The Smiley Smile Message Board

http://www.tmz.com/#article/2016/04/21/prince-dead-at-57/

This year, man...

Never wish on anyone, but he was so young.

Still not officially confirmed is it?

That's shocking and stopped me in my tracks.

Doesn't look like it. "Police are investigating a death at his house..." Seems to be the status.

what no

what


no

Waiting to notify next-of-kin before name will be released:
http://m.kcci.com/entertainment/death-reported-at-princes-house/39145690

Mpls Star Tribune now confirming

Wow. For me, this is the toughest to take of all of them this year.

How sad way to young! 2016 has been such an horrible year for musicians and actors! We are lucky nothing has happened to the beach boys so far this year!!!!

RIP Prince

goshdarn it...this fucking sucks. RIP.

CNN and Billboard both reported it too. 

While I'm not a big fan of his music, 57 is far too young to go. 

I will say, I have fond memories of listening to the Batman (1989) soundtrack on my Walkman on the way to the beach when I was a kid.

This (2016) year is turning fucking terrible SO SO many top line celebs and iconic musicians are passing  :'(

Must also say, one of (if not the best) guitar players I have had the pleasure to see live

Best live show I've ever seen.

Brian's tweet:

I'm shocked to hear that Prince passed at such a young age. Musically, he could do it all: sing, play, arrange and produce. Love & Mercy

I know right! Another legend gone it seems in 2016.  :'(

My mother and I are both huge fans. It's a shame we'll never get to see him together.

Ironic as it is, we lose Prince on the birthday of the Queen

True, so young :(. My dad's age, actually...... but I don't want to think about that.

Not super familiar with his music, but very much aware of his influence in music. RIP.

In my top 5 of all time.

Honest to god devastated.

Sign 'o' the times will be on repeat all day.

Really sad news. But the man really crammed at least two life times worth of music into his short time, he was so incredibly prolific. Let's celebrate what he left behind.

Shocking, sad, devastating news. Hard to believe. RIP!

This.

R.I.P.

I'd just like to reiterate a different post of mine somewhere: "Baby I'm a Star" is one of the best songs ever.

M, just go listen to Purple Rain

Prince had the Best Passport Photo in the Universe:
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/people/prince-had-the-best-passport-photo-in-the-universe-a6995271.html

Geez, 2016's turning out to be The Year The Music Died.....

Though I was never a huge fan of Prince, I certainly had a great amount of respect for him and his discography. Weirdly enough, was briefly talking about Prince with a friend just a few hours before his death was unannounced.....

  This has become a sadly familiar ritual in 2016. Rest in peace & power, Prince. God Bless.

One of my biggest influences passes...man, this year...

The experience of Prince's death is unique for me. Other huge, huge superstars have died during my lifetime. It's not unique in that respect. I assume it's a Minneapolis thing. This morning I heard someone had died at Paisley Park, and it didn't take long before TMZ said it was Prince. A person never wants to believe such a thing. But...

When Michael Jackson died, the news spread. But it was nothing like this. Not only was my phone blowing up while I was working, but my work email, my personal email. Everyone I work with was saying the same thing. Some are music geeks, some are totally normal office types. But in Minneapolis, it seems everyone cares more about Prince. In fact, when I got home tonight, my mom called to talk about Prince. My mom is 70 years old and didn't like Prince. But everybody loves Prince whether they like him or not.

A few posters here have said they aren't familiar with him. Not that you'll have much choice in the inevitable barrage of marketing-driven reissues in the upcoming years, but I strongly advise you to dig in. This may be the genius of his generation, the genius of the '80s.

Minneapolis is a weird town, a mostly white place that has had enclaves of black culture for a few decades. Prince grew up in black neighborhoods with black musicians surrounded by white people, white musicians, and he absorbed all of it. You aren't going to find a black musician who had a better grasp on Led Zeppelin or the Beatles. And yet he also firmly grasped James Brown, Stevie Wonder, Parliament Funkadelic, Sly Stone. There was some jazz in there, but not enough (most of the time) to make the listening experience too difficult.

I saw him (I think) three times: a late 90s outdoor local festival (in which a white-suited Larry Graham preached the gospel and led the chant of "some bass, some bass, some bass in the place"); the miraculously glorious 2004 Musicology show; and a show where he backed one of his proteges, Tamar. He was the best entertainer and possibly the best live guitarist and singer I've ever seen. This was someone who could do anything, and he could do it better than your favorite musician.

This city had a love-hate relationship with him, especially as his weirdness grew and feuds with his label became public in the '90s and '00s. But he'd been having a renaissance in recent years, putting out more music, doing some interviews, allowing his longtime media rival, the Star Tribune's Jon Bream, into various events. I wish he had another decade or so to really re-establish himself here, and to enjoy the love from this city he deserved. The uneven catalog is nothing to think twice about: there isn't a decades-long artist without similar sketchy points.

Prince's highs were equal to the best highs there have ever been in American music. He was a singular talent.

Captain, as a local, what can you tell us about Paisley Park? How it influenced Minneapolis and vice versa? How is it located within the Minneapolis environs? Is it remote, is it part of the fabric of the city? Is it, and was he, part of the regular consciousness of the city? Anecdotes?

Here's what fellow Minnesotan-musican Bob Mould had to say:

A huge talent. RIP:

http://fridaynightboys300.blogspot.co.uk/2016/04/prince-rip.html

Paisley Park isn't in Minneapolis at all. The sprawling home/studio/venue is in Chanhassan, a southwestern suburb probably 45 minutes or so from the heart of the city, depending on traffic. He built it after hitting superstardom, somewhere in the mid-80s. He recorded some of his albums (and other people's albums) there, I think starting with Around the World in a Day (but don't quote me on that), and other musicians used it as well. But the live venue was the far more important part to Minneapolitans: Prince would host dance parties and concerts there ... I was going to say often, and sometimes that's true, but sometimes you could go a long time with nothing. It seems to me he had been doing more since starting to work with 3rdEyeGirl, maybe 2 years ago. The most dependable things about those shows was that you couldn't depend on them. Almost inevitably announced (or rumored) the day of, sometimes they ended up being rumors, nothing at all. Or just dance parties with some DJ, but no live music and no Prince to be seen. Other times he might do a solo show, a full band show. His music, covers. Him singing, him drumming, him on bass, him on keys, him on guitar. Other local musicians, other nationally known musicians, current band members, potential future band members, (often) protege female singers... You had no idea what you were in for. He might play a huge role, he might just watch like a deist version of god. And Prince being Prince, they started when they started (if at all) and ended when they ended.

I wish I could tell you all more, but unfortunately while I was born and raised in Minnesota, I didn't move to Minneapolis until my junior year of college, 1996. That coincides with Prince's emancipation and Emancipation. By then, he was far beyond the tales of his early stardom, when he'd still walk around North Mpls, attend shows without entourage, shop at Ragstock to find stage costumes. By 1996, he was probably near the pinnacle of his weirdness and isolation. So he was more the subject of hero myths than a real person (outside of his work and shows). It was always about a club owner who had worked with him in 1981, a roommate whose uncle was an engineer at Paisley Park, a brother's college professor who played trumpet on recordings ... but not direct experiences. He was too big, too far removed from normal life by then. He also was living in L.A., Paris, and Toronto much of the time from the '90s onward (though back here more in recent years).

He still dominated the city in strange ways, though, as I said before, like a hero myth. If the Dakota Jazz Club had a night with no artist named, whispers would begin that it was Prince for a surprise, intimate show. If a part of some club was roped off, word was Prince was coming to see the show. Every club owner in town said that most of these were rumors, and even 9/10 of the time his people DID arrange for such things, Prince didn't show anyway. But sometimes he did. Your best odds were when he was already doing something. If he had a show at a major venue, there was a good bet he'd show up somewhere else and play, too, and then do an all-night party or show at Paisley Park. He could--and did--play music all night without repeating a song.

He engaged in a lot of guerilla marketing, too, resulting in albums advertised in ways no others were. I remember driving down Portland Avenue just south of downtown Minneapolis and seeing an entire construction area plastered with Rave Un2 the Joy Fantastic posters, like wallpaper of blue-bodysuited Princes. It was similar for Emancipation.

Last night the city was purple, literally. The I-35 bridge was lit up purple, as was the IDS Center. There was an all-night dance party with thousands of people outside, and then inside, First Ave. It was still going on at around 7 this morning, and might still be now. I suppose it's always this way, but now that he's gone a lot of people are reawakening to how great he was, how big a role he played at some point in their lives.

That was exactly the kind of post I was looking for - you am gave me a good sense of his relationship with the city. Thanks. It's really rare and interesting for an artist that big to stay around his home town, make it his base, and really contribute to its life.
Thanks again.

Paisley Park is in your heart.

It is in Chanhassen.

Got it: Chanhassen.
 But for non-Minnesotans, the recognizable name of that urban area is Minneapolis.
Like Revere, MA. Where's that? Boston.

Absolutely. For casual purposes, the only reason it's remotely relevant is to understand that going to a Paisley Park event wasn't going into the heart of downtown or some hip neighborhood, but rather a slog of substantial length along highways through an assortment of suburbs.

Beyond that, it's irrelevant. (As is Chanhassan henceforth.)

With the new name, is it "Highlight Shitty Suburbs Day?"

There's a long video on Youtube (about 30 minutes), where director Kevin Smith (not a huge fan of his, some of his work is OK) talks about how Prince asked him to direct a documentary about the release of one of his albums. The part that blew me away is that at one point, Prince's assistant tells Smith that she's directed 20 of Prince's music videos, and that they're for songs that haven't even been released. He just took them and put them away in 'The Vault'. That just seems incredible to me.

it is extremely hard to buy Prince music today; everything at amazon is out of stock. . . .he's obviously not on Rhapsody.  How can one get and play his albums today?
Can anyone confirm if he , a great soul, was half Italian? (beyond checking wikipedia. . . .)

The vault has been the stuff of legend for ... damn, decades. Rumors of collaborations with everyone (I mean, Miles Davis!?) have circulated. His posthumous catalogue may end up as remarkable as anyone's we've ever seen. That's assuming it is released, of course. Who knows what the instructions are. But there is serious money to be made.

I don't think so. Both of his parents were African American, which of course doesn't preclude Italian ancestry, but makes 1/2 pretty unlikely.

Captain, what a terrific series of posts.

This one has left me gutted. I had just rounded out my Prince collection last year, getting everything except a few of his rare and thus expensive music club releases, though I grabbed a few of those, too (and downloaded, um, legally what I couldn't purchase). I'm glad I was able to now that everyone wants their pound of flesh. I can't blame them, supply and demand and all that, but still. 

Saw a clip of his last show and he still sounded great, which makes it worse I suppose--he wasn't done yet, not by a long shot.

I've always been skeptical of the "vault." The releases that did sneak out, while solid, were also packed with some filler, remixes and such (i.e. Crystal Ball). But with Prince, it's hard to say. Someone will be getting insanely rich off of it, and it won't be him. Such is life. Hopefully he left it to someone who can curate it properly, if it was his desire for it to be released at all. 

How does someone who never seemed to age die?

I'm afraid we are going to find out.....

Yes, great to get the local color from the Captain.

A moment of sound for a great artist and entertainer....

Questlove: http://www.rollingstone.com/music/news/questlove-remembers-prince-in-this-life-youre-on-your-own-20160425?page=3

Sounding/guessing he ODd. Very sad!

I was kinda in a "who needs to hear what I have to say" mood last week, but I really really loved Prince. he was one of those artists whose sheer undeniable appeal got me listening to types of music I would normally have. "Purple Rain" and "Around the World In A Day" are my two favourite albums by him. Late last year and early this year I was listening to tons of his stuff in an attempt to fill the gaps in my knowledge. I thus discovered strange gems like "The Belle of St Mark" with Sheila E. I had been going through a similar process with Bowie shortly before he died. I was also doing it with another classic living artist who I am now most afraid for. We are so lucky to have lived at the same time as these people. Still shocked and sad.

My review of Controversy:

https://tangledupinmusic.com/2016/12/21/prince-controversy-album-review/