Rocktrospectiva: The Massive "Purple Rain" Turns 40

 

Released on 25 June 1984, "Purple Rain" was the sixth studio album by the American singer, Prince, it was released as the soundtrack album to the 1984 film of the same name, the sound is much more denser than Prince's previous albums, for the ocassion the listener can hear multiple layers of guitars, keyboards, electronic synthesizer effects, drum machines, and other instruments, the album spawned five singles ""When Doves Cry", ""Let's Go Crazy", "Purple Rain", "I Would Die 4 U", & "Take Mw With U", the first two reached No. 1, while "Purple Rain" No. 2 and "I Would Die 4 U" No. 8, making the album to reach the No. 1 on Billboard 200.

 

While Prince¡s previous album were solo recordings by himself, this record contained credits under the name of Prince And The Revolution, recorded between July 1983 and March 1984, except for "Baby I'm A Satr" early in December 1981 and "I Would Die 4 U", & "Purple Rain" and the first one were recorded as live track on 3 August 1983, this marked Prince's first album to include live recordings. 

 

Purple Rain was musically denser than Prince's previous albums, emphasizing full band performances, and multiple layers of guitars, keyboards, electronic synthesizer effects, drum machines, and other instruments, and as a soundtrack record, much of the music had a grandiose, synthesized, and even – by some evaluations a psychedelic sheen to the production and performances, regarded as the most pop-oriented record on Prince's career, with a certain elements of more experimental and creative, the artist was always open to anybody trying to contribute creatively to the process of writing but Prince was the main lyricist and melody maker for all the songs, the band members were "absolute musical equals in the sense that Prince respected us, and allowed us to contribute to the music without any interference.

 

Revolution members Fink, Coleman, and Melvoin helped write the album's fourth track "Computer Blue", the full band appears on six tracks: "Let's Go Crazy", "Take Me With U", "Computer Blue", "I Would Die 4 U", "Baby I'm A Star" and "Purple Rain" while the remaining three tracks are essentially solo performances by Prince. Apollonia sings co-lead on "Take Me With U". Three of the tracks include a string section arranged by Coleman and Prince which were conducted by Coleman and Melvoin: "Take Me With U", "Baby I'm A Star", and "Purple Rain". The string players are violin and viola player Novi Novog and cellists David Coleman and Suzie Katayama.

 

The critics ignored the album at the beginning but once this take off, the music critics noted the innovative and experimental aspects of the soundtrack's music, most famously on the spare, bass-less "When Doves Cry", its synthesis of electronic elements with organic instrumentation and full-band performances along with its consolidation of rock and R&B, were identified by critics as distinguishing, even experimental factors, and due this, the album was added to the Library of Congress' National Recording Registry list of sound recordings that are "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant". 

 

Purple Rain Track List:

 

1. Let's Go Crazy

2. Take Me With U

3. The Beautiful Ones

4. Computer Blue

5. Darling Nikki

6. When Doves Cry

7. I Would Die 4 U

8. Baby I'm A Star

9. Purple Rain

Rocktrospectiva: Prince's "Batman" Soundtrack Album Turns 35

Released on 20 June 1989, "Batman" was the soundtrack album and the eleventh studio album by American artists, Prince, his involvement in the soundtrack was designed to leverage the media company's contract-bound talent as well as fulfill the artist's need for a commercial revival. The bet result into another multi-platinum successful album. The soundtrack spawned five singles "Batdance", "Partyman", "The Arms Of Orion", "Scandalous!", & "The Future". 

The soundtrack album stayed at number one on the Billboard 200, and it was Prince's No. 1 album since "Around The World In A Day", and the single "Batdance" his first No. 1 since the single "Kiss". Recorded in six weeks, from mid-February to late March 1989,the artist used also three tracks he had bfore "Electric Chair", "Scandalous!" and "Vicki Waiting", some rumours saind the tracks "1999" and "Baby I'm A Star" from earlier albums were slated to bu usde in the film, but Prince changed that and focused in material related with the topic, back in 2010 during an interview with Rolling Stone magazina, the soundtrack was initially supposed to be a duet colaboration between he and Michael Jackson, Jacko was Batman and Prince the Joker, then Prince would have played funk songs for the villains, while Michael ballads for the heroes. 

 

Obviously this never came true due Jackson's commiments with Bad World Tour, and signed with Epic label, while the film was under production. The album was performed entirely by Prince with a few exceptions with Sheena Easton performing on "The Arms Of Orion", "Trust" features a sampled horn part by Eric Leeds and Atlanta Bliss, and "The Future", features strings by Clare Fischer, "Batdance" includes a sample of Prince's technician Matthew Larson, and "Partyman", features a vocal from Anna Fantastic, Prince's former girlfriend.  

 

All the dialogue sampled on the album, is taken directly from a workprint of Batman, especially noticeable in the beginning of the first track, "The Future", with dialogue of Michael Keaton speaking as Batman. The lyrics of each song are associated with one of the characters in the film: "The Future" and "Scandalous" are credited to Batman; while "Electric Chair" and "Trust" are credited to the Joker. "Vicki Waiting" is sung from the perspective of Bruce Wayne, while "Lemon Crush" comes from Vicki Vale; the two characters share the duet, "The Arms of Orion". "Partyman" was inspired by Prince's first meeting with Jack Nicholson (out-of-character) on-set, Batdance", whose lyrics consist mostly of samples from the film, is credited to all aforementioned parties, as well as Gemini, Prince's Batman-centric alter ego that resembles Batman villain Two-Face—Prince on the right half of the body and the Joker on the left. Prince himself is credited with singing two lines of the album as himself: "Who do you trust if you can't trust God? Who can you trust—who can ya? Nobody" in "Trust"; and the word "Stop!" that ends "Batdance".

 

The album marked a change in Prince's appearance, he switched out the elaborate costumes, polka dots and lace for much simpler attire, usually donning dark blue/black clothing and "Batman" boots. The artist's hair was fully straightened from his signature wavy curls, as shown in the "Batdance" video and his songs in the soundtrack suggest a goofy, perverse, sensuous, somewhat introverted Batman film that so far we've never gotten from anyone.

In Memoriam: Ha Muerto El Iconico Prince

El iconico cantante Prince, ha muerto a los 57 años de edad, su reprentante, Yvette Noel-Schuré ha confirmado la noticia el día hoy a los medios que Prince fue encontrado muerto en su estudio de grabación de su en Chanhassen, en Minnesota. 

Su fallecimiento fue hecho oficial momentos después de hallarle inconsciente y ya sin la posibilidad de poderlo revivir con primeros auxilios. El pasado 15 de abril Prince fue hospitalizado de urgencia luego de que su estado de salud se agravara en pleno vuelo, llevaba unos días con una terrible gripe y fue llevado inmediatamente en ambulancia a un hospital local en Illinois para su evaluación correspondiente, estuvo en observación durante cuatro horas y luego fue trasladado a su casa, su situación empeoró después de una presentación en Atlanta.

Originarío de Minneapolis, vino al mundo un 7 de junio de 1958, su madre era cantante en una banda donde tocaba sel piano su padre John L. Nelson, el nombre de la banda era Prince Roger Trio, surgiendo de ahí el nombre de su hijo, a los 7 años sus padres se divorcian, y a raíz de esto terminó quedandose con el piano de su padre, eso fue el inicio de todo, luego aprendería a tocar la guitarra y así sucesivamente con otros instrumentos, a los 17 años fichó para Warner Bros., y un año después lanzó su primer disco llamado"For You", luego vendría "Prince" con el que alcanzó sus primeros éxitos tales como "I Wanna Be Your Lover", y " I Feel For You", siempre supó la importancia de la independencia total, por lo que desde muy temprano montó su propio estudio de grabación, además de cuidar de su imagen, vestido y coreografías, era muy exigente en todo y seleccionaba cuidadosamente a sus músicos de gira y estudio.

Su gran éxito se dio en 1984 con el lanzamiento del disco "Purple Rain" que lo puso en plena competencia con Michael Jackson, Tinta Turner y Bruce Springsteen, los grandes artistas de aquel año, ganó tanto el Grammy como el Oscar a la mejor canción y compositor innovador.

Personalmente le recuerdo por el tema "Kiss" de 1988 y que venía en el disco "Lovesexy" cuyo tema  se hizo famoso por un programa de comedía mexicano de los años 80's y luego por haber hecho la banda sonora de "Batman" en 1989, del cual se desprendieron temas como "Batdance" y que tuvieron alta rotación en MTV.

Se tomaría un descanso y luego en 1991 atacaría de nuevo junto a un proyecto llamado "The New Power Generation" con quienes lanzó "Diamonds and Pearls" del cual se desprendieron muy buenos y recordados temas, tras la gira europea de 1992, decidio despidir a la banda y de nuevo desaparecer para volver a reaparecer ahora como un simbolo el cual usaría hasta el año 2000 cuando volvío a recuperar su nombre.

Un curioso episodio de su carrera fue el lío que tuvo a raíz del escándalo del llamado "Black Album", disco editado de manera pirata o "Bootleg" y que no gusto a Warner quién trato de destruir la mayor parte de las copias, pero como siempre se filtraron algunas y las grabaciones piratas continuaron.

Sus últimas actividades tuvieron que ver con el lanzamiento de "Baltimore" un tema hechó a raíz de los disturbios raciales ocurriods en esa ciudad, los últimos atentados en Paris le obligaron a posponer su gira europea llamada "Prince Spotlight: Piano and A Microphone" en donde aparecería solo con un piano y un micrófono, al final todo se quedo ahí.  

Prince es el último artista que ha pasado a engrosar la lista de notables decesos en este 2016 que incluyen entre otros a David Bowie y a Gato Barbieri hace un par de semanas, descanse en paz el principe purpura.