The Real Reason Prince Isn't Considered The Best Artist.

His voice, "da funk", timbre, panache, rhythmic interest, sultry lyrics.... ok, those are all things I know Prince to have.

But yes, his sense of melody seems rather lacking.

But to that I would add that I have never heard a Prince song with an innovative chord structure.

And that brings me to my question.... in what sense does Prince have harmonic invention? Can you suggest a single song where he would wow in this category? My current belief is that he's very pedestrian harmonically.

I would be interested to know if anyone with a background in classical music would find something--from that perspective--in Prince's music to enjoy. I suspect not.

 

I agree with that but it's a shame that it has all gone downhill since The Rainbow Children (14 years ago!) with a string of very tepid albums.

 

I come after that because they're constantly mentioned. Every third thread is about them. They even show up in threads that aren't about them. It's hilarious. Every thread, if not about the Beatles, is about classic rock. I'm allowed to speak my piece. Have I gone too far at times? Maybe. Believe me - my comment goes for me too. I get it.

Ed

 

Decent chords sequences abound - "Do U Lie?" is a nice twist on conventional structure. I knew a classical dude years ago and this one appealed to him.

Prince clearly knows his way around the intervals - "Raspberry Beret" is a masterclass.

If "The Ballad Of Dorothy Parker" doesn't do it for you then there's no hope.

 

Prince is a brilliant musician, and live performer.

His catalogue stands up to most others. I don't know if the tale is true that he didn't perform the same song twice in all his 21 nights at the O2 in London a few years back, but it was certainly true of the three nights I saw. Not many artists could do that.

Dirty Mind, 1999, Purple Rain, Sign of the Times, Parade and maybe Lovesexy are terrific albums in my view.

He is up there with other soul greats like Sam Cooke, James Brown, Aretha Franklin, the Temptations, Otis Redding, Al Green, Sly Stones, Marvin Gaye, Stevie Wonder, Curtis Mayfield, and Isaac Hayes.

He can do anything from rock, to soul, jazz, to funk.

I find it hard to compare across generations, and indeed that anyone is the best.

For me, he would be up there but in terms of jazz and soul (or whatever you want to call it) behind Miles Davis and Stevie Wonder. Birth of the Cool, to Kind of Blue, to Bitches Brew. Fingertips (at 12), to the Motown singles like I was made to Love her, to the album run from My Cherie Amour through to Hotter than July (7 or 8 albums ?). That is real genius.

 

His 2007 Super Bowl performance was awesome.....

 

He is indeed a superb guitarist!



But he rarely (with the notable exception of the Purple Rain LP) seems to show what he can do on record.

 

Anyone who progressed from the pretty darn good, For You to Dirty Mind and Controversy is probably a genius. You can hear that in the musical applications, chord progressions, this wasn't run of the mill stuff and it rarely wasn't done by any of his contemporaries.

Much like Stevie Wonder, the people Prince chose to work with made all of the difference. Wonder's prime ended shortly after he stopped working with Margoleuff and
Cecil and Prince's most popular sound ended shortly after he disbanded the Revolution. In a way, I think his best "sound" was that arty-R&B/pop stuff he did so well in the '80s. Any of the best from Parade is just superior work and I liked it in a way I didn't like most Sign o 'the Times.

 

It's not just the fan photography. There are no official presence of Prince online. No video's, no official news sites whatsoever. This to the extend and duration that you can call it career-inhabiting behaviour and as much as I respect Prince's way of doing, It's hurting and disrespectful to the fans and the music world in the same way.
With the hits in the past, he needs to have some way of letting people know he's still there. Nowadays thats something online. He still believes that people will do the work to find his legacy, but without a real presence online that's not going to happen. Fans are trying to get him online, for instance with fan sites. For the last 15 years or so they are being sued by Prince himself every now and then. Sad examples like the extensive law suit against the best Prince fansite Housequake.com are still remembered and it made fans 'hate' the person Prince. The ones left are forum-like sites (prince.org) or wiki-like (princevault.com) or short-lived...

Nowadays he uses the internet as a temperary outlet for album/tour promotion. He removes it after the event. That's not to say that it isn't fun and great what he does online. It just not consistent or logical or there after 5 minutes.

Red and blue makes purple...

 

It seems clear you don't care for this board or the primary interests of most of the members. After only 4 days here. Why are you sticking around just to argue? You haven't really don't much else.

 

Too much filler, not enough killer.

 

I knew it! He's not very good at this is he?

 

And that's the pity, because I think Prince was probably the best rock act of the '80s. 1999 and especially Purple Rain are way, way more interesting to me than anything Van Halen or even U2 did during that decade. Prince may love the funk, and he can do it well no question, but he brought a different perspective to rock and it was utterly unique and kick ass. Everything since has felt purely retro to me, just rehashing the S.O.S.

I loved his psychedelic pop, too.

I think you're getting them confused with Little Richard...

That one's deliciously Joni-esque (right down to the shout-out to La Mitch).

Yes! This! Although I like Sign and lyrically it's one of his more solid efforts, musically that's where the decline really began for me. Half the record is great but the other half? Again, Prince needs an editor, or at least, that stuff should have been compiled into two separate albums of separate moods.

And The Revolution - while perhaps not the most talented musicians he ever worked with - were clearly the most interesting. There's been way too much pointless noodling since...

Great point about Wonder, too. I've also been curious about what went wrong there. I know Songs In The Key Of Life is supposed to be his masterpiece, but I find it bloated compared to its predecessors and to some degree it foreshadows his coming decline in the same way Sign O The Times did for the Purple One...

 

I'll be a suck egg mule! The Spaceman and all his aliases,wow what drives this behavior?

 

Yeah, I think it's not so much about what the Revolution did (which in the studio, wasn't a lot), it was more that they existed. Prince had the extra sets of ears to bounce ideas off, to jam with and explore different paths. I don't think Prince ever discussed his music a lot with the Revolution, but still, when you're constantly rehearsing and so on, they had to be an influence (particularly Wendy and Lisa, who Prince did regard particularly highly). It was either Wendy or Lisa who said (I think in Touré's book on Prince) that after Prince became a superstar and he disbanded the Revolution (1986/87), he really isolated himself from all of them. They found it really difficult to even communicate with him or access him. So that had to have an effect on his music. In the Purple Rain period Prince and the Revolution rehearsed constantly, toured, filmed the movie, and were friends. In the Sign period and later (prior to Prince forming the NPG), it was just Prince, on his own, in his own studio doing what he wanted, and isolating himself from people who had been his friends and bandmates. A completely different situation and dynamic.

 

Good detective work Steve! The Scarecrow busted again for the tenth time!

 

Prince didn't do ballads well and a lot of his soul/R & B stuff is nothing special (or in some cases quite unlistenable).
On the plus side, he could rock OK, had some good catchy pop, got a bit neo-psychedelic, is a great guitar player and was very prolific.
Good, but doesn't challenge the all time greats.

 

I liked his album with Third Eye Girl pretty well. His more rock based stuff is far more my preference.

 

Thanks, an editor is what Prince has needed for years. I think the Revolution were the most interesting too. In a way you can hear a lot of things Prince could have explored on Wendy and Lisa--and they might have been put across better with Prince's input/voice and his own musical sense.

Songs In The Key of Life was a bit much but the highs were so high people didn't notice. A lot of those songs were just too long. I don't think Wonder made another great album after Hotter Than July and I didn't know love Prince's albums much after 1987.

 

It's not just the title of the OP but the entire post itself that is pretty insulting. It seems to be stating that Prince is the best and if you don't agree it's because you are old and he was after your time. You just don't know any better!!

Well, I grew up in the 80s and 90s and I don't think Prince is anywhere close to the best musician. But like others have said, there is no best. Just who we like and don't like.

I used to have to convince people that GN'R were the greatest music act ever, but I grew out of that. And I eventually realized that they weren't as great as I thought they were when my fanaticism was at it's highest.

 

And yet, many of the rest of us have. As have millions of music lovers. And hundreds of musicians.

Maybe you should define for us peasants what "innovative chord structure" and "harmonic invention" are, and then maybe we all could help you find a Prince song that has them.

Such Music Theory 101 silliness is not a prerequisite for great music.

 

Okay I'll play - that clip is not very impressive to me, I see a lot of show-off moves and flashy stuff but nothing I'd ever want to listen to again. I realize that's just a quick live clip but it's emblematic of the way I feel about Prince. He's always seemed like a pop act to me, talented yes, but he fit right in with the 80s scene, very image conscious with slick production. I don't know, maybe he's the pop/rnb equivalent of Zappa, he's prolific and seems to have that same kind of self-obsessed/tyrannical artist vibe going on. I could listen to Zappa play for hours but I got sick of Prince in that one minute clip. Otherwise the most I've heard Prince is probably when Public Enemy sampled him, that's about enough for me.

 

Wow! You're reading my mind! I was cleaning up after dinner, thinking about Stevie, and had the exact same thought. The killer distracts people from all the filler.