PRINCE
by David Khan Johnson
In 1984, our band Pacific Orchestra was performing at the now defunct Western Front night club in Cambridge, Mass. Before the show guitarist Joe Grassi and I went into Boston to see an opening day matinee of Purple Rain. We left the theater with purple stains that we still both bear to this day.
In 1988 I was working at Brockum, a Manhattan based merchandise company that produced and sold licensed goods on behalf of a large roster of artists such as the Rolling Stones, Bon Jovi, and Prince. One day in the office I was offered a pair of tickets to see Prince perform at Madison Square Garden that night. I was to rendezvous with someone on the corner of 33rd Street and Seventh Avenue who would hand off the tickets to me.
As my friend John Schmelzer and I waited patiently, an excited extremely well dressed crowd of mostly women in high heels, skirts and hats filed past us heading toward the Garden like a parade in a Fellini movie. Suddenly the wind picked up. Without warning the skies opened and a sizeable amount of thick rain dumped on us. Our clothes were soaked but we didn’t dare leave our spot. As soon as it let up, a smiling lady turned onto 33rd Street, slowed her stroll, handed us two tickets and walked on, her laminated all access pass floating on the breeze behind her. We bolted to the venue dripping wet and sat shivering in our seats.
In the center of the Garden floor sat a stage shaped like a large boulder. Flat surfaces were cut into the stone which supported drums, keyboards, amplifiers, and a playground with a swing set and a basketball court. It was unlike anything we had seen before.
The lights went down. The band walked out. Sheila E sat at the drum kit, stomping on her kick drum pedal with her sparkly high heels. The musicians tested their rigs. The noise reached a crescendo and stopped. He came out. He looked around. He raised his arm. He hit it. The Garden was on its feet. We could not feel our wet clothes.
During the show, during someone’s solo, Prince ran to the basketball court and picked up a ball, dribbled, shot, missed and walked dejectedly back to the piano. Later, as Sheila E attacked her timbales, he returned to the court, took the ball, shot and missed. He stood still looking upset for a few seconds before strapping on his guitar, cranking it up and spewing a furious round of sound across the heads of the faithful joined in love at the Garden church. After the encores, after the final bows, Prince exited the stage walking across the basketball court, his back to the hoop. He casually picked up the ball and tossed it backwards over his shoulder. It swooshed in. He did not look back.
A year or two later Joe and I saw Prince perform somewhere. We think it was Madison Square Garden, but it might have been the Spectrum in Philadelphia. The stage floor had a black and white checkerboard pattern. Prince rarely played guitar but instead danced to the thick funk and soul that he favored that night.
On August 19, 1991, on a hot, sticky New York City night, Prince performed at a private party. MTV had rented out the Ritz concert hall to celebrate the music station’s 10th Anniversary. The vast theater, once home to Studio 54, was decorated with the omnipresent MTV logo and fleshed out with a wide variety of food booths including an oyster bar with two nonstop shuckers in constant motion. I had been running the concert merchandise sales at the Ritz for several years, so, even though there was nothing to sell that night, I walked in past the long line of furious entitled music business cats who had no patience for the guest list policies. I ate piles of shrimp and roast beef, washing it down with a nice champagne. I loved MTV.
Fifteen minutes prior to show time I stood alone at the edge of the stage. The jaded music industry heavyweights were not straying far from the open bars. The lights went down and the band walked out. A handful of people of people carried their drinks closer to the stage.
I once asked Trent Reznor about a Nine Inch Nails concert that I saw at the Academy Theater in New York. I thought it was an exciting show. He said that no one does a good show in New York because the gig is packed with record label people, lawyers, managers, booking agents, media, celebrities, and music business bottom feeders who demand the artist’s attention all the while eroding the artist’s focus on the art that attracted everyone in the first place.
I am guessing that this thought was on Prince’s mind as he walked onstage and faced the vacant dance floor at the Ritz. Nonetheless, he straightened up, counted it off, and laid it down. The power of his set was an admonishment to the spoiled posers gobbling sushi. He would not be denied. He demanded THEIR attention and got it with a furious lashing that drew the crowd closer and closer, fueled them up, made them dance and cheer. He did not smile.
He directed the band into his recent single Gett Off, a nasty bit of relentless funk, and rode it for 20 minutes. The bitches who had ignored him now wet their pants as he humped and ground and shivered on his four inch heels. The next morning they would be bragging that they were there at the edge of the stage when they caught his eye.
During “Nothing Compares to You” he climbed on top of the grand piano, lay on his stomach facing down at the keys and called up a sultry solo playing the glistening instrument backwards. Nothing compared.
The Palladium on 14th street had once been the Academy of Music, a premier New York concert theater. During the early nineties, the venue mutated into a giant disco populated by time travelers who came from the sixties sporting Nehru jackets, beads, square glasses, and miniskirts. Despite its dance floor configuration, on July 13 & 14, 1994 Prince decided to bring live music back to the sacred hall by performing two late night shows.
He performed a song that I had never heard before called Shhh (Break It Down). Opening with a dramatic salvo of whole notes exploding against an aggressive drum roll, the song built to a sonic peak then slickly dropped down to a slow soulful groove reminiscent of the Dramatics, Ohio Players or the Stylistics lush with sensuous background vocals and cut with Prince’s falsetto. Sexy. The ladies squealed.
Lenny Kravitz came out for the encore. It was OK but the house had already been thoroughly rocked and the adornment seemed gratuitous.
Joe Doyle was one of the retired NYPD detectives who ran security at the Beacon Theater in New York. I told him I was going to see Prince and he told me about guarding him several years prior.
I’ll paraphrase Joe:
“I went up to Prince’s hotel. His handler came out and said that I was never to speak directly to Prince, only to the handler. I said OK.
Prince came out and asked ‘Is the car ready?’
The handler turned to me “Is the car ready?’.
‘Yes,’ I said, ‘The car is ready.’
The handler turned to Prince. ‘The car is ready.”
Prince replied, ‘Good. Let’s go.’
The handler told me, ‘Good. Let’s go.’
In the elevator, Prince said to the handler, ‘Let’s go to the studio first.’
The handler said to me, ‘Let’s go to the studio first.’
I said, ‘OK.’
The handler turned to Prince. ‘He says OK.’
For three days it went that way. He never once spoke directly to me. It was good. I liked it. I wish more of my jobs were like that.”
In March of 1993, after changing his name to TAFKAP, Prince came to Radio City Music Hall for a three night stand in support of his recently released album The Love Symbol. The record’s cover was decorated with a new glyph that was omnipresent that night from the T-shirts to the body shape of his guitars to the giant set piece in the lobby.
Reaching for something more than a traditional concert experience (which we would have all been happy with) Prince pushed the envelope by having actors dressed in Arab robes chase his paramour/actress/singer/dancer Mayte through the aisles. The golden chains hanging across his face from his motorcycle cap swayed while he spun his cane to the beat of My Name is Prince. After eluding the villains, Mayte sidled up to Prince and humped him, then the stage, he humped her, she sang, more humping. They whispered in each others’ ears. Prince laughed. They danced. She slinked. She laid on the piano. He sang to her. It was kind of a Yoko/John thing. It was uncomfortable to watch. The stiff skits were leaden. But, the song list was fantastic (Sexy MF, Peach, 1999, Scandalous) and we were treated to an encore appearance by Lenny Kravitz.
Cathy Cleghorn, who handled his merchandise at Brockum, alerted me to an after show event a few blocks away at the disco Club USA. Prince’s early morning performances were legendary and I was excited to check it out. She lead our little group into the uncomfortably jammed club where the dancers were in mid sweat deep into that four on the floor disco beat. At 2:30 Prince’s band shuffled onto a two foot high platform that served as a stage. They tuned up and the prerecorded music faded out. The dancers, who either didn’t recognize or know who Prince was, were furious that the beat had evaporated. They hooted. They booed. They came to dance; they paid their money to dance, not to stand in awe of the world’s greatest performer.
It quickly became obvious that the sound system in the club was inadequate for a full performing band. Prince’s mic squealed in agony. There were several false starts. While the roadies scampered around hunched over in an attempt to remain invisible, Prince was stuck standing in the lone spotlight. He had lost control, something that he obviously hated. He alternated between smiles (“Everything’s cool”) and grimaces (“Someone will pay for this tonight”).
When a bleak semblance of a mix was hobbled together they began again. Despite the thrashing fury of funk (Black MF in the House), hits (When You Were Mine), and treats (Tower of Powers’ What is Hip), things never truly jelled.
We streamed out at 5 am happy to have been there but feeling sorry for Prince who only wanted to thrill us. Again. And again.
In 1988 I was working at Brockum, a Manhattan based merchandise company that produced and sold licensed goods on behalf of a large roster of artists such as the Rolling Stones, Bon Jovi, and Prince. One day in the office I was offered a pair of tickets to see Prince perform at Madison Square Garden that night. I was to rendezvous with someone on the corner of 33rd Street and Seventh Avenue who would hand off the tickets to me.
As my friend John Schmelzer and I waited patiently, an excited extremely well dressed crowd of mostly women in high heels, skirts and hats filed past us heading toward the Garden like a parade in a Fellini movie. Suddenly the wind picked up. Without warning the skies opened and a sizeable amount of thick rain dumped on us. Our clothes were soaked but we didn’t dare leave our spot. As soon as it let up, a smiling lady turned onto 33rd Street, slowed her stroll, handed us two tickets and walked on, her laminated all access pass floating on the breeze behind her. We bolted to the venue dripping wet and sat shivering in our seats.
In the center of the Garden floor sat a stage shaped like a large boulder. Flat surfaces were cut into the stone which supported drums, keyboards, amplifiers, and a playground with a swing set and a basketball court. It was unlike anything we had seen before.
The lights went down. The band walked out. Sheila E sat at the drum kit, stomping on her kick drum pedal with her sparkly high heels. The musicians tested their rigs. The noise reached a crescendo and stopped. He came out. He looked around. He raised his arm. He hit it. The Garden was on its feet. We could not feel our wet clothes.
During the show, during someone’s solo, Prince ran to the basketball court and picked up a ball, dribbled, shot, missed and walked dejectedly back to the piano. Later, as Sheila E attacked her timbales, he returned to the court, took the ball, shot and missed. He stood still looking upset for a few seconds before strapping on his guitar, cranking it up and spewing a furious round of sound across the heads of the faithful joined in love at the Garden church. After the encores, after the final bows, Prince exited the stage walking across the basketball court, his back to the hoop. He casually picked up the ball and tossed it backwards over his shoulder. It swooshed in. He did not look back.
A year or two later Joe and I saw Prince perform somewhere. We think it was Madison Square Garden, but it might have been the Spectrum in Philadelphia. The stage floor had a black and white checkerboard pattern. Prince rarely played guitar but instead danced to the thick funk and soul that he favored that night.
On August 19, 1991, on a hot, sticky New York City night, Prince performed at a private party. MTV had rented out the Ritz concert hall to celebrate the music station’s 10th Anniversary. The vast theater, once home to Studio 54, was decorated with the omnipresent MTV logo and fleshed out with a wide variety of food booths including an oyster bar with two nonstop shuckers in constant motion. I had been running the concert merchandise sales at the Ritz for several years, so, even though there was nothing to sell that night, I walked in past the long line of furious entitled music business cats who had no patience for the guest list policies. I ate piles of shrimp and roast beef, washing it down with a nice champagne. I loved MTV.
Fifteen minutes prior to show time I stood alone at the edge of the stage. The jaded music industry heavyweights were not straying far from the open bars. The lights went down and the band walked out. A handful of people of people carried their drinks closer to the stage.
I once asked Trent Reznor about a Nine Inch Nails concert that I saw at the Academy Theater in New York. I thought it was an exciting show. He said that no one does a good show in New York because the gig is packed with record label people, lawyers, managers, booking agents, media, celebrities, and music business bottom feeders who demand the artist’s attention all the while eroding the artist’s focus on the art that attracted everyone in the first place.
I am guessing that this thought was on Prince’s mind as he walked onstage and faced the vacant dance floor at the Ritz. Nonetheless, he straightened up, counted it off, and laid it down. The power of his set was an admonishment to the spoiled posers gobbling sushi. He would not be denied. He demanded THEIR attention and got it with a furious lashing that drew the crowd closer and closer, fueled them up, made them dance and cheer. He did not smile.
He directed the band into his recent single Gett Off, a nasty bit of relentless funk, and rode it for 20 minutes. The bitches who had ignored him now wet their pants as he humped and ground and shivered on his four inch heels. The next morning they would be bragging that they were there at the edge of the stage when they caught his eye.
During “Nothing Compares to You” he climbed on top of the grand piano, lay on his stomach facing down at the keys and called up a sultry solo playing the glistening instrument backwards. Nothing compared.
The Palladium on 14th street had once been the Academy of Music, a premier New York concert theater. During the early nineties, the venue mutated into a giant disco populated by time travelers who came from the sixties sporting Nehru jackets, beads, square glasses, and miniskirts. Despite its dance floor configuration, on July 13 & 14, 1994 Prince decided to bring live music back to the sacred hall by performing two late night shows.
He performed a song that I had never heard before called Shhh (Break It Down). Opening with a dramatic salvo of whole notes exploding against an aggressive drum roll, the song built to a sonic peak then slickly dropped down to a slow soulful groove reminiscent of the Dramatics, Ohio Players or the Stylistics lush with sensuous background vocals and cut with Prince’s falsetto. Sexy. The ladies squealed.
Lenny Kravitz came out for the encore. It was OK but the house had already been thoroughly rocked and the adornment seemed gratuitous.
Joe Doyle was one of the retired NYPD detectives who ran security at the Beacon Theater in New York. I told him I was going to see Prince and he told me about guarding him several years prior.
I’ll paraphrase Joe:
“I went up to Prince’s hotel. His handler came out and said that I was never to speak directly to Prince, only to the handler. I said OK.
Prince came out and asked ‘Is the car ready?’
The handler turned to me “Is the car ready?’.
‘Yes,’ I said, ‘The car is ready.’
The handler turned to Prince. ‘The car is ready.”
Prince replied, ‘Good. Let’s go.’
The handler told me, ‘Good. Let’s go.’
In the elevator, Prince said to the handler, ‘Let’s go to the studio first.’
The handler said to me, ‘Let’s go to the studio first.’
I said, ‘OK.’
The handler turned to Prince. ‘He says OK.’
For three days it went that way. He never once spoke directly to me. It was good. I liked it. I wish more of my jobs were like that.”
In March of 1993, after changing his name to TAFKAP, Prince came to Radio City Music Hall for a three night stand in support of his recently released album The Love Symbol. The record’s cover was decorated with a new glyph that was omnipresent that night from the T-shirts to the body shape of his guitars to the giant set piece in the lobby.
Reaching for something more than a traditional concert experience (which we would have all been happy with) Prince pushed the envelope by having actors dressed in Arab robes chase his paramour/actress/singer/dancer Mayte through the aisles. The golden chains hanging across his face from his motorcycle cap swayed while he spun his cane to the beat of My Name is Prince. After eluding the villains, Mayte sidled up to Prince and humped him, then the stage, he humped her, she sang, more humping. They whispered in each others’ ears. Prince laughed. They danced. She slinked. She laid on the piano. He sang to her. It was kind of a Yoko/John thing. It was uncomfortable to watch. The stiff skits were leaden. But, the song list was fantastic (Sexy MF, Peach, 1999, Scandalous) and we were treated to an encore appearance by Lenny Kravitz.
Cathy Cleghorn, who handled his merchandise at Brockum, alerted me to an after show event a few blocks away at the disco Club USA. Prince’s early morning performances were legendary and I was excited to check it out. She lead our little group into the uncomfortably jammed club where the dancers were in mid sweat deep into that four on the floor disco beat. At 2:30 Prince’s band shuffled onto a two foot high platform that served as a stage. They tuned up and the prerecorded music faded out. The dancers, who either didn’t recognize or know who Prince was, were furious that the beat had evaporated. They hooted. They booed. They came to dance; they paid their money to dance, not to stand in awe of the world’s greatest performer.
It quickly became obvious that the sound system in the club was inadequate for a full performing band. Prince’s mic squealed in agony. There were several false starts. While the roadies scampered around hunched over in an attempt to remain invisible, Prince was stuck standing in the lone spotlight. He had lost control, something that he obviously hated. He alternated between smiles (“Everything’s cool”) and grimaces (“Someone will pay for this tonight”).
When a bleak semblance of a mix was hobbled together they began again. Despite the thrashing fury of funk (Black MF in the House), hits (When You Were Mine), and treats (Tower of Powers’ What is Hip), things never truly jelled.
We streamed out at 5 am happy to have been there but feeling sorry for Prince who only wanted to thrill us. Again. And again.
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