Was recently listening to some 1999/Purple Rain Era soundchecks and was amazed at how funny and happy Prince seemed at the time.

Growing up in the 80s and 90s I always thought of Prince as a quite, hyper introvererted intense artist type. Not really light and playful.

In these soundchecks he's making fun of Philadelphia ('We ain't going there! I hate Philly! They ain't even goin' to smell our fumes when we pass by!'), ribbing the sound guy about how his piano mic wasn't turned on 'the night before' and how he had to 'fake it', adding in stuff like 'pizza' and 'pussy' in DMRS and saying it was 'now a perfect weekend!', laughing at people's shoes and hair in the band, etc.

A really cool side to him is experienced.

soladeo1 said:

Was recently listening to some 1999/Purple Rain Era soundchecks and was amazed at how funny and happy Prince seemed at the time.

Growing up in the 80s and 90s I always thought of Prince as a quite, hyper introvererted intense artist type. Not really light and playful.

In these soundchecks he's making fun of Philadelphia ('We ain't going there! I hate Philly! They ain't even goin' to smell our fumes when we pass by!'), ribbing the sound guy about how his piano mic wasn't turned on 'the night before' and how he had to 'fake it', adding in stuff like 'pizza' and 'pussy' in DMRS and saying it was 'now a perfect weekend!', laughing at people's shoes and hair in the band, etc.

A really cool side to him is experienced.

thanks 4 sharing those soundchecks, cool!

i was just thinking about some of the most hilarious (to me) song moments are on 1999...

everybodys got a bomb we could all die any day... ow! ( ow??? lol!)

and the computery voice saying "can u relate?" after that lets pretend we're married line, lol!!!

"We're doin' the show right? Did I say we'd do the show once today? PSYCHE! Here we go!"

Nude Tour rehearsal.

The "hamburgers, pizza, root beer, pussy" is hysterical. That's a great "DMSR" rehearsal in general.

I live in Philadelphia and did not like the things he said about our city.

Love this rehearsal clip where they're singing When The Saints Go Marching In.

Prince even jokes about people not knowing who the Rolling Stones are. Guessing that's a reference to Brown Mark's first gig at the Stones show.


https://www.youtube.com/w...HRbdk3Emic

Wlcm2thdwn3 said:

I live in Philadelphia and did not like the things he said about our city.

Y'all can't be that tenderheaded or obtuse.

Best two rehearsals for funny banter:

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1983 "band tuning" rehearsal for the 8/3/83 show where Matt, Lisa and Wendy are goofing off while waiting for Wendy's guitar to be fixed. Matt does his "Lena Finkage" and Popeye voices, they all goof on the song "My House" by Madness, Wendy starts singing Suburban Lawn's lyrics "Oh my genitals", and then Lisa does a hilarious version of Stevie Nick's "Stand Back" using her keyboard as vocals. Absolutely hilarious. First time I heard it I was laughing so hard I had tears running down my face.

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1984? 85?...somewhere around there - the whole group - Revolution, plus Susannah, Wally and Brooks doing Soul Psychodelicide over and over. Brooks has Prince bursting out in laughter - I think by doing some funky dance move or something. It starts with Wendy doing a super funky guitar lick to the backing loop (I think), and Brooks saying "That's funky Wendy, that's funky!" Prince is clearly happy, energetic, and having tons of fun with the band.

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I've heard many rehearsals from both the 80's and 90's, and to me there is no question that Prince sounds and seems to be much happier and more easygoing during the 80's sessions. I guess that makes sense considering the way things progressed in the 90's.