What Was Prince's Audience At First?

Can anyone that was around when Prince first arrived, tell me what was his audience & how did people view him?

Like during Prince era-Controversy era, what was his place in music?

 

The first album generated absolutely NO commotion on the pop side of things, although "Soft and Wet" was a modest R&B hit.

I got a promo copy of the first album sent to me when it came out. It was in my collection of albums in my dormroom that year, and I can't recall ANYONE ever pulling it out and asking about it...The only time anyone talked about Prince was when a guy down the hall saw the album and mentioned that his brother, a dentist in MN, had helped bankroll the demo that got Prince signed.

On later albums, before he broke through to the mainstream, you could hear some of his music on adventurous alternative rock stations. But the first album was entirely ignored on the pop/rock side of things.

 

When I first heard Prince it was through the local new wave radio station and no other stations played him until he broke big a couple of years later.

 

My little sister went to see him every time he came through town. She was a little white girl in her mid-teens. She used to come back and tell me how great it was that Prince talked about God at his shows. I wanted no part of it. In retrospect I wish I had been open-minded enough to go with her but I had my head too far up Clapton's butt at the time.

 

Ha! Good story.

 

I remember "I Wanna Be Your Lover" as a regular hit on the singles chart that introduced me to Prince. Dirty Mind and Controversy received very good reviews from the press, and I remember quite a bit of play on the radio as well. There was a lot of publicity generated when he appeared in a dress in warm up sets for the Stones. Not sure who the "core audience" was, but he received very good coverage from the time of his second album, so most people were exposed to his music.

 

The first time I heard/saw him was performing "I Wanna Be Your Lover" on American Bandstand, and then later hearing it quite a bit on pop radio. For me, Pop music pretty much was his intial audience. Yes, there were R&B leanings in his music, but that was true of other artists getting radio play at the time, too.

 

Is there an artist today that shares the same audience that Prince had when he first came out?

 

Comparitivly, since Prince changed his sound quite radically after his first two albums, I'd say it's too soon to tell. Off the top of my head, I can't really think of one.

 

You guys are crazy lucky to have witness Prince.

 

I don't have any Prince in my collection, the only exposure I had was seeing him playing live on some talk show years ago, his playing was very impressive to say the least, but I never followed up to get any of his stuff.

What, if anything represents his peak of guitar playing?

 

Beat me to this...

Prince starts truly shredding at 3:28

 

That's it!!! I almost bought a Prince Hohner Tele!

 

Oh man, you have to find his First Ave Birthday Show from 1984. He was very focused that night. But on record, "Temptation" from Around the World In A Day comes to mind.

 

I was a freshman in High School starting in the fall of '82. There was a girl in my typing class - Latino, long curly dark hair, dark makeup around her eyes - who wore long purple coats and frilly sleeves. It was an odd getup for Phoenix. She had these badges on her coat sometimes, a picture of some guy on them. I couldn't tell who.

Then in the spring of '83 I was over at a friend's house - they had cable - and saw "Little Red Corvette" for the first time on MTV. Loved it. Took a few weeks, but one day I was sitting in typing class, that girl walked in, and I suddenly realized what the outfit was all about.

I'm slow, but I catch on eventually.

So, I'd say that Prince had developed a pretty devoted core audience by '82, probably on the strength of Dirty Mind and Controversy, which I've only glommed onto in distant hindsight, but apart from that wasn't well known.

I do recall hearing "I Wanna Be Your Lover" on the radio back in '79, but I hated it! I remember Casey Kasem telling us about this Minneapolis prodigy on American Top 40 one Sunday. Whatever! Sounded like all the other contemporary R&B-esque stuff to me. Still not my favorite Prince tune...

 

The first time I saw Prince, was in a video he did from his 'Dirty Mind' album around 1979/1980. He was wearing the same outfit from the 'Dirty Mind' album cover. I couldn't change the channel fast enough. Possibly the worst thing I had seen up to that point. The next time I saw him was at the Coliseum in L.A., at the Rolling Stones concert in 1981. I think he was wearing the same cheesy outfit, and he got booed off the stage. I figured that was the last we'd ever see of that guy. Then he comes out with '1999', and got rid of the cheesy 'Dirty Mind' outfit, and I started to take him seriously.

 

"I Wanna Be Your Lover" was my intro to Prince, too. Thought it sounded like a Michael Jackson record. But remember, this was when "Jacko" broke out of the pack with his "Don't Stop 'Til You Get Enough."

 

I remember hearing I Wanna Be Your Lover a bunch of times on the radio during a road trip to New Orleans >> >Mardi Gras. I don't remember if that was 1979 or 1980, but I sought-out the album when I got home. I don't remember what kind of radio stations we were listening to, but they must have been Black-oriented stations... pop rock radio was pretty bad by then.

 

They were playing I Wanna Be Your Lover on the radio in Elmira NY in 1979, so it must have been a sizeable hit. That's the earliest I remember. The next year, Rolling Stone gave Dirty Mind 4 1/2 or 5 stars in a review.

 

He was an R&B darling at first. Pop radio was totally unaware of him.

Ed

 

The scary thing is...I'm not sure we've heard the peak of his guitar playing yet. He either hasn't done it yet or it's in the Paisley Park vault.

Ed

 

Visionaries. Like the folks who bought Apple stock 20 years ago.

 

I'm from upstate NY, suburbia, high school in the early 1980's,was sort of a band geek with friends in a lot of different circles so I listened to a wide range of popular music. Had friends into heavy classic rock, Sabbath, Led Zep, ACDC. Had friends into new wave, B52s, Adam Ant. Had a lot of friends into pop-rock liker Loverboy, REO, Styx. Had friends into disco, R&B, (Commodores, EW&F) even some of the emerging rap like Sugarhill Gang. Personally I grew up fascinated by Casey's Top 40 and then got turned on to Zappa in junior high. I don't remember Prince being on anybody's radar that I hung out with. '1999' came out right at the beginning of my senior year. I remember hearing "Little Red Corvette" that winter, first time he was in my consciousness at all. I remember saying to a friend "Prince who?" not knowing he wasn't using his last name. Then I went off to college in northern New England and Prince was a little more on the radar but still not too much. In fact I still didn't know that he had any albums out before '1999'. Our college station wasn't playing him. A few of my friends from more urban places were playing tracks from '1999', but I don't remember anyone hyped up over him.

But then 'Purple Rain' was released summer 1984, my first summer home from college, and everything changed. Drinking age was still 18 back then so we were going out to the local rock clubs seeing bands and they were playing "When Doves Cry" and "Let's Go Crazy" on the pa before the bands came on. And of course those songs were all over the radio.

So for me and the people I hung out with...pre '1999', "who's Prince?". '1999'-era, just another artist. Post 'Purple Rain', massive.

 

So was he more of a critics darling at first?