Awesome ’80s in April: Purple Rain (1984)

purple rain poster

In my review of Desperately Seeking Susan, I talked a little about how Madonna and Michael Jackson were the biggest stars of the 1980s. One could argue that Prince was up there, too. He had numerous hit songs and his style was very much a part of that decade.

I liked some of his songs, but if I’m behind honest, I wasn’t really that into him. I’ve never really ventured beyond his hits and it was decades after its release before I had even heard the song “Purple Rain” much less seen the movie.

I’ve learned to appreciate more of his music over the last few years and was happy to use the Awesome ’80s in April as an excuse to finally watch this film.

As a piece of cinema, as a narrative story, Purple Rain is not great. As a time capsule, as a snapshot of Prince in this particular stage of his career it is pretty fascinating. As a music video, it is freaking fantastic.

They say the story is more or less autobiographical with Prince pretty much playing himself. Here he’s called The Kid and he’s an up-and-coming musician in Minneapolis along with his band The Revolution. They have a regular gig at the First Avenue nightclub (an actual Prince haunt) but the headliners are Morris Day and The Time. The two groups have a less-than-friendly rivalry.

The Kid has a lot of talent, but his personal life is a mess. His father (Clarence Williams III) was a musician as well, but he never made it big and is now an alcoholic and abusive husband. Two of the women in The Revolution hand him the music to “Purple Rain” a song that they wrote, but he refuses to listen to it. He wants to be the star.

He starts a relationship with Apollonia (Apollonia Kotero) but when her own musical career starts to take off the Kid suddenly makes those lyrics from “When Doves Cry” become reality (“Maybe I’m just too demanding/Maybe I’m just like my father, too bold”). He becomes jealous and abusive. He also plays a brutal rendition of “Darling Nikki” at the club while staring directly at her.

If this movie is autobiographical then Prince does not come off as a good guy. The weird thing is the film doesn’t really give him much of a redemption arc. He does come to realize that he’s becoming more like his father, but he doesn’t really apologize to Apollonia or the band. His only real action is to finally perform “Purple Rain” and even then he doesn’t acknowledge that it was written by his bandmates.

It is, however, a brilliant performance of that song and at that moment I can forgive him, too. All the songs and performances are terrific. They really are the reason to watch the film. And for that, it is well worth watching. Just don’t come expecting a great story or any real insight into Prince, the character, or the person.

Watch Scary Pockets Perform “Purple Rain”

When I’m not watching movies or posting shows, I sometimes turn on Youtube and look for good music. There is a whole cottage industry of folks playing cover songs on a regular basis and racking up pretty sizable followings.

Scary Pockets is one of my favorites. They are from Los Angeles and they do funkified versions of all kinds of pop songs. I really dig them and thought you might too. This is their version of Prince’s “Purple Rain”.

Random Shuffle (06/10/06) – Sarah McLaughlin, The Lemonheads, The Black Crowes, Prince & Nico

Originally posted on July 11, 2006.

“Building a Mystery” – Sarah McLaughlin
From Pure Moods – Celestial Celebration

I’ve never been much of a Sarah McLaughlin fan. I like her whisper of a voice but there is something about her songs that just don’t move me in anyway. This particular song I like okay, mainly because it brings up a fairly specific time frame (college years) that I enjoy getting nostalgic about.

This particular version is a rather scorching live version (sorry I couldn’t find the clip on YouTube). Sarah really gets into it (she even lets loose with an F-bomb) and the band behind her nails the groove. It is off of one of those new agey Pure Moods disks that my wife got from the library. Most of the album was way too ‘new jazz’ for my tastes, but there are a few good numbers that go well with a nice mix tape to get the wife in the mood.

“Frank Mills” – Lemonheads
From It’s a Shame About Ray

Speaking of Nostalgia, this Lemonheads brings me back to my late high school years like a bullet. On the liner notes of this album were all the lyrics to the songs, but they were jumbled up like. So you might get one line from song 1 then it would go to another line from song 2. I spent several hours one night going through each song and matching up the lyrics.

Yes, I was once a lyrics freak. I used to keep a notebook of my favorite lyrics. Of course, I used to also consider myself a poet and kept a notebook full of those awful things.

Speaking of lyrics I once tried to write out the lyrics to Def Leppard’s “Pour Some Sugar On Me” and got them all wrong. I was way too young to understand the overstated sexual overtones of the song and thought it was a nice ode to vegetables and picnicking. Hilarious.

This is, of course, a cover of a song from Hair. Evan Dando pretty much nails it with his soft-man voice and an acoustic guitar. He hits the hippie naivety of the song without an ounce of irony. Much better in fact than the more popular cover of “Mrs Robinson” he also sings on the same album.

“She Talks to Angels” – The Black Crowes
From Shake Your Money Maker

Throw this one into my pile of all-time favorite songs. Most of the Black Crowe “rockers” I could live without, but there is something about their organ-laced ballads that melt my kidneys.

This one with its tale of a misguided lass moves me in ways I can’t speak of around children.

I saw the Crowes at the end of a very long festival concert, and I must admit I didn’t much care for them. But again it was at the end of the night after hearing something like 8 hours of music. This was also Atlanta in the middle of summer so my skin was burnt to a crisp. What really stands out to me is the gyrating couple standing near us. The man was behind doing his thing while the lady was reaching around back and….oh the kiddies again, um never mind.

“7” Prince
From The Hits

This song always reminds me of my cousin Clifton. I have a very specific memory of him playing this song and loving it right before we left for some family get-together.

Prince always reminds me of working on an EPA Superfund project. Me and my boss used to crank up the hits collection and rock out. She was a cool boss. But the secretary there was a total wash-out be-ach. She complained once because I played “Sexy MF” and she was offended by the cursing. The funny thing was she used to get explicit with her own sexual history. Pissed me off. I can’t have Prince get funky, but she can tell me, in detail, about her own funkiness?!

Speaking of that lady, first day on the job she had a 3.5-inch floppy disk turned backward trying to stick it into the computer. I watched her try it three or four times before she asked for help. Hilari-freaking-ous.

“These Days” – Nico
From The Royal Tenenbaums Soundtrack

I usually make a face when someone mentions Nico simply because I have old tendencies towards the Velvet Underground and there was a whole history with Nico and the Velvets. Rumor has it Andy Warhol made the Velvets have Nico sing a few numbers in order for him to fund the band.

Turns out Nico has a really pretty voice and this song is beautiful. She has a very nasally kind of delivery but it matches perfectly with the acoustics and the longing lyrics. It also fits perfectly into the film, something Wes Anderson has a knack for.

Random Shuffle (05/08/06) – Gene Autry, Otis Redding, Prince, Jeff Tweedy & Guns N Roses

sleepless in seattle

“Back in the Saddle Again” – Gene Autry
From the Sleeping in Seattle soundtrack

Though a bit of a cheesy romantic comedy, Sleepless in Seattle sports a very nice soundtrack consisting of great vocal jazz, old country, and classic standards. This Gene Autry number is the kind of country music I love. Before country music was bastardized by slick production and the anti-Christ named Shania Twain it was full of old cowboy songs and blues-inspired cheatin’ songs.

It is music with a heart. Everyone’s heard the old joke about what you get if you play a country song backward – you get your wife back, your house, back, your dog back… – but there is a sincerity and a joy to that music not felt in Nashville proper for years.

otis blue

“You Don’t Miss Your Water” – Otis Redding
from Otis Blue

Nobody sings soul music like Otis Redding. There is so much heartache in his voice he could make a statue of Hitler cry. Yet he could jump out of his soul with some rhythm and blues.

He does a version of “Satisfaction” that even Keith Richards says sounds more like what he wanted than the Stones version.

This is a slow, soulful number with heartbreaking lyrics, but it’s not my favorite Otis tune. It’s just a tad too slow for my liking, without a great melody to back it.

It’s still powerful Otis soul, but if I was recommending Otis Redding sad songs, I’d head for “These Arms Of Mine” or “Pain in My Heart” before I led anyone to this song.

purple rain

“When Doves Cry” – Prince
from Purple Rain

Ah, Prince when he was just Prince. They say his last album was pretty smokin’ but I have to admit I haven’t given it a spin. Judging from his appearance at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame a couple of years back, he’s still got it though.

This song reminds me of my sophomore year at college. There was a social club on campus that were nicknamed the Doves. Pledges had to sing this song at will, or maybe they had it on a t-shirt. Anyways this was their song.

A great freaking song it is. Killer guitar, a sweet backbeat, and Prince doing his Prince thing like no other.

“I’m the Man Who Loves You” – Jeff Tweedy
from 3/05/05

From a live acoustic solo gig, he did in Chicago. Well, later he was joined by most of Wilco, but the first set is nothing but Tweedy and his guitar. He does some old Tupelo numbers and lots of Wilco favorites.

This version suffers a little without the band, but it’s cool to hear these songs stripped down to just the basic melody and Tweedy’s oddball lyrics. He actually manages some pretty good fast picking on his little acoustic.

I keep expecting to hear the crowd really sing along since it must have been an intimate show, but I never do. I guess they had respect for the man and the song and didn’t want to disturb him.

“Paradise City” – Guns N Roses
from (10/2/87)

There has been a lot of brouhaha over Axl Rose and the new Guns N Roses album that has supposedly been coming out for several years now. This is the stuff that keeps people talking about a band that really hasn’t done anything since the early 1990s.

The sound quality on this live performance is a little muddled, but the blazing, explosion coming from the band is enough to blow out the speakers and make the neighbors call the cops.

Axl is all over the place screaming like a mad chimpanzee on fire. Slash tears the mutha up with his solo. The rest of the band blazes like a blind demon on Judgment Day. I just got this bootleg in the mail yesterday, so I can’t say much about the rest of the disk, but if this version is anything like the rest, then sign me up for the reunion tour.