I lived in SLC Utah from the time I was 5 to 15 years of age. Back then people my age were only into certain types of music. You had your punks, heavymetalers (rockers), new wavers, and a few contemporary (TOP 40) listeners. Not many people cared about soul, funk, R&B, or rap/hip hop. When MJ released Off the Wall and Thriller people all around the world recognized his talent. The breakdancing phase came and went and when it was gone most people there talked down on breakin... I still loved it! Seeing MJ do the moonwalk live at the Grammy's on TV triggered my love for soul music. Even though my ears were saturated with music ranging from OZZY, to the SEX PISTOL's, to Tears for Fears etc. etc. I really enjoyed listening to James Brown,MJ, Lionel Richie,P-FUNK and any other great soul/funk/R&B acts which I could only access through MTV. Not many stations played that type of music and everybody despised RAP which was another style I was diggin! Then I discovered Prince. I had only heard Little Red Corvette and 1999 on the radio here and there but had no clue as to who it was. After I saw the videos for both songs I was hooked. Up until this point MJ was my favorite artist and I thought nobody could top him. But when I saw Prince I knew there was something unique about him. He danced, he sang, and most importantly he played guitar. Something MJ didn't do. Then came When Doves Cry. That song and video and movie just blew my mind away. I couldn't express my instant love to any friends because they would just tease me and say Prince is gay, why do you like him? Are you gay. So I stayed hush and stuck with my newfound music. I remember hearing one night that Prince was to play in Detroits Joe Louis Arena. People attending were to wear purple clothing and if I'm not mistaken P had covered his body with purple body paint (at least that's what they reported on the radio). Hearing this gave me a euphoric rush of excitement and I so badly wanted to experience it myself. I was too young though and back then Prince would never step foot in UTAH. My pops talked about moving to Cali and about a year later we sold our house and were on our way. I could care less about the move I just knew moving out here would definitely enable me to see him live. Ironically on my second night in Cali I heard on the radio P was at the Universal Ampitheatre as special guests of Sheila's show. I was assed out again. I got over it and continued buying anything and everything I could that had to do with him. SOTT skipped the states (just my luck) but a year later came Lovesexy to the LA Sports Arena. Before that night I felt like I had missed so much but fact of the matter was it had only just begun. I usually wouldn't write this long of a thread but fuck it for the Prince forum it's worth it. I'm just wondering what/where/why/ or how come you even got into Prince and why it wasn't just a phase. Even the folks on this site that talk down on him or what he does still find their way into his forum all of the time. That tells me even some of them still have a deep soft spot for ole boy. If they were really sick of him or didn't care at all about him why would they continue to come to a site mainly based around him. NOTE: To my surprise I now know that in the 90's Prince ended up playing in Utah.

whoa slow down peeps... the overflow of posts on this thread is making the org shake a lil...

pejman said:

What Up, P!? I just got home from work and a storm is on the way here to "Cashville", TN. I feel You tho' bro. When I first heard Prince I was five years old and at time time was in Columbus, OH. My dad kept bumpin' " I wanna be..." and I would sit there secretly groovin'. Then finally I asked him one day,"Daddy, whose the lady that sings that song?". Boy did I get a SURPRISE. Like U, I had mostly only gave a rat's ass about MJ. MJ is still and WILL ALWAYS BE my man, but I've loved Prince from that day forward...his attitude, voice, musicianship (that REALLY fucked me up at first), those nasty lyrics...damn I miss the old P...

When Prince is on his game, his music is unbelievable.

When he goes off on one of his "they did me wrong" tangents, people lose interest, in droves.

I'll see what happens next...

i'm in it for the music...and the ass.

I was 12 yrs old and watching Don Kirschner's Rock Concert... they played the "I wanna b" video with him in the little loincloth (i think) I fell in love! I loved the sound of his voice and being raised in a house full of musicians respected his musicianship as well but oh, that loincloth..lol I always thought it odd that 2 of my favorite artists of all time I found out about on that same show.. Bob Marley was on it too.. Whew!! What an epiphany!!

The only problem was that most of high school my mom would sneak into my room, look at the walls and sigh.."don't you like any white men?"

Prince was daring, he was risque, he was beautiful and he played guitar!! I remember that was important to me in the beginning, how he could play that guitar. His genius kept me a fan. yes a fan. I don't know about this "Fam" business cuz i dont feel like I've been treated like family, but that's not why I buy his cd's now is it?

I still reserve the right to bitch from time to time because I can, and because I did buy all those albums, posters, concert tickets etc. You get to bitch in love, friend, and business relationships too, doesn't mean it'll do any good, but you can bitch all the same... i'm rambling..sorry..

I am in this whole thing for Prince himself. His music is great..He is great. Face it people, The older Prince gets, the Finer he gets...I love him...

Long live the music!!

squirrelgrease said:

Yup

---

Sweet...the first time I heard Prince I was in Columbus, Ohio as well. In fact, I got sucked into the multi-colored, ultrasexual world of Prince music in a MAJOR way growing up in Columbus. I used to mow lawns and listen to Dirty Mind on my walkman...over and over and over. Same with ATWIAD and SOTT. Then I bought my CD player, and Lovesexy dropped, and I gathered up the courage to actually pick up the long box with the naked girly-man on the cover (well okay, I tried to get my sister to buy it for me, but she said if I wanted to hear it that bad I'd just have to get it myself)...

And listening to Lovesexy that first time, all the way through, in one track...on my CD player/dual cassette/ radio boombox that I bought from Radio Shack with my lawn mowing money...wow, that's something that nobody can ever take away from me.

WonHungLo said:

ohhh, you wanted a testimonial, pej? i'd say my piece, but i ain't in the mood right now...maybe later on.

Handclapsfingasnapz said:

whenever you wanna ... I know once your in gear you drop a hell of a testimonial!!

angle1234 said:

my sentiments exactly...and heck I just love that incredible ass and his music has a special place in my heart and I did finally get to meet and talk with him..those E Y E S... okay um, gotta go and um well...I'll be around

theblueangel said:

That's funny. The first time I really noticed Prince was after seeing When Doves Cry. I was in Columbus at the time visiting my grandparents. For the longest time I thought Do Me Baby and I Wanna Be Your Lover were sung by a woman. Nevertheless, I didn't get deeper into Prince until the mid 90's. What finally won me over was the passion, the complexity and the joy in his music.
[This message was edited Mon Jul 28 22:04:06 PDT 2003 by whodknee]

Handclaps said:


What about the eyes, girl? huh?

His music is like nobody else's and you have to admit, he is interesting.

I just like the variety in his work. Odd tho', 'cos once upon a time if a Prince song came on the radio I'd shut it off. Such was my initial dislike of the man.

Cloudbuster said:

I can tell U which part of him (as a man) i don't like -
The hairy part(s)

pejman said:

Yep. Sad but true.

pejman said:

• Every minute of "Come."
  
• Feeling like I can't get up in the morning, then blasting "Let's Work" or "Everlasting Now" and getting up with a smile.
  
• Hearing "Love Thy Will Be Done" for the first time.
  
• The guitar solo from "Pink Cashmere."
  
• The guitar solo and breakdown from "I Could Never Take The Place Of Your Man."
  
• "Forever In My Life/It" from the "SOTT" movie.
  
• For adding "Sexy Motherfucker" to America's vocabulary.
  
• Those fingers.
  
• Getting me through every fit of anger, pain, depression, lust, love, incest, drunkenness and joy I've ever had.
  
• Sheila E.
  
• The Revolution.
  
• John Blackwell.
  
• Rhonda B.
  
• "Just My Imagination."
  
• "Does your man have an ass like miiine??"
  
• That scene in "UTCM" where Mary first lays eyes on Christopher in that paisley outfit.
  

the reason why i like prince
1 his sexy bedroom eyes
2.his smile
3 his voice
4.his creativity
5.his different hairstyles
6.his clothes
7the way he can make you hot just by playing his guitar
8his music
9 the way he moves
10 his shyness
11 his badness
12 his determination
13 his strength
14 his body
15 his performance on stage
16 how he feel about love
that is some of the reason why i like prince

bumpies!

awright, here's my testimonial:

unlike most of the people who've posted here, i didn't get to experience prince when he wuz the shit--dirty mind had only been out for two months when i wuz born, and purple rain came out when i wuz 3 years old. i wuz raised as an only child, tho' i had two older siblings, so no experiences with overhearin music that way.

the very first instance that i can remember seein/hearin the man is when i wuz about 7 or 8--friday night videos used to play the videos for "icnttpoym" and "alphabet st.". q-102 (pop radio station in des moines, iowa) used to play "u got the look" all the fuckin time! i liked the song, but never gave it much thought. i wuz too busy playin with toys and whatever.

then sometime in '89, i wuz sittin at home watchin the jukebox network (cheapie version of mtv that barely came in on the teevee). they'd play all these old videos, even some from p's ghost bands/proteges (vanity 6, morris day, etc.)--but one day, this video came on...it wuz the vid for "kiss". i immediately fell in love with the song, tho' 8-year old me wuz sittin and wonderin, "how come he can sing so high, like a girl?" to this day, "kiss" is my all-time fave prince song. i also remember when the batman soundtrack came out, cuz q-102 would always play "partyman" and "the arms of orion" (i wuz crazy about that song then!)...

...fast forward a couple years. i wuz 15 years old, just about to get outta junior high n'stuff. i'd stay saturday nights over at my older sister's house sometimes, and most of the time she and my two nieces weren't home, so i'd be at home alone with nuffin to do and nowhere to go. there'd be nuffin on teevee, so i would go thru my sister's huge collection of cassette tapes to find sumfin to listen to.

well, one day i happened to come across a prince album that wuz in her stash. by that time in my life i knew a little bit about prince: d & p, pr and he had just switched his name over to some symbol-thing. didn't know much, i know. anyway, i looked at the name of the album: dirty mind. i wuz like, "i never heard of this album before, when'd it come out?" i flipped over the tape to see what the copyright year on it wuz...

1980. the album had been around for as long as i've been alive. i wuz like, "whoa!!! cool!!! i wonder how it sounds..." so, i popped it in my sister's stereo and gave it a listen all the way through.

8 songs and a half-hour later, i wuz just floored by what i'd heard. not cuz of the sexual content--but because of the main message...it's cool to deviate from the norm. i ended up dubbin a copy of the album for myself and takin it home with me.

i really started gettin into him when i wuz in 11th grade. i pretty much stood out amongst my peers, who were listenin to the shit that emptee-vee fed them. me, i dug prince and everybody knew it--i really didn't get crap for it, i got asked the usual "isn't he gay?"-type questions. there were a few others who liked 'im but they mostly liked the pr stuff.

i've been a prince geeklette for about 8 years now. although i'm much more into p's older material than his newer worx, i still gotta give the brotha some props cuz he's become pretty much a living legend within my lifetime. that, and he's from the midwest as well and ain't ashamed to represent where he's from. i honestly couldn't imagine him movin outta state or movin all the way over to california or what-not.


...umm, that's my story.

testify to the edit
[This message was edited Wed Jul 30 14:47:59 PDT 2003 by Handclapsfingasnapz]

I love it!!! Now das what I'm talkin about!!! The testimonial has been dropped!!!

FunkMistress said:

GO FUNKMISTRESS!!!

I love all those reasons you chose but the last one... that scene... the zoom in on Prince scene... the drum hiiting as the camera zooms in... that's awesome!!!

i remember hearing a man

singing a song on the radio

unlike i've ever heard a man sing

the music was funky and his voice

was full of passion and honesty

then, one day i laid eyes on him

on his album cover, for you

that's all she wrote

prince has proven 2 be bold

and brilliant


fan4life

Pej, in the beginning he helped to influence my sexual nature. No man I know can get me so wet with a 5 second verse i.e. "I sincerely wanna F..."

But now,I seek the songs and verses that empower women, i.e Cream, P-Control,"they say no ones perfect, but they don't know you" etc. Regardless of the genre, the music is so positive I just love it!! I blast Everlasting NOW here in the 'hood on a daily basis in my car. Having been a fan since 1979, I can't imagine His music not being around. And like the song War, I could go on and on and on.

enjoyniki said:

to think you be bumpin Everlasting Now in the hood!!! you rock!!!

pejman said:

Purple Rain got me hooked.

I have since bought many more albums. It wasn't a phase because Prince's music is brilliant, particularly the 80s stuff. No other artist was daring enough at the time to do what he did, or with such talent, nor with such distinctiveness or variety. Prince plays so many styles, and can express so much. Everyone else seemed more interested in following trends. Prince was years ahead of them, trailblazing.

to think you be bumpin Everlasting Now in the hood!!! you rock!!![/quote]

Pej, how else do u think I will get up outta the hood???...I can't let nobody bring me down!!!

enjoyniki said:

Pej, how else do u think I will get up outta the hood???...I can't let nobody bring me down!!![/quote]




Now thatz what I'm talkin about!!!