Najee said:

Rick James was one of the baddest funksters of all time and was the only one that could give Prince a run for his money.

vainandy said:

The point is that IMO Rick James really didn't bring anything new to the genre (similar to what R. Kelly did), just built on what his immediate predecessors did and parlayed it into a successful career. Prince did bring rock sensibilities musically and lyrically to the genre that wasn't quite used to the degree he incorporated them in the Minneapolis Sound.
[Edited 8/23/07 9:37am]

Najee said:

Funkadelic, Sly Stone, Jimi and even the Commodores were funkrock way before Prince.

Funkadelic, Sly Stone, Jimi and even the Commodores were funkrock way before Prince.

rebelsoldier said:

But not quite in the manner that Prince used rock elements. The Commodores' style was more in the style of Southern acts like Lynrd Skynrd. Jimi Hendrix was a hard rock artist whose songs appealed more to the white rock audiences. Funkadelic was like on some Frank Zappa-type trip.
[Edited 8/23/07 17:12pm]

Najee said:

What about let's take it to the stage and One Nation era Funkadelic. The Isleys are a better example.
Rick always wanted to make a rock album but according to him the world wasn't ready for a black rockstar. And sadly it's still not ready for it.

rebelsoldier said:

I wish black musicians would just take a chance. I hate to see that it's accepting to do what is "considered 'black' music" when today's music shits bars. I wished Rick had been brave enough to do a rock album. Hey some of his funk audience may have not dug it, but I sure as hell would've!

Timmy84 said:

Most funk fans would have loved because Rick always had the Rock element in songs like Hollywood, Fire it up, Love gun etc. Im sure people would have related to it. He already had the rockstar aesthetic and attitude.

Sowhat said:

Oh man, I would give my left nut to have seen that.

Timmy84 said:

Most funk fans would have loved because Rick always had the Rock element in songs like Hollywood, Fire it up, Love gun etc. Im sure people would have related to it. He already had the rockstar aesthetic and attitude.

NWF said:

When I saw that tour Zapp was Rick's opening act. Rick was a "Rock Star" in every since of the word. His music was rebellious, raw, hard and funky! I have an album from 1971 of Ricks band The Great White Cane. It sounded like the Santana Band with horns and Rick singing. Awesome! Rick was "funk-n-roll". Nothing closer to rock-n-roll than that. Too bad MTV was too racist to play his videos.

rebelsoldier said:

I wish black musicians would just take a chance. I hate to see that it's accepting to do what is "considered 'black' music" when today's music shits bars. I wished Rick had been brave enough to do a rock album. Hey some of his funk audience may have not dug it, but I sure as hell would've!

vainandy said:

When R. Kelly first came out, he tried to be Bobby Brown (I saw a promo video he did with his group MGM from '89 and the video looked like a ghetto "Every Little Step I Take"), then when he came with Public Announcement, he sounded like Aaron Hall with his group producing music that sounded like it was off the crates of some Guy shit. Then when his first solo album came out, he was a carbon copy of Aaron: bald head, sunglasses, wearing just a vest, singing with that voice - that actually was Charlie Wilson's.

Throughout the rest of his career though, he also tried to be like these guys:
Ron Isley (whom he actually worked with and probably helped destroy musically, lol)
Michael Jackson (whom he also worked with)
Marvin Gaye (whom he claims he's the next incarnation of... )

There was never a point where I thought R. Kelly was being R. Kelly.

Rick James, on the other hand, while he DID emulate Marvin and Sly and James and the like, had his OWN sound, his OWN voice and his OWN thing.

Prince also emulated a lot of styles, like you said, Andy, the new-wave stuff, the punk stuff and mixed it with R&B and funk.

But R. Kelly was and always will be the bastard child of Aaron Hall, Teddy Riley, Ron Isley and Marvin Gaye without no attempt to try to be himself.

Also, Rick wouldn't be crazy to do something like "Trapped in the Toilet...er, Closet".

sunlite said:

Yup the great white cane album also reminds of Roger and the human body.

Timmy84 said:

Well, we did have Living Color, Lenny Kravitz, and of course Sananda!

Rick was the "baddest muthafunka" on the planet, until Prince stole his women, his act and his thunder. He's from my hometown and my first arena rock concert! Throwin' Down tour 1982. There will never be another that did it like him.

If you watch some of the extrs scenes of the Charlie Murphy/Rick James sketch on the "Chappelle's Show season 2" DVD, you can see that even then Rick was still pretty bitter about Prince. He was dissing him and mocking him and stuff. He even dissed Charlie by saying he couldn't believe he lost a basketball game to him.

If you watch some of the extrs scenes of the Charlie Murphy/Rick James sketch on the "Chappelle's Show season 2" DVD, you can see that even then Rick was still pretty bitter about Prince. He was dissing him and mocking him and stuff. He even dissed Charlie by saying he couldn't believe he lost a basketball game to him.

NWF said:

Rick was bitter towards Prince right up to the end. It seems like wasted energy to me....he could have used that energy to goo create music or something.

"IT'S A CELEBRATION BITCHES!!!!"

Everything always has to go down the same shitty road @ the Org Can't talk about Rick w/o talking about Prince & the feud & the fucking Chappelle show

There was a time when Rick was the mf MAN, fuck competition. I remember him for "Ghetto Life" & "Dream Maker", "Bustin' Out" & "You & I" - that's what he means to me. Leather wearin', braided up, licking @ the camera, glitter & shit, not giving a fuck. Rick put out some seriously kick-ass music in his day, the rest is goofy surface nonsense