Now I could sit here and write about the new albums out this week from the likes of Camila Cabello, Fat Joe, Liam Payne and even XXXTENTACION but I’d rather take you back to 1999. Well, actually I’ll take you back to the fall of 1982 as that is when the face of pop and rock music would change forever. Prince released his fifth album, 1999, 37 years ago and his estate just released a Super Deluxe edition of it that includes a completely remastered version of the groundbreaking record plus remixes and edits of a number of the songs from 1999 plus a full length live concert from the albums tour. What longtime Prince fans like myself have clamored for for years is to hear songs from Prince’s massive vault and the Super Deluxe edition of 1999 does not disappoint. There are 17 songs that have never seen the light of day included many that Prince die-hards have been longing to hear for decades.
“Little Red Corvette” and “1999” are songs that everyone knows and are the two singles that helped propel Prince to mega-stardom and sell 4 million copies. It’s the 17 new songs that show how prolific of a writer Prince was. During this time he was writing for himself and his other projects most noticeably The Time and Vanity 6 all while writing and recording a song a day. Take a moment to let that sink in. Prince would write the lyrics to a song, write the music, record his vocals and play all of the instruments and he would do that basically every day during this time. That’s a lot a music and they are finally available to listen to.
Prince would often sing about living life large as he only knew how but he takes a different approach to finance on “Money Don’t Grow On Trees.” Here he professes that he’s a hard-working boy that believes you need to have a college degree and a 9 to 5 in order to succeed. Not really accustomed to his Purple Majesty telling people to stay in school and get a good job. Musically the song sounds like something you would hear on his HITnRUN records especially Phase Two’s “Baltimore.”
The song I cared to hear the most is “Vagina,” a track about a hermaphrodite who was the best of both worlds. “Vagina” could have easily fit on Controversy or Dirty Mind. The song was long rumored to have been written for Vanity 6 and only contains Prince’s vocals and guitar. There are no drums in the song which gives it somewhat of an unfinished sound.
Upon the first listen of “Rearrange” I can’t help but question where have I heard this song before. After some back and forth it finally hits me that it’s arrangement is very similar to “Irresistible Bitch” the b-side of 1999’s “Let’s Pretend We’re Married”. It also seems to be the kissing cousin of “Lady Cab Driver”.
Throughout his nearly 40 year career Prince would write songs leave them and come back to them years later and there are a few examples of this on the new 1999. “New Power Generation” was released in 1990 as a part of the Graffiti Bridge soundtrack. However in 1982 it first came to life as “Bold Generation” and was recorded during the time Prince was working on The Time’s What Time Is It?. The song includes only Prince and Morris Day like most of The Time’s work did.
Next of the 17 unreleased tracks is the instrumental “Colleen”. This song was named after sound engineer Peggy McCreary who worked closely with Prince during this time when he would record at Sunset Sound Studios in California. Peggy told Andrea Swensson on the podcast Prince: The Story of 1999 that she was tiring of scrambling to figure out what he was working on or what the line in a chorus of a song was. One night he was leaving the studio and she called out “What’s the name of this song?” and with a little smile on his face he said “What’s your middle name?”. She replied with Colleen and he said “Write that down” and left the studio.
One of the funner songs included in this set is the rockabilly track “You’re All I Want”. McCreary said that Prince arrived to the studio clad in bluejeans, white T-shirt and black leather jacket. A song that shocked me to not be included on any Prince album is “If It’ll Make U Happy”. I’ll never understand why this was never included on an album let alone a single. It’s one of those songs that would have fit perfectly in any era of Prince’s career. This laid back reggae/ska-esque track is the highlight of the unreleased songs on 1999.
The original 1982 version of “Possessed” is included. “Possessed” is a song Prince resisted several times. He recorded a new version with The Revolution in 1983 and then again in 1984. The 1984 version was meant to be included in the soundtrack for Purple Rain but didn’t end up making the cut. There is an instrumental portion in the film used in a scene where Morris Day is attempting to seduce Apollonia. There are other songs that Prince returned to in this collection including “How Come U Don’t Call Me Anymore?”, “Feel U Up” and “Can’t Stop The Feeling I Got”. “Can’t Stop” is the second song in the collection to be revisited for Graffiti Bridge. It is the lead track on the soundtrack to the film and Prince appeared to also revisit “You’re All I Want” for some inspiration on “Can’t Stop” as the sped up clap along portion of the rockabilly song appears in the 1990 version.
The new wave sounding “Yah, You Know” is another favorite as is “No Call U”. The early 1980s seemed to be a time where Prince was inspired greatly by rockabilly music. “No Call U” joins 1999 vault gems “You’re All I Want,” “Turn It Up” and Controversy’s “Jack U Off” as evidence of the inspiration the genre had on him during this time.
Prince wrote about drugs throughout his career always using an anti-drug stance. An early example of this is “Purple Music” where in it he sings “don’t need reefer, don’t need cocaine Purple Music does the same to my brain”. Besides it’s music-as-a-drug message it’s also one of the first songs where he sings about the color purple.
1999 is obviously not Prince’s best album as Purple Rain and Sign O’ The Times hold that honor but 1999 sets the foundation for those albums and all of the other great worked that followed. The 1999 (Super Deluxe Edition) is hands down the best thing to come form the Vault and his estate so far. I really hope similar editions are to follow for Around the World In a Day, Sign O’ The Times, Parade and Gold Experience. One wish I really have is to finally have a completed Dream Factory album. This was supposed to be the follow up album to Parade but after Wendy and Lisa told Prince they wanted to leave the Revolution he scraped the project and dismantled the band.
Steven McCash is the Music Columnist for SoBros Network. He is the pioneer of New Music Friday, highlighting each week’s new releases in the world of music, in addition to the occasional live show review. Follow on Twitter: @MC_Cash75
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