{"id":973809,"date":"2019-12-02T11:09:12","date_gmt":"2019-12-02T18:09:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rollingstone.com\/?p=918020"},"modified":"2019-12-02T11:09:12","modified_gmt":"2019-12-02T18:09:12","slug":"princes-previously-unreleased-purple-music-is-1999-era-perfection","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kfmu\/music-news\/princes-previously-unreleased-purple-music-is-1999-era-perfection\/","title":{"rendered":"Prince\u2019s Previously Unreleased \u2018Purple Music\u2019 is \u20181999\u2019-Era Perfection"},"content":{"rendered":"
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You have to wade deep into the generous, overwhelming, embarrassment-of-riches expanded reissue of <\/span>1999<\/a> <\/span><\/i>before you stumble across \u201cPurple Music,\u201d finally available for public consumption after circulating in bootleg form for a solid portion of its 37 years of existence. <\/span><\/p>\n

At nearly 11 minutes long, \u201cPurple Music\u201d is one of the most claustrophobic, repetitive songs Prince<\/a> ever made, which also means it\u2019s one of the funkiest songs in his prodigiously funky catalog. The star programs a churning, never-ending stream of percussion, squashing together whooshing electronic splats and ticks and clatters. Then he burrows his guitar and bass into the tiny, surely uninhabitable crevices between these beats, and somehow creates life \u2014 itchy, urgent, compulsively danceable riffs. <\/span><\/p>\n

Prince had taken on this type of challenge before: See the Time\u2019s \u201c777-9311,\u201d<\/a> where the programmed hi-hats coat the entire track. But there is more room to maneuver in the \u201c777-9311\u201d beat, more space between the claps, longer passages where the pitter-patter of the beat falls away to let Prince carve and pirouette with guitar and voice (though Morris Day sang Prince\u2019s lyrics on the final version of the track). <\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cPurple Music\u201d is far more unrelenting, with a galloping beat that never lets up. At first, Prince plays restrained bass riffs \u2014 the type of stolid three-note runs that serve as the engine for \u201cErotic City,\u201d another one of his funkiest workouts. But around the 26-second mark, Prince signals he has different intentions with \u201cPurple City\u201d: He squeezes a rash, even foolhardy number of notes into a quick downward squiggle on the bass. Soon he takes a similar approach on the guitar, which starts whining and biting like a swarm of mosquitos, gaining detail and intensity after a few cautious forays. <\/span><\/p>\n

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Popular on Rolling Stone <\/h3>\n<\/p><\/div>\n

As \u201cPurple Music\u201d progresses, the melodic interjections get even crazier. Around 2:40, a spindly, skronky guitar line slides sideways into the track and ends with a dissonant flourish, like a drunk falling slowly off a couch. Around 3:20, the bass gets frisky again, playing buoyant melodic parts to match the main vocal theme. After the 6:20 mark, Prince briefly deploys a haunted-house synth much like the one that surfaced a few years later in <\/span>Purple Rain<\/span><\/i>\u2018s \u201cComputer Blue.\u201d<\/a> <\/span><\/p>\n

Prince makes room for silliness as well as unchecked virtuosity here. There\u2019s a goofy digression in the background \u2014 \u201cIt\u2019s time for your morning bath, sir. What would you like to bathe in this morning?\u201d \u2014 and random commands: \u201cDrive, you idiot!\u201d These moments of levity provide temporary relief from all the ankle-breaking intensity, if that\u2019s what you require.<\/span><\/p>\n

While trying to decipher Prince\u2019s decision-making process seems foolish, at least one selfish listener finds it nearly impossible to understand why he wouldn\u2019t have released \u201cPurple Music\u201d in the Eighties. Even if he didn\u2019t want to include it on <\/span>1999<\/span><\/i>, it seems like an obvious candidate for a B-side. That was the fate of another fierce track from this period, \u201cIrresistible Bitch,\u201d which came out as part of the \u201cLet\u2019s Pretend We\u2019re Married\u201d single. \u201cErotic City,\u201d which was cut a couple years later, remains one of the only Prince songs to rival the headlong, intoxicating qualities of \u201cPurple Music;\u201d the singer put it out as the B-side to \u201cLet\u2019s Go Crazy.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Sadly \u201cPurple Music\u201d did not receive the same treatment. But now that it is finally officially here, listeners should make up for lost time.<\/span><\/p>\n

via:: Rolling Stone<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

You have to wade deep into the generous, overwhelming, embarrassment-of-riches expanded reissue of 1999 before you stumble across \u201cPurple Music,\u201d finally available for public consumption after circulating in bootleg form for a solid portion of its 37 years of existence.  At nearly 11 minutes long, \u201cPurple Music\u201d is one of the most claustrophobic, repetitive songs […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[76],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-973809","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-music-news"},"acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-06-14 06:18:52","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"distributor_meta":false,"distributor_terms":false,"distributor_media":false,"distributor_original_site_name":"KFMU Solar Powered Radio","distributor_original_site_url":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kfmu","push-errors":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kfmu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/973809","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kfmu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kfmu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kfmu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kfmu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=973809"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kfmu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/973809\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kfmu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=973809"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kfmu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=973809"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kfmu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=973809"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}