has a good paying job, and works to provide a nice life for his wife and son, has a ton of money saved away, and the Kid has access to it.

I don't think it was ever implied that that family was poor.