A commenter told me a few weeks ago that the 10th anniversary of Prince's untimely death had occurred on April 21st and so I said that I would try and get another Prince song up as soon as possible. Well, just a couple of days shy of the 42nd anniversary since its release on May 16th 1984, I give you "When Doves Cry".
Prince already has half a dozen songs up on KKP but this is just his third ROY article as a performer after "Batdance"; the rest of the articles are up here because he contributed to the songwriting whether it be for Kahoru Kohiruimaki（小比類巻かほる）or other fellow artists such as Chaka Khan. But although I provided "Batdance" as his first ROY on the blog, I think it's safe to say that "When Doves Cry" is the more significant one in terms of his discography and legacy within music (it's ranked No. 37 on the "Rolling Stone" 500 Greatest Songs of All Time list).
Personally, my memories of "When Doves Cry" is the video which had heavy heavy airplay on the various music shows. For a period of several months, I frankly thought that it would become a permanent entry on any Top 10 video list. I had a friend who lived in a university dormitory who often woke up to this song along with one other tune; apparently he'd dance to it as well which is one good way to wake up for classes, although I'm not sure how his downstairs neighbour felt.
Now that I've listened to it once more after a very long time, I realize that I'm having a tough time trying to categorize it. And apparently, Wikipedia has had a tough time of it, too, throwing a number of genres at it including avant-pop and neo-psychedelia which I never would have thought of. In the end, my Labels list has it as pop and R&B, but you readers may have different opinions. It is indeed a distinct song in the universe and many folks came to the same opinion as well as it topped the Billboard charts for months in America. It did the same in Canada, too.
Well, exactly 42 years ago to the day, what was up on the Top 10 of Oricon just about when "When Doves Cry" was released?
1. Checkers -- Kanashikute Jealousy （哀しくてジェラシー）
2. Akina Nakamori -- Southern Wind （サザンウインド）
3. Off-Course -- Kimi ga, Uso wo, Tsuita（君が、嘘を、ついた）
Wow, 10 years, still feels like yesterday. Really wish he was still here with us. "When Doves Cry" is a easy 10/10 song, same goes for the Purple Rain album too. It's still crazy to me that he contributed two songs to Kahoru Kohiruimaki and also distributed her Time The Motion album via his Paisley Park Records label in Japan. Good songs too.
ReplyDeleteYeah, can't quite believe it's been a decade since he left the world. "Purple Rain" was quite the phenomenon back in the day. So many popular songs came from that one.
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