• Funk,  Prince,  Soul

    this is not music

    One day Prince will compile and release all of the great 12″ extended remixes of his glory days. By request, here’s another: the extended “Alphabet St. (this is not music, this is a trip)”. Excuse the background vinyl noise.

    Prince: Alphabet St. (this is not music, this is a trip) – mp3 – original version found on Lovesexy

    P.S. A question for anyone out there who converts LP’s on to their PC’s: any recommendations for good software to efficiently remove the background snaps, crackles, and pops? I used Microsoft Plus Analog Recorder for a while, but it takes … a … long…time.

  • Rock

    Marah Live Video

    Thanks to Zack from the great city of Milwaukee, Wisconsin, we have video from Marah’s performance at Mad Planet in Milwaukee last week. Here they are singing “Barstool Boys” from their fantabulous 2000 release, ‘Kids in Philly’. Dave and Serge Bielanko are in vintage rock star form, and as a bonus, you get some quality Serge stage banter.
  • Funk,  Soul

    Sly as a Loon

    For some reason, I sat through the entire broadcast of the Grammies last week. Of course it was great to see the Boss perform “Devils & Dust” and sit in on the Wilson Pickett tribute (singing “In the Midnight Hour” with Sam Moore).

    Watching poor Paul McCartney sing “Yesterday” along with Linkin Park while Jay Z “uh-huh”ed and “yeah”ed in the background was one of the sadder moments for me. I don’t get it. Watching the immodest and overrated Kanye West lose awards did put a smile on my face though.

    But the jaw dropping moment had to be when Sly Stone shuffled out during a reunion / tribute to the Family Stone (along with the ubiquitous Joss Stone, John Legend, Fantasia, etc.). Hunched over, with a gold jacket and a giant peroxide Mohawk, he sang a few bars of “I Want to Take You Higher” and then was on his way. The man looked to be about 10 shades of crazy – priceless!!

    So naturally I dug through my LP’s and dug out a great song Sly did with Jesse Johnson (former guitarist for The Time), ironically named “Crazay”.

    Jesse Johnson Featuring Sly Stone: Crazay (mp3) – Found on ‘Shockadelica’, Jesse’s 1986 album.

  • Funk,  Prince,  Rock

    Prince Unleashes his Fury

    Okay, IckMusic has admittedly turned into a Prince blog the last several days. Juuust one more post and I’ll move on (maybe). There have been several requests for the mp3 to Prince’s new tune “Fury”. I can’t supply you with a link to buy the studio version yet because there apparently isn’t one available. If anyone comes across the song for sale, please let me know and I’ll get a link up here right away.

    For now, a couple things:

    Go pre-order 3121, which comes out on March 21st.

    And here is an mp3 from Saturday night:

    Prince: Fury (mp3) from 02/04 performance on Saturday Night Live.

  • Funk,  Prince,  Soul

    Irresistible Prince

    To round off my Prince posts before tonight’s SNL appearance, I want to drop another few your way, and also steer you toward the brand new video from his March 21 release ‘3121’. It’s called “Black Sweat”, and it’s vintage funky down n dirty Prince. I ripped a lil mp3 from the audio so you can sample it before you go to Amazon and preorder it. I assume this is one of the two he’ll be performing tonight. Hopefully with Steve Martin as host, there will be a Three Amigos skit and Prince will play the part of the Singing Bush (or Jefe).

    Prince: Black Sweat (mp3) – new **
    Prince: Irresistible Bitch (mp3) – B side to “Let’s Pretend We’re Married”, found on The Hits : B-Sides
    Prince: Let’s Work – Extended 12″ (mp3) – original version found on Controversy

    Video: Black Sweat (need to use Internet Explorer for the Yahoo player)

  • Prince,  Soul

    Prince’s Old Friends

    Here’s an early outtake from around 1985 (supposedly during the ‘Parade’ sessions). “Old Friends 4 Sale” is rumored to be about Jimmy Jam & Terry Lewis, two members of The Time that went on to much success as producers (Janet Jackson’s ‘Control’), and Big Chick Huntsberry, his former bodyguard. It’s a slow, somber, bluesy tune, one of my many favorites.

    Prince: Old Friends 4 Sale (#2) (mp3)

  • Funk,  Prince,  Soul

    Prince on SNL this Weekend

    On paper, this weekend’s Saturday Night Live is looking mighty fine: host Steve Martin with musical guest Prince. I’m going on 22 years as Prince fan. His output over the last many years by and large hasn’t done a whole lot for me, but I still buy everything he puts out, I’ll catch him when he’s on the tube, and I most definitely catch him live whenever possible.

    Most likely because it’s tied to my adolescence and all the memories associated with it, I’m partial to Prince’s 1980’s output: (not in chronological order) ‘Sign o the Times’, ‘Purple Rain’, ‘Around the World in a Day’, ‘1999’, ‘Parade’, ‘Controversy’, ‘Dirty Mind’, the ‘Black Album’ and ‘Lovesexy’ (okay, 1989’s ‘Batman’ soundtrack, but that didn’t do it for me).

    His 12″ maxi-single releases during this era were always something to look forward to, because they would be extended remixes of the album versions. One of the cool ones was Lovesexy’s “I Wish U Heaven”, which was stretched out to 10 minutes. The soft funky pop of the album version gives way to a couple of funky sojourns into Prince’s creative genius. I miss that era of being a Prince fan.

    Prince: I Wish U Heaven (Parts 1,2, and 3) 12″ Maxi-Single Extended Version
    – original version found on ‘Lovesexy’, a great album which spawned one of the more unfortunate album covers in musical history.