It keeps getting stated over, and over and over again; one of the best things about Prince was how he was able to make music which appealed to a wide variety of musical tastes. It's like he said, his creations were like his children, different people think and like different things; doesn't make the songs/albums/his children "good" or "bad" simply based upon peoples' opinions. I personally don't care what ANYONE says, I like For You better than Dirty Mind. So you're going to get a boatload of different opinions, I just think that it's awesome that people have the chance to take a class and are actually interested in his music.

Asenath said:

It keeps getting stated over, and over and over again; one of the best things about Prince was how he was able to make music which appealed to a wide variety of musical tastes. It's like he said, his creations were like his children, different people think and like different things; doesn't make the songs/albums/his children "good" or "bad" simply based upon peoples' opinions. I personally don't care what ANYONE says, I like For You better than Dirty Mind. So you're going to get a boatload of different opinions, I just think that it's awesome that people have the chance to take a class and are actually interested in his music.

I agree!

TheEnglishGent said:

They like SOTT, Parade and Purple Rain, that is a good start in my book. 1999 and Lovesexy are more complex and have more layers to digest, give them time, they will come around. And mad props for getting people into Prince

OldFriends4Sale said:

laurarichardson said:

206Michelle said:

OldFriends4Sale said:

Lovesexy is the greater album as for as Princeology is concerned

Yes it is. However, I feel that the listener has to “get” Prince in order to “get” and appreciate Lovesexy. It’s not a very accessible album for the novice Prince listener. The listener has to have a background of listening to his previous albums in order to understand Lovesexy.

You're probably right.I had listened to Parade and SOTT before Lovesexy and was pretty used to his sound by then and was primed for it I guess.I immediately loved it though.Glam Slam,Anna Stesia,Dance On,When Two Are In Love and I Wish U Heaven especially.

I'm pretty confident his mid 80s albums are the ones that will stand for all time. But people may well explore everything else as a knock on effect in future. This is a legendary artist we loved, I've no doubt about that.

[Edited 3/3/18 13:22pm]

Marrk said:

I'm pretty confident his mid 80s albums are the ones that will stand for all time. But people may well explore everything else as a knock on effect in future. This is a legendary artist we loved, I've no doubt about that.

[Edited 3/3/18 13:22pm]

Well, for those of us who raised our kids on Prince, the love of the more "obscure" albums will always stand... My son, who is about to turn 30, listed Lovesexy as one of his favorite Prince albums to listen to recently... Even though one of his greatest accomplishments was getting down the guitar solos from the Purple Rain album when he was younger... Of course, it helped that I took him to 10 Prince concerts...

AhPook said:

I think that it's awesome that you're using Prince in a college class. Hopefully, you'll hook some of the younger generation on him. I'm a relatively young Prince fan myself as I am 31 (born in 1986).

.

Have you exposed them to Diamonds and Pearls, , Come, or The Gold Experience?

.

There are some good tracks on those albums for discussion:

*Money Don't Matter 2 Night*

Thunder

Diamonds and Pearls

Live 4 Love

Sexy MF

My Name Is Prince

Seven

Papa

Race

We March

Billy Jack Bitch

databank said:

I was 19 in 1996 so Prince's rappish stuff was fine for my generation

I'm virtually the same age, and it wasn't at all fine with me. I quite liked “My Name Is Prince” (his delivery was uniquely his own) and “Sexy MF”, but after that… “Dead On It” should have been his first and last statement on rap in my view, at least on record.

purplethunder3121 said:

Marrk said:

I'm pretty confident his mid 80s albums are the ones that will stand for all time. But people may well explore everything else as a knock on effect in future. This is a legendary artist we loved, I've no doubt about that.

[Edited 3/3/18 13:22pm]

Well, for those of us who raised our kids on Prince, the love of the more "obscure" albums will always stand... My son, who is about to turn 30, listed Lovesexy as one of his favorite Prince albums to listen to recently... Even though one of his greatest accomplishments was getting down the guitar solos from the Purple Rain album when he was younger... Of course, it helped that I took him to 10 Prince concerts...

Lucky lad. I only saw him twice – 95 and 98.

Adorecream said:

They like SOTT, Parade and Purple Rain, that is a good start in my book. 1999 and Lovesexy are more complex and have more layers to digest, give them time, they will come around. And mad props for getting people into Prince

As someone who's probably a similar age to the college students I second this. It took me a while to really love 1999 as much as I do now... What helped with that was listening to the protege albums of around that era and reading up about it in general. Purple Rain is still my all-time fav tho.

Interestingly, my experience over the course of the last 20 years or so was that in order to introduce Prince's music to non fans, the best approach was to have them hear one of whatever were his last few releases at that particular moment.

Somehow, it seemed Prince's latest music was always more accessible to contemporary listeners and non-fans than his "classic" records.

AhPook said:

databank said:

I'd like to know more about that. How exactly do you organize a "Prince class" with 19 college students?

I use Prince as a lens. We use his music as an entry point for discussions of race, gender, religion, sexuality, politics, etc. It's more of a class about culture than a music class. Prince is just the textbook.

This is a pretty neat topic. Thing I notice about non fans is how often you can catch them with a more obscure track and basically trick them into liking Prince's stuff. Like NEWS blew my in laws away. Exodus brings in the funk lovers. Stuff like Hallucination Rain and the back end of LAst December catch the psople who think he's just a pop artist off guard.


The R&RHOF performance caught a lot of people dead in their tracks as well when he melted the faces of the entire audience.

HatrinaHaterwitz said:

I'd give them nothing better than a C-

And a straight F for any that dissed Lovesexy.

206Michelle said:

I think that it's awesome that you're using Prince in a college class. Hopefully, you'll hook some of the younger generation on him. I'm a relatively young Prince fan myself as I am 31 (born in 1986).

.

Have you exposed them to Diamonds and Pearls, , Come, or The Gold Experience?

.

There are some good tracks on those albums for discussion:

*Money Don't Matter 2 Night*

Thunder

Diamonds and Pearls

Live 4 Love

Sexy MF

My Name Is Prince

Seven

Papa

Race

We March

Billy Jack Bitch

We're beyond D&P and getting to the rest. We talked about Willin' and Able ("There's some kings in my deck and a queen or 2 / So you know there ain't nothin' that I wouldn't do") and Live 4 Love. Gett Off was a winner. I'm not really doing music reviews with them (although I ask how they liked the homework). We use Prince to work through larger issues.

AhPook said:

For what it's worth, the 19 college students in my Prince class unanimously believe the Batman soundtrack is better than Lovesexy. They also think Purple Rain is "a trip," 1999 sounds "too eighties," and Parade is "weirdly great." They loved Sign O' the Times and hated the Black Album.

Another thing about Lovesexy that makes it less accessible to the novice Prince listener is that the album is all one track. I understand what Prince was trying to do by making the album all one track, but it's also obnoxious because I can't add Anna Stesia and Lovesexy to my playlists of favourite Prince songs.

deebee said:

AhPook said:

206Michelle said:

I think that it's awesome that you're using Prince in a college class. Hopefully, you'll hook some of the younger generation on him. I'm a relatively young Prince fan myself as I am 31 (born in 1986).

.

Have you exposed them to Diamonds and Pearls, , Come, or The Gold Experience?

.

There are some good tracks on those albums for discussion:

*Money Don't Matter 2 Night*

Thunder

Diamonds and Pearls

Live 4 Love

Sexy MF

My Name Is Prince

Seven

Papa

Race

We March

Billy Jack Bitch

We're beyond D&P and getting to the rest. We talked about Willin' and Able ("There's some kings in my deck and a queen or 2 / So you know there ain't nothin' that I wouldn't do") and Live 4 Love. Gett Off was a winner. I'm not really doing music reviews with them (although I ask how they liked the homework). We use Prince to work through larger issues.

I would add Eye Hate U and Dark to that list, they need to know that prince was the master of the "Spurned man done wrong by his cheating ass woman" ballad. There is so much emotion and passion in these songs and they need to know the gravitas in them, that Prince was the amster of emotional music too. Like the NPG Operator says, this experience will cover love, romance, courtship, sex, commitment, loneliness, vindictiveness etc

AhPook said:

206Michelle said:

I think that it's awesome that you're using Prince in a college class. Hopefully, you'll hook some of the younger generation on him. I'm a relatively young Prince fan myself as I am 31 (born in 1986).

.

Have you exposed them to Diamonds and Pearls, , Come, or The Gold Experience?

.

There are some good tracks on those albums for discussion:

*Money Don't Matter 2 Night*

Thunder

Diamonds and Pearls

Live 4 Love

Sexy MF

My Name Is Prince

Seven

Papa

Race

We March

Billy Jack Bitch

We're beyond D&P and getting to the rest. We talked about Willin' and Able ("There's some kings in my deck and a queen or 2 / So you know there ain't nothin' that I wouldn't do") and Live 4 Love. Gett Off was a winner. I'm not really doing music reviews with them (although I ask how they liked the homework). We use Prince to work through larger issues.

If you don't mind, can you explain the line "There's some kings in my deck and a queen or 2 / So you know there ain't nothin' that I wouldn't do" because my best guess is that it's some kind of double entendre, possibly referring to a threesome.

Adorecream said:

AhPook said:

We're beyond D&P and getting to the rest. We talked about Willin' and Able ("There's some kings in my deck and a queen or 2 / So you know there ain't nothin' that I wouldn't do") and Live 4 Love. Gett Off was a winner. I'm not really doing music reviews with them (although I ask how they liked the homework). We use Prince to work through larger issues.

I would add Eye Hate U and Dark to that list, they need to know that prince was the master of the "Spurned man done wrong by his cheating ass woman" ballad. There is so much emotion and passion in these songs and they need to know the gravitas in them, that Prince was the amster of emotional music too. Like the NPG Operator says, this experience will cover love, romance, courtship, sex, commitment, loneliness, vindictiveness etc

Those are both excellent tracks. Dark is a masterpeice of a song, and the best track off of Come, in my opinion. Eye Hate U is fantastic, full of twists and turns, plus an awesome guitar solo.

fen said:

databank said:

I was 19 in 1996 so Prince's rappish stuff was fine for my generation

I'm virtually the same age, and it wasn't at all fine with me. I quite liked “My Name Is Prince” (his delivery was uniquely his own) and “Sexy MF”, but after that… “Dead On It” should have been his first and last statement on rap in my view, at least on record.

Well maybe you weren't into hip-hop in the first place?

IDK, the only people I've ever heard complaining about hip-hop and rap in P's music were Prince fans (half of which are Springsteen/Dylan fans who dislike rap in the first place).

Other people who were non-fans, but enjoyed hearing some Prince music in my company, never complained about it.

young pups don't know shit.

206Michelle said:

AhPook said:

We're beyond D&P and getting to the rest. We talked about Willin' and Able ("There's some kings in my deck and a queen or 2 / So you know there ain't nothin' that I wouldn't do") and Live 4 Love. Gett Off was a winner. I'm not really doing music reviews with them (although I ask how they liked the homework). We use Prince to work through larger issues.

If you don't mind, can you explain the line "There's some kings in my deck and a queen or 2 / So you know there ain't nothin' that I wouldn't do" because my best guess is that it's some kind of double entendre, possibly referring to a threesome.

Who knows what Prince meant there. His lyrics can be inscrutable. But it came up in a discussion of sexuality and gender identity. For myself, I always thought it adressed his feminine side. Like the line in Arrogance: "What makes a man want to rule the world? / Make him man enough to say he's 50/50 girl?"

sulls said:

AhPook said:

For what it's worth, the 19 college students in my Prince class unanimously believe the Batman soundtrack is better than Lovesexy. They also think Purple Rain is "a trip," 1999 sounds "too eighties," and Parade is "weirdly great." They loved Sign O' the Times and hated the Black Album.

Keep in mind, this is the generation that eats Tide pods

Co-sign