My cousin jamming Little Red Corvette on her boom box at Thanksgiving. I was like WTF is that music? Those drums and synths hooked me forever.

[Edited 7/24/20 9:03am]

In '83 or so the UK Radio 1 Top 40 chart show presented by DJ Tommy Vance would use the 1999 leadline as background music to the countdown four times each show (40-31, 30-21, 20-11, 10-2). I used to listen to the show most weeks but had no idea that I was listening to a Prince song, as I didn't 'discover' him until May '84.

I still occasionally flashback to hearing Vance's voice when I hear the studio version of 1999.

Soft and Wet

No idea but the firs I really loved was Call My Name after watching the beautiful video thanks to some user ina MJ forum back in 2008.

Heard his music before.. "Controversy, "Do Me, Baby , "I Wanna Be Your Lover" ... but the Red Corvette MTV Video ... was when i was hooked

I reckon it was Controversy, on Countdown (classic Australian TV show that introduced my generation to everything good in the world)

When Doves Cry

The first Prince song I ever heard was Controversy on the radio when it came out in November 1981.

The777Man

"Rave", I bought the album from the used CDs section the following year of its release. And here I am 20 years later

I Wanna Be Your Lover from a Ktel record.

I remember seeing Kiss on the tv and thinking "thats a real strange looking guy"

I got a tape from a classmate of Purple rain, but don't know if that was before or after that.

I only know hearing IIWYG on the radio that got me hooked.

Wanna Be Your Lover on the radio

[Edited 7/27/20 10:33am]

4 The Tears In Your Eyes, on the We Are The World album when I was 6. I might have heard something on the radio prior to that and not known, but I have vivid memories of listening to that tape on my Mom's Walkman and being taken by this song. I also really dug the Huey Lewis track at the time!

The next would have been I Could Never Take The Place of Your Man, followed a couple years later by the Batman soundtrack, at which point I became a fan for life.

[Edited 7/27/20 16:16pm]

I think it was 1999. Or Little Red Corvette. I really don't know, and I'm confused because neither got radio play in my town (except on the weekly top 40 countdown show, which ran on a station that was normally not top 40, for some reason, so I knew them from the videos, but I can't figure out what I was watching videos on when they came out, since the two shows I thought were most likely (WTBS Night Tracks and NBC's Friday Night Videos don't seem to have started until June and July of 1983. But anyway, one or the other of them, and I recorded the videos so I could listen to them repeatedly.

I remember hearing Soft and Wet on the radio when it came out. At first, I thought it was Sylvester who was well known and also sang in a falsetto. I also remember hearing IWBYL and WYWTMSB all the time, but it wasn't until Dirty Mind that he really clicked to me as an artist.

I Wanna Be Your Lover. He was on Midnight Express in 1979 I think. They introduced him as some young musical genius, then he came on in his zebra outfit and we were like "who the heck is this??" Such good memories.................

I saw the video for "1999" one night on New York Hot Tracks. I felt dirty afterward.

I think it was "Why You Wanna Treat Me So Bad" on the radio.

First track I heard was 1999, I liked it but had no clue who was singing it. Next one I heard was When Doves Cry, I was sold immediately and became a huge fan since.