Prince on Tavis Smiley (PBS)
Posted by Pierre Igot in: MusicFebruary 20th, 2004 • 1:06 am
This was a real treat. The first part of the show was a short instrumental piece by Prince on acoustic guitar. Then there was a 15-min interview about various topics: the Grammy performance with Beyoncé, the music industry, Prince’s audience, the evolution of his art, raciness in hip-hop today, etc. There were no ground-breaking revelations, but a new studio album is definitely coming out this year (although no details were provided).
Then the show featured a unique live performance of “Reflection” (a song released exclusively through the NPGMC web site in 2003) with Prince singing and playing acoustic guitar and… Wendy Melvoin (formerly of the Revolution) accompanying him, on acoustic guitar as well. (She didn’t sing.) It was quite moving to see the revived chemistry between the two. And the performance was top-notch.
Then as a special bonus they previewed the new video clip for the forthcoming single “Musicology”. It was very disappointing that they didn’t show the whole thing, and it’s hard to get a good idea of what the song is really like when experienced in full, but it definitely sounded very funky indeed — probably the funkiest single Prince has released in a long time (although “The Work, Part 1” was pretty effective too in the funk department).
I hope that this upcoming “mainstream” release by Prince enjoys the success that the artist so rightfully deserves. It’s hard to predict in today’s ultra-commercial environment, but if anyone can launch a revival of real music performed by real musicians for real music lovers, it’s got to be Prince.
Witness the scope of his artistry as it was displayed in less than half an hour in a show that was, well, mostly talk! Even though I am more than familiar with Prince’s immense body of work, I couldn’t help but get excited all over again!