i stumbled upon Questlove 'admitting' that he'd slept on the NPG band after watching the 1992 Blu Ray from the D&P set. I was wondering what all of you thought. To me, as a listener of his fantastic Questlove Supreme podcast, I found it very odd. There are times when I listen to his podcast and I'm startled by what a historian he is. He seems to know a lot on a lot of musicians. I'm always impressed and you can tell he's not pretending. He actually seems to know what he is talking about from a wide range of musicans...Steve Ferrone to Ray Parker to Jack White to Greg Phillinganes, Steve Miller to Elvis Costello. Amazing.

So it is equally amazing to me that a man who is so so loving of Prince, would somehow miss the 90s period like he says he has. He didn't actually konw that the band was INCREDIBLE in the 90s? He wasn't aware that Michael Bland and Sonny T were possibly Prince's most amazing rhythm section...and consiering all those that came before and after, that says a LOT. He didn't realize Tommy Elm was a player of his calibre? What about Rosie? I just find it unbelievable. I can only think, he must be good friends with the Rev members and so, he isn't as open to celebrating the greatness of Prince's bands following. Live, it's not even a competition. Prince got exponentially better and more interesting post Rev.

I personally feel Diamond's and Pearls is on the weaker side of his career as far as a studio album (not including Live stuff, Piano and voice, or Instrumentals). But if I think of everything even up to that point like from 1978-1993 D&P was the least exciting for me. Glam Slam is also a less captivating show than so many others I've seen. I know it's not a proper tour show since it was like a one off sort of thing. I guess I don't know countless one off shows but the few I do know like the birthday show and some others I think were superior to Glam Slam. But none of this means I don't like the album or the show. It simply means I think he has done way better before and after that era.

As far as Questlove I think you're right that he gives Prince his most props in the 80's. A lot of people I think missed out on 90's Prince but D&P was a commercial success and comeback of sorts for him as far as the charts go so it's weird that he'd have missed this era in any way. All NPG configurations I think were great in their own ways but that Musicology era was absolute fire.

Questlove is oddly a hardcore (yet fairweather) Prince fan.

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Listen, everyone loves their fav era. However, Quest has long since held on to the oldhead belief that Prince was done after '88. Fact is, Prince kicked out some amazing music, performances, and art for his entire career. Does on have to dig all of it? Nope.

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Personally, I don't think Prince circa 1986/Under The Cherry Moon era holds a candle to Prince of 1994/95. That's just me. The fact that Quest is just realizing that he may need to reconsider his views now just means he's not as strapped onto to the purple fan wagon as he'd have us believe.

93-95 npg can run circles around the rev and i would much rather have live recordings from that era be released than any 80's live shows

It's a personality thing.

It's like a jackass hipster/pseduo-intellectual college coffee house brodude personality he's spent his entire life cultivating.

If you've met one you've met them all.

My sincerest condolencenses for anyone out there that falls for the magic act.

Just because the dude wants to be seen as the "Prince expert" more than anything else doesn't mean he's any more authoratative than some n00b on reddit asking for more recs after Purple Rain.
Some people are just natural blowhards constantly gassing themselves up. It is what it is. Recognize the clues and navigate accordingly.

[Edited 3/6/24 19:21pm]

I'd even take it further saying the POST-D&P NPG line-up is the cream of the crop. Almost the same core cast, but refined to perfection. Levi's guitar licks became smoother and greasier, the rhythm section got bolder and became the tightest backbone to date in Prince's career, horn arrangements got tastier and were more cleverly used, even Tony M's rapping -when featured- became less shouty and seemed to finally find a better place. I don't mean just the 1993 Act I and Act II tours, go think of The Undertaker, Goldnigga or even the bulk of The Vault: Old Friends 4 Sale or the early stages of what was to become Come. That band blows the 1991-early 1992 NPG out of the water.

Maybe that's why most Prince fans I know doesn't take him serious when he's pretending to be some Prince "scholar"

Duplicate thread: https://prince.org/msg/7/470670