Album Anniversary - October 8, 2015

Today is the 35th anniversary of Dirty Mind, the third album from Prince.

June 7, 2015

Good Morning! Here are your daily birthday quotations...

Gwendolyn Brooks (1917 – 2000):

“Live not for Battles Won.

Live not for The-End-of-the-Song.

Live in the along.”

and

“Poetry is life distilled.”

and

“Books are meat and medicine

and flame and flight and flower

steel, stitch, cloud and clout,

and drumbeats on the air.”

Orhan Pamuk (1952 - ):

“Real museums are places where Time is transformed into Space.”

and

“I read a book one day and my whole life was changed.”

Louise Erdrich (1954 - ):

“Life will break you. Nobody can protect you from that, and living alone won't either, for solitude will also break you with its yearning. You have to love. You have to feel. It is the reason you are here on earth. You are here to risk your heart. You are here to be swallowed up. And when it happens that you are broken, or betrayed, or left, or hurt, or death brushes near, let yourself sit by an apple tree and listen to the apples falling all around you in heaps, wasting their sweetness. Tell yourself you tasted as many as you could.”

and

“We do know that no one gets wise enough to really understand the heart of another, though it is the task of our life to try.”

and

“Some people meet the way the sky meets the earth, inevitably, and there is no stopping or holding back their love. It exists in a finished world, beyond the reach of common sense.”

Prince (1958 - ):

“If you don't like the world you're living in, take a look around you, at least you got friends.”

and

“Act your age and not your shoe size.”

and

“Put the right letters together and make a better day.”

Album Anniversary - April 22, 2015

Today is the 30th anniversary of Around the World in a Day, the seventh studio album from Prince.

June 7, 2014

Good Morning! Here are your daily birthday quotations...

Gwendolyn Brooks (1917 – 2000):

“Live not for Battles Won.

Live not for The-End-of-the-Song.

Live in the along.”

and

“Poetry is life distilled.”

and

“Books are meat and medicine

and flame and flight and flower

steel, stitch, cloud and clout,

and drumbeats on the air.”

Orhan Pamuk (1952 - ):

“Real museums are places where Time is transformed into Space.”

and

“I read a book one day and my whole life was changed.”

Louise Erdrich (1954 - ):

“Life will break you. Nobody can protect you from that, and living alone won't either, for solitude will also break you with its yearning. You have to love. You have to feel. It is the reason you are here on earth. You are here to risk your heart. You are here to be swallowed up. And when it happens that you are broken, or betrayed, or left, or hurt, or death brushes near, let yourself sit by an apple tree and listen to the apples falling all around you in heaps, wasting their sweetness. Tell yourself you tasted as many as you could.”

and

“We do know that no one gets wise enough to really understand the heart of another, though it is the task of our life to try.”

and

“Some people meet the way the sky meets the earth, inevitably, and there is no stopping or holding back their love. It exists in a finished world, beyond the reach of common sense.”

Prince (1958 - ):

“If you don't like the world you're living in, take a look around you, at least you got friends.”

and

“Act your age and not your shoe size.”

and

“Put the right letters together and make a better day.”

Great Songs from My Favorite Year in Music: 1985, Part 24

Prince - "Raspberry Beret" & Pop Life"





(Single Releases: May & July 1985)
I feel the first thing I have to do on this post is comment on the videos above. You see, Prince doesn't allow his artistic properties to be presented on YouTube. Frankly, I'm not even sure how this poster got away with it, other than by mentioning fair use. I don't blame Prince. His battles with record companies and intermediaries are well documented. But, it makes it difficult to do a survey like these. In these instances, I merely suggest you take in the music and not worry so much about the visuals, which is somewhat a shame since Prince is known for making great videos. In 1985, I was still riding high on the wave created by Purple Rain, an album that is easily one in my top 5 album of all-time list. Like another of my favorite artists, David Bowie, Prince would continually reinvent himself and his music. Prince had always been versatile, but his follow-up album to his biggest success was a surprise to some. He went from dramatic funk-rock and erotic imagery to the hippie-aesthetic of Around the World in a Day. There was a Sgt. Peppers vibe ever-present throughout the tracks on the album, while still maintaining Prince's masterful ability to craft universally great pop melodies. In other words, Prince keeps changing, but is always constant. Is that contradictory? With Prince, I'd argue that it isn't. "Raspberry Beret" and "Pop Life" were the two most popular singles from the album, hitting #'s 1 and 7 respectively. Though I love "Beret," I actually prefer the smooth ride of "Pop Life," with great Purple Rain-esque backup vocals from Wendy and Lisa. It also touched on social issues, in somewhat of a rehearsal for Sign o' the Times. While his 1985 album didn't have as much resonant cachet as Purple Rain, or the consistent groove of Parade, it deserves notice and attention for these two songs alone.