bonatoc said

Prince didn't believe in the bullshit of posing outside the stage.
Most of his videos are him performing, for the video, or for a live audience.
Ain't no way Prince is going to do thirty takes to correctly
throw a bowl of milk over his shoulder.

Go watch Mountains workprint video

WhisperingDandelions said:

Madge is a classy lady.

rdhull said:

bonatoc said

Prince didn't believe in the bullshit of posing outside the stage.
Most of his videos are him performing, for the video, or for a live audience.
Ain't no way Prince is going to do thirty takes to correctly
throw a bowl of milk over his shoulder.

Go watch Mountains workprint video

Prince in there is all about performance,
not not-so-subtle ejaculation metaphors.

Fincher's shooting probably took about a week.
I'm pretty sure Skipper wrapped his takes in half a day.
And that workprint is all there is, presumably.

Again, no bullshit.
Especially in 1986 when he suddenly choses to kick
every single show-business butt on stage without a single artefact.

[Edited 3/17/20 15:48pm]

bonatoc said:

rdhull said:

Go watch Mountains workprint video

Prince in there is all about performance,
not not-so-subtle ejaculation metaphors.

Fincher's shooting probably took about a week.
I'm pretty sure Skipper wrapped his takes in half a day.
And that workprint is all there is, presumably.

Again, no bullshit.
Especially in 1986 when he suddenly choses to kick
every single show-business butt on stage without a single artefact.

[Edited 3/17/20 15:48pm]

huh?

rdhull said:

rdhull said:

bonatoc said:

Prince in there is all about performance,
not not-so-subtle ejaculation metaphors.

Fincher's shooting probably took about a week.
I'm pretty sure Skipper wrapped his takes in half a day.
And that workprint is all there is, presumably.

Again, no bullshit.
Especially in 1986 when he suddenly choses to kick
every single show-business butt on stage without a single artefact.

[Edited 3/17/20 15:48pm]

huh?

Right? sometimes this guy's verbal diarrhea gets on my nerves.

[Edited 3/17/20 20:05pm]

[Edited 4/2/22 1:16am]

Cool
Drive Me Wild
Glamorous Life
.

Automatic

Raspberry Beret
America

Girls & Boys

Glam Slam

Alphabet St

slyjackson said:

rdhull said:

huh?

Right? sometimes this guy's verbal diarrhea gets on my nerves.

[Edited 3/17/20 20:05pm]

Wait. I feel a thousand words coming.

bonatoc said:

feeluupp said:

"For an artist of his caliber... Prince doesn't have good music videos." -Madonna

I disagree with Madonna.Prince has several excellent videos: "When Doves Cry","I Wish U Heaven"."Batdance","Raspberry Beret","Alphabet St" (yes,I think this video is great),and a few others.

I love the videos from the 1999 album.Yes,these are just 'performance videos' but they truly capture the look,the excitement and the spirit of that album.

dodger said:

bonatoc said:

Wait. I feel a thousand words coming.

Jackson was being a bit sly but I'm curious why he felt the need to bold diarrhea

I like how it sounds that word in english, don't get me wrong, I really like how bona express himself in written form, is just that sometimes I can't understand what the hell he's talkin about.

-

When Doves Cry.

&

Alphabet St.

-

SoulAlive said:

feeluupp said:

"For an artist of his caliber... Prince doesn't have good music videos." -Madonna

I disagree with Madonna.Prince has several excellent videos: "When Doves Cry","I Wish U Heaven"."Batdance","Raspberry Beret","Alphabet St" (yes,I think this video is great),and a few others.

I love the videos from the 1999 album.Yes,these are just 'performance videos' but they truly capture the look,the excitement and the spirit of that album.

Sure he has several, some classic iconic ones as well, but overall as a whole when you compared him to the other major artists at the time, his VISUAL artistry always was supbar for his genius ability musicially and showmanship...

I mean like I said in 1988 he had Alphabet St compared to other major artists videos during that year, it was cartoonish.

That's the one thing that always surprised me about Prince, his music videos were so corny.

Most of them look very cheap, for instance Mountains and Holy River, specially the latter.

I was at Paisley for the "Gold" shoot; very repetitive with him doing the moving sidewalk thing over and over.

It would've cool to see "Batdance."

slyjackson said:

Most of them look very cheap, for instance Mountains and Holy River, specially the latter.

"The Holy River" video is almost as nightmarish
as the Emancipation booklet, technocolorically speaking.
But it certainly ain't cheap.
It's nightmarish to witness Prince throwing himself
and this much money in a plastic fountain.

The precise calendar of the shooting seems unknown (Princevault says end of 1996), but it's fair to assume Prince is dealing with the situation he's going through with either a heavy dose of altering-mind chemical, or the most naive, imploring, childish belief that a miracle is going to happen soon, and puts it to film.
It's so sad these images show at first a photoshopped spirituality based around his navel.
The end result is visually one of the most unwillingly egomaniac things he's ever put out.
But was he able to reason then?
"The Holy River" didn't deserve this. Although it's still Prince and the Band here and there. "I get along with a little help of my friends". But considering what was going on, we'd better let the video take dust on some shelf and show some sympathy. Go for the Top of the Pops if you really need visuals.
But this song deserves nothing but images of your past and future life.
The video seems to convey the exact opposite of the letitgo of the ego
that lays at the heart of the song.


What can be cheap about "Mountains"?
Fantastic make-up on everyone.
Fine photography (the "official" quality on Youtube is a disgrace).
Great performance from all the Revolution.
The cheap blue screen effects?
Captain EO it ain't, Dude.

More like the sixties kind of visual FX.
Homemade. Trippy DIY. Graffitis about Africa.
And a Klan nod, come on. The tamborine chasing them all.
Prince has always been about the sixties. Their core spirit.
It's blatant in the DIY-like mirror effect in "When Doves Cry".


In this sixties vein, the "Alphabet Street" video is some kind of masterpiece.
It doesn't try to make the kind of grand music video statement
all West Coast coked up commercial directors were going after
at the time just to bring home a Moon Man trophy.

A few seriously sexy shots of Skipper, lasting only a few frames,
close the funky abstract PlaySkool™ and bring his point home: videos don't matter tonight.

"Alphabet St." is just straight out of the album concept
and doesn't beg you to like it. The CD one track only attitude, dude.
"It's about the music, stupid."


Like "Paisley Park".
Which is a phenomenal music video, precisely because
what everyone expected of a guy who was still #1 everywhere
was a "Thriller"-like budget shooting.

Prince does basically an iPhone (camcorder) video at the local park for his new album,
and it looks like it's been edited by a cinema student high on pot
in some garage, which is probably (one of) the point(s).
Prince is a Woodstock child. He said so in his bio.

Psychedelia is always a kiss away, kiss away.
I still get a kick out of seeing kids lip syncing over it,
thirty and some years after. It would have been incredible
with shots of Prince doing the basketball bumps himself.


If Prince viewed or approved some of his videos as being a plain "go listen to the record,
the revolution will not be televised", then he's a music video genius in my book.

Sometimes Prince didn't give a fuck about the video,
because Prince treated his recorded music like a book,
it should generate your own mental imagery.
This is what listening to music should be all about.

The stage was the place where visuals get much more attention from him.
That's why a Prince video requires nothing more but him performing.
Here I am, I am, and I don't need no zombie six hours make-up.
I'm busy recording.

And when Prince did take the video medium seriously,
it always had to be a full-length movie.


"Sign Of The Times" (the video) goes after Dylan,
but in Prince's alternate 1987, mankind has submitted to electronics
and some A.I. is left making the lyrics appear and disappear.
Like in Dylan's video, words fall to the ground.

The final product questions the need to put a song to video,
shows the politic cowardice in pop music lyricists (this is not a love song)
around the mid-eighties (except for a few examples like Bruce, but this one is a sixties song),
and prefigures computer graphics soon conquering every image there is to show.


People are free to fantasize of David Fincher, and cranes, and stunt crews and shit.
But Skipper has a rehersal and then some studio coming on,
he ain't gonna spend a week masturbating himself in the editing room.

When he did it for Under The Cherry Moon,
he found it so frustrating he started blaming the music, the dumbass.
But thank God for "Kiss", which is probably his best video,
because it combines impeccable imagery, humour and dazzling physical performances.
Which kind of sums Prince The Performer pretty well.

[Edited 3/22/20 11:14am]

1999 or Dirty Mind videos

bonatoc said:

slyjackson said:

Most of them look very cheap, for instance Mountains and Holy River, specially the latter.

"The Holy River" video is almost as nightmarish
as the Emancipation booklet, technocolorically speaking.
But it certainly ain't cheap.
It's nightmarish to witness Prince throwing himself
and this much money in a plastic fountain.

The precise calendar of the shooting seems unknown (Princevault says end of 1996), but it's fair to assume Prince is dealing with the situation he's going through with either a heavy dose of altering-mind chemical, or the most naive, imploring, childish belief that a miracle is going to happen soon, and puts it to film.
It's so sad these images show at first a photoshopped spirituality based around his navel.
The end result is visually one of the most unwillingly egomaniac things he's ever put out.
But was he able to reason then?
"The Holy River" didn't deserve this. Although it's still Prince and the Band here and there. "I get along with a little help of my friends". But considering what was going on, we'd better let the video take dust on some shelf and show some sympathy. Go for the Top of the Pops if you really need visuals.
But this song deserves nothing but images of your past and future life.
The video seems to convey the exact opposite of the letitgo of the ego
that lays at the heart of the song.


What can be cheap about "Mountains"?
Fantastic make-up on everyone.
Fine photography (the "official" quality on Youtube is a disgrace).
Great performance from all the Revolution.
The cheap blue screen effects?
Captain EO it ain't, Dude.

More like the sixties kind of visual FX.
Homemade. Trippy DIY. Graffitis about Africa.
And a Klan nod, come on. The tamborine chasing them all.
Prince has always been about the sixties. Their core spirit.
It's blatant in the DIY-like mirror effect in "When Doves Cry".


In this sixties vein, the "Alphabet Street" video is some kind of masterpiece.
It doesn't try to make the kind of grand music video statement
all West Coast coked up commercial directors were going after
at the time just to bring home a Moon Man trophy.

A few seriously sexy shots of Skipper, lasting only a few frames,
close the funky abstract PlaySkool™ and bring his point home: videos don't matter tonight.

"Alphabet St." is just straight out of the album concept
and doesn't beg you to like it. The CD one track only attitude, dude.
"It's about the music, stupid."


Like "Paisley Park".
Which is a phenomenal music video, precisely because
what everyone expected of a guy who was still #1 everywhere
was a "Thriller"-like budget shooting.

Prince does basically an iPhone (camcorder) video at the local park for his new album,
and it looks like it's been edited by a cinema student high on pot
in some garage, which is probably (one of) the point(s).
Prince is a Woodstock child. He said so in his bio.

Psychedelia is always a kiss away, kiss away.
I still get a kick out of seeing kids lip syncing over it,
thirty and some years after. It would have been incredible
with shots of Prince doing the basketball bumps himself.


If Prince viewed or approved some of his videos as being a plain "go listen to the record,
the revolution will not be televised", then he's a music video genius in my book.

Sometimes Prince didn't give a fuck about the video,
because Prince treated his recorded music like a book,
it should generate your own mental imagery.
This is what listening to music should be all about.

The stage was the place where visuals get much more attention from him.
That's why a Prince video requires nothing more but him performing.
Here I am, I am, and I don't need no zombie six hours make-up.
I'm busy recording.

And when Prince did take the video medium seriously,
it always had to be a full-length movie.


"Sign Of The Times" (the video) goes after Dylan,
but in Prince's alternate 1987, mankind has submitted to electronics
and some A.I. is left making the lyrics appear and disappear.
Like in Dylan's video, words fall to the ground.

The final product questions the need to put a song to video,
shows the politic cowardice in pop music lyricists (this is not a love song)
around the mid-eighties (except for a few examples like Bruce, but this one is a sixties song),
and prefigures computer graphics soon conquering every image there is to show.


People are free to fantasize of David Fincher, and cranes, and stunt crews and shit.
But Skipper has a rehersal and then some studio coming on,
he ain't gonna spend a week masturbating himself in the editing room.

When he did it for Under The Cherry Moon,
he found it so frustrating he started blaming the music, the dumbass.
But thank God for "Kiss", which is probably his best video,
because it combines impeccable imagery, humour and dazzling physical performances.
Which kind of sums Prince The Performer pretty well.

[Edited 3/22/20 11:14am]

Good post, and agree with you your last statement.

bonatoc said:

"Sign Of The Times" (the video) goes after Dylan,
but in Prince's alternate 1987, mankind has submitted to electronics
and some A.I. is left making the lyrics appear and disappear.
Like in Dylan's video, words fall to the ground.

.

SOTT was commissioned by WBR and was made on a very common kind of system used to add titles etc. to video.

.

The final product questions the need to put a song to video,
shows the politic cowardice in pop music lyricists (this is not a love song)
around the mid-eighties (except for a few examples like Bruce, but this one is a sixties song),
and prefigures computer graphics soon conquering every image there is to show.

.

An none of it were Prince's ideas. It's just a cheap, quick & dirty video.

BartVanHemelen said:

bonatoc said:

"Sign Of The Times" (the video) goes after Dylan,
but in Prince's alternate 1987, mankind has submitted to electronics
and some A.I. is left making the lyrics appear and disappear.
Like in Dylan's video, words fall to the ground.

.

SOTT was commissioned by WBR and was made on a very common kind of system used to add titles etc. to video.

.

The final product questions the need to put a song to video,
shows the politic cowardice in pop music lyricists (this is not a love song)
around the mid-eighties (except for a few examples like Bruce, but this one is a sixties song),
and prefigures computer graphics soon conquering every image there is to show.

.

An none of it were Prince's ideas. It's just a cheap, quick & dirty video.

I find hard to believe someone as in control of his image
as was Prince didn't give his final approval.
What is behind "commissioned"?

Wasn't it commissioned because Prince didn't want to do a video at the time?
Wasn't it because the only video he envisioned couldn't be filmed yet?
It couldn't be commissioned without Prince's defection about it,
which is an approval in itself. Prince letting other creatives mingle with the visuals
of his first single of his new album (and what album!) was still Prince's decision.

You know how WB was still (at the time)
letting Prince free reins and giving cash.
At some point, some budget was signed
for an expensive, high production live shooting,
instead of spending it in the singles videos.

"very common kind of system"?
I think the end result is what counts here.
You can consider the end result "cheap, quick & dirty".
But it's not very relevant. So is Funhouse and countless others.

"And none of it were Prince's ideas".
I didn't attribute them to Prince.
Creatives working around Prince got more creative,
lots of interviews confirm that. It's still a Prince's video in the end.
The emphasis I put on some of Prince's concepts
doesn't mean I think he developed them or executed all of them.
Dude's kinda busy.

But since SOTT the video is only made of Prince's lyrics,
I'd say that all that appears on screen
are ALL Prince's "ideas".

[Edited 3/24/20 8:21am]

editmisred

[Edited 3/24/20 23:02pm]

bonatoc said:

BartVanHemelen said:

.

An none of it were Prince's ideas. It's just a cheap, quick & dirty video.

I find hard to believe someone as in control of his image
as was Prince didn't give his final approval.
What is behind "commissioned"?

Wasn't it commissioned because Prince didn't want to do a video at the time?
Wasn't it because the only video he envisioned couldn't be filmed yet?
It couldn't be commissioned without Prince's defection about it,
which is an approval in itself. Prince letting other creatives mingle with the visuals
of his first single of his new album (and what album!) was still Prince's decision.

You know how WB was still (at the time)
letting Prince free reins and giving cash.
At some point, some budget was signed
for an expensive, high production live shooting,
instead of spending it in the singles videos.

"very common kind of system"?
I think the end result is what counts here.
You can consider the end result "cheap, quick & dirty".
But it's not very relevant. So is Funhouse and countless others.

"And none of it were Prince's ideas".
I didn't attribute them to Prince.
Creatives working around Prince got more creative,
lots of interviews confirm that. It's still a Prince's video in the end.
The emphasis I put on some of Prince's concepts
doesn't mean I think he developed them or executed all of them.
Dude's kinda busy.

But since SOTT the video is only made of Prince's lyrics,
I'd say that all that appears on screen
are ALL Prince's "ideas".

[Edited 3/24/20 8:21am]

I enjoy your posts for the most part but, just out of curiosity, why do you format your posts here as if you're writing a song or a poem.

It's a cool gimmick, obviously deliberate and with some thought behind it but are you a songwriter?

Sometimes when I'm fucking around jamming with my friends I have to sing since I can't play anything and your writing style makes me want to use your posts as lyrics.

herb4 said:

bonatoc said:

I find hard to believe someone as in control of his image
as was Prince didn't give his final approval.
What is behind "commissioned"?

Wasn't it commissioned because Prince didn't want to do a video at the time?
Wasn't it because the only video he envisioned couldn't be filmed yet?
It couldn't be commissioned without Prince's defection about it,
which is an approval in itself. Prince letting other creatives mingle with the visuals
of his first single of his new album (and what album!) was still Prince's decision.

You know how WB was still (at the time)
letting Prince free reins and giving cash.
At some point, some budget was signed
for an expensive, high production live shooting,
instead of spending it in the singles videos.

"very common kind of system"?
I think the end result is what counts here.
You can consider the end result "cheap, quick & dirty".
But it's not very relevant. So is Funhouse and countless others.

"And none of it were Prince's ideas".
I didn't attribute them to Prince.
Creatives working around Prince got more creative,
lots of interviews confirm that. It's still a Prince's video in the end.
The emphasis I put on some of Prince's concepts
doesn't mean I think he developed them or executed all of them.
Dude's kinda busy.

But since SOTT the video is only made of Prince's lyrics,
I'd say that all that appears on screen
are ALL Prince's "ideas".

[Edited 3/24/20 8:21am]

I enjoy your posts for the most part but, just out of curiosity, why do you format your posts here as if you're writing a song or a poem.

It's a cool gimmick, obviously deliberate and with some thought behind it but are you a songwriter?

Sometimes when I'm fucking around jamming with my friends I have to sing since I can't play anything and your writing style makes me want to use your posts as lyrics.

Right? boy's got talent for writing.

RJOrion said:

Bonatoc is the Shakespeare of prince.org...always has been... sometimes his comments read like parables from the Old Testament, but i read them joints diligently...

I agree it's wonderful, he's really clever, as I aid before boy's got talent. Even though sometimes, I can't understand him.

RJOrion said:

dodger said:

RJOrion said:

Bonatoc is the Shakespeare of prince.org...always has been... sometimes his comments read like parables from the Old Testament, but i read them joints diligently...

Same for me. I see his long posts, and I know it’ll take me 3 or 4 reads to fathom but he’s an irresistible bitch