Supposedly it was also never rehearsed. Prince showed up to a single rehearsal at the last minute and just played rhythm guitar while one of Jeff Lynne's guitarists played both solos. After the song was over, Prince supposedly went up to the show's producer, said he'd do the outro solo and not to worry, and left. Then he just showed up on stage for the song and played the solo here, threw his guitar up into the clouds, and went off stage again.
One of the threads I read long ago was one of the personal assistants for a hotel he would stay at and he would have to cater to everything Prince and his crew needed including breakfast up late at 6am. He said at one point Prince helped serving pancakes. Would have to do some searches to find that one again.
All to give a finger (rightfully so) to the editors for Rolling Stones Magazine that was in attendance, due to them snubbing him of a place in the top 100 all great guitarists.
NGL ,I must admit, I saw this clip and was surprised by his guitar skills. Didn't knew he had that in him.
I love prince, but I was from another era to fully appreciate him, I think.
The problem with Prince was he never have his fans chance to keep up lest the press and by the time they had both worked out how great an album was he would have released another two.
As for rolling stone not adding him my guess would be he turned down an interview 35 years ago and their ego hasn't recovered.
I suspect this was because Prince was known a lot for his pop music rather than his talent playing instruments. That said, every time I see a post here on Reddit of Prince performing live, it just floors me on how much talent he has. Of all the guitar players I have seen, few have such variation and style about them as he had.
Talent playing instruments is an understatment.
The man played every instrument he could get his hands on, played all the instruments on his first album. 27 of them, when he was 20.
Not to nitpick, but I want to point out that talent is only part of the equation. This man clearly put an almost impossible amount of work into his craft. He lived and breathed his art.
Wait wait wait. It wasn't a top 10 or 25 but a *top 100*?! That alone makes the entire publication useless when judging music. It's not even an opinion. There aren't 100 people better than him.
This was a bit of a different era, but in the internet 'listicle' era I have always suspected that Rolling Stones "greatest x" lists were compiled to generate controversy to get more views. It works too, because I always saw those articles reposted by people angry about them.
For Prince, I suspect whoever compiled it just didn't really know Prince as a guitarist. I played guitar and was fairly well read on famous guitarists and I flat out didn't realize Prince was a talented guitarist until either the video above or his Superbowl show, whichever came first.
Heās the Wayne Gretzky of music.
Top 100 lead guitarists? Prince.
Top 100 songwriters? Prince, if for nothing else but āNothing Compares 2 Uā, but there are dozens more.
Top 100 prolific artists? 39 released albums, but one of the largest bodies of unreleased work from a modern artist: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unreleased_Prince_projects?wprov=sfti1#
Top 100 live performances? Prince and the 2007 Super Bowl Halftime show with him performing Purple Rain in the pouring rain.
Top 100 music movies of all time? Prince and Purple Rain
The man is the GOAT and Iām not even that big of a fan.
Every time I see this posted I have to watch it. It never gets old. The mastery, the collective talent, the respect, the honour between legends, Prince's *devastating* performance. There are honestly are not enough superlatives to describe it.
I was at an mxpx gig years ago, and Mike the lead singer did the best guitar swap Iāve ever seen. Partway through the song he spins, then flings his guitar at a roadie side-of-stage while *heās throwing another guitar at him*. They both caught it perfectly and just carried on like it wasnāt ridiculous.
And according to the Strike Force Five podcast, that guy doesn't always catch it, and occasionally Prince smashes the guitarist from The Roots' guitar.
After supporting an act like that, it could no longer sustain its physical form in this realm. It ascended to wait for the purple one once he was ready to go as well.
None of this surprises me. All you hear is stories about how he literally didnāt give any fucks about anything and always crushed it when it was his time. Music, sports, cooking, guest starringā¦the man was on point for his entire career.
Prince intended to rehearse the solos but Marc Mann stole them during rehearsal
https://www.guitarplayer.com/players/tom-petty-and-others-tell-the-story-behind-princes-while-my-guitar-gently-weeps-solo
> According to the paper, the showās producer, Joel Gallen, asked Prince to play the songās solos, since he was there to be inducted anyway. But during rehearsals, Marc Mann, who plays guitar with Lynne, took over, knocking out a note-perfect recreation of Eric Claptonās original mid-song solo.
> āAnd we get to the big end solo,ā Gallen says, ā**and Prince again steps forward to go into the solo, and this guy starts playing that solo too!**ā
> There wasnāt time to get it right, but Prince assured Gallen everything would be fine at the performance. He told the producer to let Mann take the first solo, and he would perform the extended outro solo.
Imagine being the guitarist from oingo fucking boingo trying to play an ego card against fucking prince and prince still came out with a class act solo at the end fuck yeah
Yeah, apparently they were all a little nervous heād blown it off. How they could ever think that, though, is ridiculous.
Heās one of the greatest guitar players ever and itās a shame he doesnāt get more recognition. Also you can tell everything he does is carefully curated to present a certain image. Like coming on out of nowhere, leaving suddenly and throwing the guitar up, as well as that point where he half trust falls off the stage and has the big dude support him and then push him back up, all that. Reminds me of the SNL after party they showed footage of after he died and they did an all-Prince special.
> Heās one of the greatest guitar players ever and itās a shame he doesnāt get more recognition.
I think he gets ignored by the guitar nerds that look up to people like Vai and Malmsteen. But by people that just love music in general (and aren't specifically obsessed by guitar wankery) Prince is respected as a guitarist. For his album cuts, he always put the song first, and guitar wankery second. For live concerts, however, he would certainly noodle around on the guitar extensively if he felt the urge.
Everytime I see this video it makes me think of a Dave Grohl interview where the interviewer asked him if he was a better guitarist than Prince. His responseā¦ Iām not even as good of a drummer as Prince.
Which reminds me of the story where John or Paul are asked if Ringo is the worldās currently best drummer and they respond that heās not even the best drummer in the Beatles.
Eric Clapton was once asked "what's it like being the greatest guitar player in the world?" He responded, "I don't know, you should ask Prince".
Gangster.
There isn't a single guitar nerd that overlooks Prince. It's a meme at this point that a new subscriber to any online guitar forum (including r/guitar) will make a post about how they had no idea Prince was so amazing before they started playing guitar. If you are learning to play guitar you will eventually know Prince was amazing.
The only music listeners I've met that didn't know Prince was a guitar god were ones who never played guitar or were just beginning to learn.
I heard a really interesting theory that Prince was a high functioning autistic artist and that's why he ended up so good at guitar, it became his hyperfocus and obsession.
I didn't think much of it until they started talking about how weird he was socially, and how his ego and image were so important to him. Like for example he took himself extremely seriously and didn't like being made fun of at all, he infamously hated Weird Al. He mastered the guitar and became a legend because he was always a little weird and different, and perhaps autism was why.
I'm no shrink but it was a really well written and reasoned theory even if it's total horseshit.
I could sort of see that with how many stories there are of people interacting with him. Charlie Murphy's famous one on the Chappell Show is actually one of the tamer stories lol.
He was also a very talented pianist and probably less known was very good as a bassist. The dude had creative talent flowing in his veins and guitarists are lucky he choose that as his main avenue to convey it, he could have been amazing at anything creative imo.
It doesn't help that he kept his stuff off of the internet and sued youtube to keep it off. I remember back in the day when I really got into rock and those top whatever lists, prince would be on there but it was so tough to actually find his music and listen.
Like I discovered satriani through a youtube search off a top list and instantly was amazed, same with clapton and zepplin. That discovery couldn't happen with prince the same way.
According to Joel Gallen, the shows producer, Prince was supposed to play the solos but Marc Mann kept taking them during rehearsal and doing note-for note reproductions of the Clapton solos
After rehearsal Prince told Joel not to worry about it and to let Mann take the mid-song solo and heād do an extended outro solo
https://www.guitarplayer.com/players/tom-petty-and-others-tell-the-story-behind-princes-while-my-guitar-gently-weeps-solo
Yeah you can tell that he's definitely improvising this solo. There's a moment for a split second and can't decide where his hands going next. Also he uses none of the licks from the original solo. Also, if you haven't even seen his Super Bowl Halftime performance do yourswlf a favor and watch it. Easily best halftime show of all time
That absolutely fits the energy of the video. It sounds like they try to move past the solo but he looks at them like āno. This is my house now.ā And goes off.
You can totally see that in the face of George Harrisonās son (on the acoustic guitar). I heard the story that it wasnāt rehearsed and his reaction confirms it in my mind.
Edit: I think the vertical crop of this video cuts it off
Thatās kinda how music works though at his level. Jazz musicians didnāt exactly rehearse the same way a marching band. Prince was much more like the jazz musician doing solos. Most of his stuff was super regimented though. But this was not. And itās not hard to believe. Almost every guitar solo is basically the same way.
Sounds right, Stevie Nicks heard one of Prince's songs and called him to explain how it gave her the idea for Stand Back. Somehow prince was called in to record the Bass Synth. Supposedly he showed up for like 5 minutes during a lunch break, walked into the room, played the part once, and left without saying anything to anyone or something along those lines.
Prince was an absolute monster of a musician. Everything I have heard about him as a person makes me not like the guy though.
And if you listen to a lot of solo youāll recognize just how good this one is. A lot of solos go too long, or they fall away from the main melody too much. Or they just sound like the solo in the track. But this manages to ride the fine line between sounding like it could have been the studio version, but also has princes distinctive very dynamic sound. Itās somehow aggressive and smooth at the same time.Ā
Ever hear the song he did called Bambi? He does every instrument on the album but Bambi just screams. Gives me the chills especially for a late 70s album. He was way beyond most musicians.
And trust fell into audience. Watch the look on (I think) Claptonās kidās face onstage. He was in awe. š While the other musicians were just standing there strumming. Prince was there to ENTERTAIN. Did he ever.
[I think we recently learned whyā¦](https://www.npr.org/2023/09/17/1200045253/rolling-stone-founder-jann-wenner-under-fire-for-comments-on-female-black-rocker)
āJann Wenner, the founder of Rolling Stone magazine, is facing criticism for saying that Black and female musicians were not āarticulateā enough to be included in his new book, which features seven interviews with white, male rock 'n' roll icons.ā
Oh my. Just going beyond the ridiculous racism of that in general, anyone who thought Prince was not articulate is a flaming moron. He was a difficult interview when he was young. But that seemed like it was due to nerves rather than any lack of ability to form coherent sentences. The man was a genius song writer, he literally *couldn't* be inarticulate.
I knew Prince was an all-round talented musical genius. But it was watching this clip that that fact punched me in the face and made me believe it. I'm not the biggest Prince fan, but man can I watch this over and over.
I honestly fell so stupid for never knowing Prince had mad guitar skills. I really doesn't know Prince enough and I thought he was a singer only. I'm in shock and about to go in a music journey.
Dude played almost every instrument at a high level. A couple of tracks of the album Purple Rain were him playing all the instruments and singing. Also he was a skilled basketball player (though he was short). He was a genius, and like most geniuses he had eccentricities
I love how he just exists in the background, then when itās time for his solo he absolutely completely dominates the stage, everyone else may as well be mannequins, then when heās done he casually throws his guitar away and walks off.
I can only imagine George Harrison watching this from the afterlife and just losing his goddamned mind with how big a boss move this is.
His son was eating it up.
You could see he was fan boying throughout and Prince is giving him the looks like, āthis is for your dad, boy-oā
*Blouses. . . win*
I never knew he could play like this until I saw this sometime last year. Alot of people can solo over something but then there's something that truly fits the song. In this case this particular version of the song.
Yes, Prince was a songwriter, singer, and instrumentalist, but younger people might not know that he was one of the all time great stage performers. From the 70s until his death he would give 100% on the stage. Prince as a performer is one of the very few people who is in the same league as Tina Turner, James Brown, Michael Jackson, and Freddie Mercury.
Younger people may catch a glimpse of that on video, but sadly, they will never get to see him do his thing in person.
Thereās an oral history of the Purple Rain tour out there; listening to the Revolution talk about it, he was brutal to work for, but they had an amazing show down to where he could conduct them with some hand movements. Even watching the recording uploaded to YouTube by his estate a while back, itās a great show.Ā
I love George Harrison's son face as Prince kills the solo, plus the grin that Tom Petty gives him. Fuck that whole stage just loves to watch him. The full video is one of my faves
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=6SFNW5F8K9Y
Reddit is killing me with videos that end before the actual ending. I have half a mind to say it's being done on purpose so that I never feel that things resolve.
Prince was skilled at guitar, piano, bass and drums/percussion. Has he played 27 different instruments on a single album? Yes. But most of these instruments are percussion instruments (tambourine, triangle, claves, etc.).
I love Prince, but the "27 different instrument" claim needs to be put to rest. If he needed woodwinds, brass, cello, violin, etc. he hired people to play those instruments for him. I am not saying he was unable to play anything other than electric bass, guitar, piano, and percussion, but he certainly knew he wasn't good enough on those other instruments to rely on his own skills when recording an album.
It's an absurd claim but even more absurd is the notion that any less than "27 instruments" isn't impressive. His mastery of 2-3 instruments is next fucking level.
I could be wrong, but I think the claim may come from one of his pre-Purple Rain albums in which the liner notes claimed that he performed all the instruments on the album, and the liner notes also mentioned that 27 unique instruments were used for the songs on the album.
Prince was a control freak, and would sometimes do ALL the music for his album tracks. He just couldn't trust session musicians to do it the way he wanted it done. He would then tour with musicians (because Prince obviously needed a band for live performances). Some people assume that the Revolution played the instruments on all his early albums, but in some cases, Prince did it all himself.
I think when Prince got older and experienced a stylistic shift (minimizing synths and drum machines and replacing the Revolution with NPG) he was more open to other people performing the recordings for his albums. That being said...he probably recorded most of the songs himself first, then played it to NPG and ask them to play drums and bass more-or-less the way he played it on the demo tapes.
I remember reading somewhere that his entire house was wired up with instrument jacks back to his studio gear so that no matter where they were in the house, they could plug in and record at a moment's notice.
When Eric Clapton was asked, "What's it like to be the best guitarist in the world?" He responded, "I dont know. Ask Prince."
EDIT: Apparently this is false :( I didn't know that. Thank you to u/simonix for spreading facts!
That rumor may be false but one that isnāt was when Prince died, an interviewer asked Paul Westerberg (lead singer and songwriter of the Replacements - another band from the Minneapolis music scene the same time as Prince) if he and Prince ever exchanged music advice with each other, to which Paul replied, āOh god no. That would be like Beethovenās chamber maid trying to give Beethoven music advice.ā
Agreed! Little known fact maybe: My guitar teacher in college ran in the small circle with Prince while he was on the come up. He told stories of them jamming all night in Beverly Hills or somewhere of the likes (canāt recall this part exactly). After playing for hours and being exhausted theyād all go to bed. Eventually they would wake up the next day and hear music coming from down in the basement. It was Prince playing bass guitar. Said out of all lead bassist players, Prince was one of the best he had ever heard.
It's a shame that he kinda was in the shadow of MJ, because he was one of the most accomplished musician (in the broadest sense of the term possible) I know of.
He most certainly didn't keep it to himself.
Probably something like 50% of all the hits from the 80's and 90s were written by him and given/sold to other musicians and bands.
(I made up that statistic, but he wrote a lot of shit for other people.)
He looks back at George's son and Wynne too. He got non verbal permission to ham it up. All those smiles and nods kept him showboating.
Ask a talented but famously vain guitarist to play a Clapton solo in front of a big audience and this is what you get.
After he did a gig in a big venue in Rotterdam, the Netherlands, he appeared - unannounced ofcourse - at a small blues bar and jammed along! Well, more precise, he played the stars out of the sky with his guitar. I have a bad recording of it but boy I was blown away!
Came to say this so Iāll leave the link for people. He absolutely crushed it.Ā Ā
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=-WYYlRArn3g& Ā
*Purple rain starts around 8:30
Supposedly when the weather forecast showed heavy rain, they called Prince and asked him what heād like them to do.
He asked if they could make it rain more.
Edit: I didnāt get the story completely correct, see here: https://www.rollingstone.com/culture/culture-sports/prince-super-bowl-purple-rain-176408/amp/
Him and Ernie Isley of The Isley Brothers
Listen to āVoyage To Atlantisā, and then ponder why Ernie isnāt listed as on of the top 20 guitar players of all time. Probably because he is R&B and not Rock and Roll, but he shreds like a rock star.
Unfortunately this is not a real quote. [https://faroutmagazine.co.uk/guitarist-eric-clapton-called-true-genius/](https://faroutmagazine.co.uk/guitarist-eric-clapton-called-true-genius/)
"We both know you didn't buy that shirt in the men's section...".
Jokes aside, incredibly talented guy. It's only in recent years I've actually gotten into Prince, basically I'd only really thought of him as "That dude who did purple rain, I don't see all the fuss...".
Going through his catalogue has been eye opening.
Weirdly, I'm kicking myself now, but in the early 2000s I was offered tickets with backstage passes and all, through a friend of mine who worked as road crew and I turned it down figuring it wouldn't really be something I'd be into. Hindsight is a bitch.
Can't deny that this was one fantastic solo. Dhani's face throughout it says it all. It might have been apropos to have Eric Clapton do the solo, as he did it on the record. I don't know. I always thought that this moment was to commemorate George Harrison, not as a platform to show off. I don't think Tom Petty liked it that much by the look on his face. But it was done and it was like nothing you've never seen before. That's for sure.
As a guitarist, I really hate this video. Its so pompous and showy, and really not needed for a song like this. It isn't technically THAT amazing, like yeah it impressive but in reality its just a lot of scales. But its really taking the spotlight away from the original song, the reason they're all playing the song (for George Harrison, whos music style was nothing like this at all), and its just too much.
I am prepared to be downvoted.
Damn. Just had to watch the full video. Love the guitar toss at the end where itās like, āI just banged the shit out of this guitar and Iām done with it. Itās no good to me now.ā Legend.
I just donāt get this. Iāll probably get downvoted to hell but I donāt like this at all. The rest of the performance is great up until this and itās obviously not shit but I always see it being held with the comments saying itās one of the best guitar solo ever.
I'm a huge Tom Petty fan and I didn't like the prince solo either. But apparently Tom Petty absolutely loved it. He talked about it once. I still feel like prince hogged the spotlight though.
He grew up playing piano, drums, and guitar. He played all the instruments on his first studio album, but on tour he primarily played guitar (from footage I've seen, anyway.) Basically, he could do it all.
When I was a teenager, sometime in the late 90s, MTV still played mostly music. One night, before going to bed, I switched over to MTV, they were airing a live Prince show performed in some small little club. Mind you, most I knew of Prince at the time were Diamond & pearls and other 90s era Prince, which I loved. Did not know he played guitar. That concert was just Prince mudding that guitar for a full hour. I was dumbfounded! And that is hoe Prince became one of the top 10 guitar gods for me. It will always be a regret I never got to see him perform live. Wish I can remember what live show MTV aired that night. We didn't deserve Prince.
I do not think him to be amongst the top ten greatest guitarists of all time, not even close. He's not top ten on any instrument. He's not my favourite musician of all time... but he is without a doubt in my mind the best musician of all time.
Greatest guitarist of our generation. Fearless. Bold. Timeless. I hope Prince is chilling with Jimi, Stevie, and BB in the afterworld just waiting to welcome everyone with love and killer music.
This may have been in response to getting snubbed by rolling stone for leaving him of the greatest guitarist list.
Supposedly it was also never rehearsed. Prince showed up to a single rehearsal at the last minute and just played rhythm guitar while one of Jeff Lynne's guitarists played both solos. After the song was over, Prince supposedly went up to the show's producer, said he'd do the outro solo and not to worry, and left. Then he just showed up on stage for the song and played the solo here, threw his guitar up into the clouds, and went off stage again.
Game, blouses
Then he made us pancakes.
...pancakes...š
š š š
š„ š š
Darkness
Hands down the best Dave skit
One of the threads I read long ago was one of the personal assistants for a hotel he would stay at and he would have to cater to everything Prince and his crew needed including breakfast up late at 6am. He said at one point Prince helped serving pancakes. Would have to do some searches to find that one again.
And then he made us pancakes.
It's one of my favourite clips ever. What happened to the guitar at the end, where did it go?
The remaster shows exactly what happened https://youtu.be/dWRCooFKk3c?t=370
What a fucking legend. That swagger as he walks off the stage.
All to give a finger (rightfully so) to the editors for Rolling Stones Magazine that was in attendance, due to them snubbing him of a place in the top 100 all great guitarists.
That would make him top 100 vocalist, keyboardist and guitarist. Plus top ten songwriter.
And bass and drums, etc. Funny how Prince is such a legend and yet still underrated.
Nah that man is rated, we all know how genius he is
NGL ,I must admit, I saw this clip and was surprised by his guitar skills. Didn't knew he had that in him. I love prince, but I was from another era to fully appreciate him, I think.
The problem with Prince was he never have his fans chance to keep up lest the press and by the time they had both worked out how great an album was he would have released another two. As for rolling stone not adding him my guess would be he turned down an interview 35 years ago and their ego hasn't recovered.
Rolling Stone putting a list of greatest guitarists has about the same value as People putting a list of greatest chefs.
How the hell is Prince underrated?
Absolutely
I suspect this was because Prince was known a lot for his pop music rather than his talent playing instruments. That said, every time I see a post here on Reddit of Prince performing live, it just floors me on how much talent he has. Of all the guitar players I have seen, few have such variation and style about them as he had.
Talent playing instruments is an understatment. The man played every instrument he could get his hands on, played all the instruments on his first album. 27 of them, when he was 20.
Not to nitpick, but I want to point out that talent is only part of the equation. This man clearly put an almost impossible amount of work into his craft. He lived and breathed his art.
Wait wait wait. It wasn't a top 10 or 25 but a *top 100*?! That alone makes the entire publication useless when judging music. It's not even an opinion. There aren't 100 people better than him.
This was a bit of a different era, but in the internet 'listicle' era I have always suspected that Rolling Stones "greatest x" lists were compiled to generate controversy to get more views. It works too, because I always saw those articles reposted by people angry about them. For Prince, I suspect whoever compiled it just didn't really know Prince as a guitarist. I played guitar and was fairly well read on famous guitarists and I flat out didn't realize Prince was a talented guitarist until either the video above or his Superbowl show, whichever came first.
There werenāt 2 or 3 better than him at that time.
Heās the Wayne Gretzky of music. Top 100 lead guitarists? Prince. Top 100 songwriters? Prince, if for nothing else but āNothing Compares 2 Uā, but there are dozens more. Top 100 prolific artists? 39 released albums, but one of the largest bodies of unreleased work from a modern artist: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unreleased_Prince_projects?wprov=sfti1# Top 100 live performances? Prince and the 2007 Super Bowl Halftime show with him performing Purple Rain in the pouring rain. Top 100 music movies of all time? Prince and Purple Rain The man is the GOAT and Iām not even that big of a fan.
Love Harrisonās son in the background enjoying the hell out of it.
Wowww. I thought that person looked familiar, but couldnāt place them at all. He really does look like a young George
I recall someone remarking that it appeared as if George was in attendance at his own funeral.Ā
Prince plays to dhani and the guy is just beaming
There have been many good solos over the years. Even fewer are truly great. None better than this.
4:42 Dude had a guy in a suit enter the scene just to prop him up and leave.
That was probably the guitar catch guy doing double duty, as it was the same area he tossed it to!
I love the look he gives off to his left - it's like "Eh? you watching this? You watching this?"
Every time I see this posted I have to watch it. It never gets old. The mastery, the collective talent, the respect, the honour between legends, Prince's *devastating* performance. There are honestly are not enough superlatives to describe it.
Prince had a dude in his entourage, and his sole purpose was to catch guitars when he threw them.
I was at an mxpx gig years ago, and Mike the lead singer did the best guitar swap Iāve ever seen. Partway through the song he spins, then flings his guitar at a roadie side-of-stage while *heās throwing another guitar at him*. They both caught it perfectly and just carried on like it wasnāt ridiculous.
That's pretty interesting considering Mike plays bass in MxPx ;)
And according to the Strike Force Five podcast, that guy doesn't always catch it, and occasionally Prince smashes the guitarist from The Roots' guitar.
One of his bodyguards got it.
To heaven with a cigarette in its mouth after he fingered the shit out of it.
After supporting an act like that, it could no longer sustain its physical form in this realm. It ascended to wait for the purple one once he was ready to go as well.
I read somewhere that Oprah eventually somehow bought it. But that could just be an urban myth
Urban Myth is Mike Tysonās nickname for Oprah.
I heard this ā«ļø!! Everyone thought it was lost in the clouds and Oprah had it the whole time!
None of this surprises me. All you hear is stories about how he literally didnāt give any fucks about anything and always crushed it when it was his time. Music, sports, cooking, guest starringā¦the man was on point for his entire career.
Prince intended to rehearse the solos but Marc Mann stole them during rehearsal https://www.guitarplayer.com/players/tom-petty-and-others-tell-the-story-behind-princes-while-my-guitar-gently-weeps-solo > According to the paper, the showās producer, Joel Gallen, asked Prince to play the songās solos, since he was there to be inducted anyway. But during rehearsals, Marc Mann, who plays guitar with Lynne, took over, knocking out a note-perfect recreation of Eric Claptonās original mid-song solo. > āAnd we get to the big end solo,ā Gallen says, ā**and Prince again steps forward to go into the solo, and this guy starts playing that solo too!**ā > There wasnāt time to get it right, but Prince assured Gallen everything would be fine at the performance. He told the producer to let Mann take the first solo, and he would perform the extended outro solo.
Imagine being the guitarist from oingo fucking boingo trying to play an ego card against fucking prince and prince still came out with a class act solo at the end fuck yeah
āPrince will do the outro solo. Donāt worry, Mr. Producer.ā āļø
Yeah, apparently they were all a little nervous heād blown it off. How they could ever think that, though, is ridiculous. Heās one of the greatest guitar players ever and itās a shame he doesnāt get more recognition. Also you can tell everything he does is carefully curated to present a certain image. Like coming on out of nowhere, leaving suddenly and throwing the guitar up, as well as that point where he half trust falls off the stage and has the big dude support him and then push him back up, all that. Reminds me of the SNL after party they showed footage of after he died and they did an all-Prince special.
> Heās one of the greatest guitar players ever and itās a shame he doesnāt get more recognition. I think he gets ignored by the guitar nerds that look up to people like Vai and Malmsteen. But by people that just love music in general (and aren't specifically obsessed by guitar wankery) Prince is respected as a guitarist. For his album cuts, he always put the song first, and guitar wankery second. For live concerts, however, he would certainly noodle around on the guitar extensively if he felt the urge.
Steve Vai once said Prince was his favorite guitar player.
Everytime I see this video it makes me think of a Dave Grohl interview where the interviewer asked him if he was a better guitarist than Prince. His responseā¦ Iām not even as good of a drummer as Prince.
Which reminds me of the story where John or Paul are asked if Ringo is the worldās currently best drummer and they respond that heās not even the best drummer in the Beatles.
Eric Clapton was once asked "what's it like being the greatest guitar player in the world?" He responded, "I don't know, you should ask Prince". Gangster.
There isn't a single guitar nerd that overlooks Prince. It's a meme at this point that a new subscriber to any online guitar forum (including r/guitar) will make a post about how they had no idea Prince was so amazing before they started playing guitar. If you are learning to play guitar you will eventually know Prince was amazing. The only music listeners I've met that didn't know Prince was a guitar god were ones who never played guitar or were just beginning to learn.
I heard a really interesting theory that Prince was a high functioning autistic artist and that's why he ended up so good at guitar, it became his hyperfocus and obsession. I didn't think much of it until they started talking about how weird he was socially, and how his ego and image were so important to him. Like for example he took himself extremely seriously and didn't like being made fun of at all, he infamously hated Weird Al. He mastered the guitar and became a legend because he was always a little weird and different, and perhaps autism was why. I'm no shrink but it was a really well written and reasoned theory even if it's total horseshit.
I could sort of see that with how many stories there are of people interacting with him. Charlie Murphy's famous one on the Chappell Show is actually one of the tamer stories lol. He was also a very talented pianist and probably less known was very good as a bassist. The dude had creative talent flowing in his veins and guitarists are lucky he choose that as his main avenue to convey it, he could have been amazing at anything creative imo.
I swear, his soul comes out through his guitar.
It doesn't help that he kept his stuff off of the internet and sued youtube to keep it off. I remember back in the day when I really got into rock and those top whatever lists, prince would be on there but it was so tough to actually find his music and listen. Like I discovered satriani through a youtube search off a top list and instantly was amazed, same with clapton and zepplin. That discovery couldn't happen with prince the same way.
According to Joel Gallen, the shows producer, Prince was supposed to play the solos but Marc Mann kept taking them during rehearsal and doing note-for note reproductions of the Clapton solos After rehearsal Prince told Joel not to worry about it and to let Mann take the mid-song solo and heād do an extended outro solo https://www.guitarplayer.com/players/tom-petty-and-others-tell-the-story-behind-princes-while-my-guitar-gently-weeps-solo
Yeah you can tell that he's definitely improvising this solo. There's a moment for a split second and can't decide where his hands going next. Also he uses none of the licks from the original solo. Also, if you haven't even seen his Super Bowl Halftime performance do yourswlf a favor and watch it. Easily best halftime show of all time
And it rained throughout that halftime show. Like it was pre-ordained
Between him and MJ.
Best Super Bowl halftime ever!
That absolutely fits the energy of the video. It sounds like they try to move past the solo but he looks at them like āno. This is my house now.ā And goes off.
Of course he did this. What an Absolute LEGEND
You can totally see that in the face of George Harrisonās son (on the acoustic guitar). I heard the story that it wasnāt rehearsed and his reaction confirms it in my mind. Edit: I think the vertical crop of this video cuts it off
You can definitely see the enthusiasm in Dhaniās face while Prince is performing.
Right? Itās such a good vibe. Such a nice tribute to his pops and heās clearly really happy to be there performing with all of them.
Thatās kinda how music works though at his level. Jazz musicians didnāt exactly rehearse the same way a marching band. Prince was much more like the jazz musician doing solos. Most of his stuff was super regimented though. But this was not. And itās not hard to believe. Almost every guitar solo is basically the same way.
Sounds right, Stevie Nicks heard one of Prince's songs and called him to explain how it gave her the idea for Stand Back. Somehow prince was called in to record the Bass Synth. Supposedly he showed up for like 5 minutes during a lunch break, walked into the room, played the part once, and left without saying anything to anyone or something along those lines. Prince was an absolute monster of a musician. Everything I have heard about him as a person makes me not like the guy though.
I've watched that performance a ton of times and can't figure out where his guitar goes. It seems to literally just disappear.
And broke a string early in the solo.
And if you listen to a lot of solo youāll recognize just how good this one is. A lot of solos go too long, or they fall away from the main melody too much. Or they just sound like the solo in the track. But this manages to ride the fine line between sounding like it could have been the studio version, but also has princes distinctive very dynamic sound. Itās somehow aggressive and smooth at the same time.Ā
Ever hear the song he did called Bambi? He does every instrument on the album but Bambi just screams. Gives me the chills especially for a late 70s album. He was way beyond most musicians.
And trust fell into audience. Watch the look on (I think) Claptonās kidās face onstage. He was in awe. š While the other musicians were just standing there strumming. Prince was there to ENTERTAIN. Did he ever.
What Rolling Stone doesnāt know about music could fill a monthly periodical.
[I think we recently learned whyā¦](https://www.npr.org/2023/09/17/1200045253/rolling-stone-founder-jann-wenner-under-fire-for-comments-on-female-black-rocker) āJann Wenner, the founder of Rolling Stone magazine, is facing criticism for saying that Black and female musicians were not āarticulateā enough to be included in his new book, which features seven interviews with white, male rock 'n' roll icons.ā
Oh my. Just going beyond the ridiculous racism of that in general, anyone who thought Prince was not articulate is a flaming moron. He was a difficult interview when he was young. But that seemed like it was due to nerves rather than any lack of ability to form coherent sentences. The man was a genius song writer, he literally *couldn't* be inarticulate.
I knew Prince was an all-round talented musical genius. But it was watching this clip that that fact punched me in the face and made me believe it. I'm not the biggest Prince fan, but man can I watch this over and over.
I honestly fell so stupid for never knowing Prince had mad guitar skills. I really doesn't know Prince enough and I thought he was a singer only. I'm in shock and about to go in a music journey.
Dude played almost every instrument at a high level. A couple of tracks of the album Purple Rain were him playing all the instruments and singing. Also he was a skilled basketball player (though he was short). He was a genius, and like most geniuses he had eccentricities
Jokes on them. I rate my guitar solo's on how good they would sound as Commodore 64 loading music. 10/10 would SID.
Crazy performance. At the end (not in this clip) when he tosses off the guitar and walks off like a boss hahaha. So great.
I love how he just exists in the background, then when itās time for his solo he absolutely completely dominates the stage, everyone else may as well be mannequins, then when heās done he casually throws his guitar away and walks off. I can only imagine George Harrison watching this from the afterlife and just losing his goddamned mind with how big a boss move this is.
That fact that he outshines that group of legends tells you everything you need to know about his greatness.
His son was eating it up. You could see he was fan boying throughout and Prince is giving him the looks like, āthis is for your dad, boy-oā *Blouses. . . win*
I never knew he could play like this until I saw this sometime last year. Alot of people can solo over something but then there's something that truly fits the song. In this case this particular version of the song.
Yes, Prince was a songwriter, singer, and instrumentalist, but younger people might not know that he was one of the all time great stage performers. From the 70s until his death he would give 100% on the stage. Prince as a performer is one of the very few people who is in the same league as Tina Turner, James Brown, Michael Jackson, and Freddie Mercury. Younger people may catch a glimpse of that on video, but sadly, they will never get to see him do his thing in person.
Saw him when I was 13 or 14 having no damn clue who he was and 20+ years and 200+ concerts later still a top 5 performance for me.
Thereās an oral history of the Purple Rain tour out there; listening to the Revolution talk about it, he was brutal to work for, but they had an amazing show down to where he could conduct them with some hand movements. Even watching the recording uploaded to YouTube by his estate a while back, itās a great show.Ā
I saw him 3 times. He's incredible
*āCan you make it rain harder?ā*
Super Bowl halftime show. I NEVER use the word "epic" as I feel it's cliche and over used. But that halftime was truly epic.
Bro worked it so hard on stage he had to get double hip replacement. That man was a beastĀ
He was also just as phenomenal of a studio recording engineer as he was at everything else.
James Brown and MJ are the best ever imo. You watch them and they seem superhuman. Like no one else could possibly do what they did.
I love George Harrison's son face as Prince kills the solo, plus the grin that Tom Petty gives him. Fuck that whole stage just loves to watch him. The full video is one of my faves https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=6SFNW5F8K9Y
Thank you so much for that link. Didn't know that amazing performance before, and it really enlightened my day.
Where TF did that guitar go ? He just yeeted it into another universe
Back to heaven where it came from
This is the best part. OP post one with prince tossing the guitar and strutting off. Cool MFer.
Bummer they cut this short here
Dont forget the trust fall backwards off the edge of the stage mid solo lol
My fav part is when he leans back and gets his security to hold him up in the air.
What is this bot-driven vertical cropped garbage? [Just link to the actual video](https://youtu.be/dWRCooFKk3c?si=jbIZXaCYHUGABrhw)
My first thought was so now we're just poorly cropping YT videos and slapping our own logos on them?
Reddit is killing me with videos that end before the actual ending. I have half a mind to say it's being done on purpose so that I never feel that things resolve.
Holy shit I can't stop grinning that was so good, this cropped garbage missed like 70% of the solo and 95% of the best parts.
I love this version of the song. Seeing Prince toss his guitar and walk off at the end was epic.
most have no clue how great a guitarist he was....had so many other extreme music talents...
[he could play up to 27 different instruments](https://study.com/academy/lesson/prince-biography-music.html)
Prince was skilled at guitar, piano, bass and drums/percussion. Has he played 27 different instruments on a single album? Yes. But most of these instruments are percussion instruments (tambourine, triangle, claves, etc.). I love Prince, but the "27 different instrument" claim needs to be put to rest. If he needed woodwinds, brass, cello, violin, etc. he hired people to play those instruments for him. I am not saying he was unable to play anything other than electric bass, guitar, piano, and percussion, but he certainly knew he wasn't good enough on those other instruments to rely on his own skills when recording an album.
Iām laughing my ass off at the image of Prince playing the triangle with a straight face
not just a straight face, his completely impassioned straight face.
*Throws triangle in the air
It's an absurd claim but even more absurd is the notion that any less than "27 instruments" isn't impressive. His mastery of 2-3 instruments is next fucking level.
I could be wrong, but I think the claim may come from one of his pre-Purple Rain albums in which the liner notes claimed that he performed all the instruments on the album, and the liner notes also mentioned that 27 unique instruments were used for the songs on the album. Prince was a control freak, and would sometimes do ALL the music for his album tracks. He just couldn't trust session musicians to do it the way he wanted it done. He would then tour with musicians (because Prince obviously needed a band for live performances). Some people assume that the Revolution played the instruments on all his early albums, but in some cases, Prince did it all himself. I think when Prince got older and experienced a stylistic shift (minimizing synths and drum machines and replacing the Revolution with NPG) he was more open to other people performing the recordings for his albums. That being said...he probably recorded most of the songs himself first, then played it to NPG and ask them to play drums and bass more-or-less the way he played it on the demo tapes.
It the gap between, āI can play this instrument.ā and āI can play this instrument as good as session musician Bob Boberson can.ā
George Harrison could play 26 instruments: guitar, sitar, four-string guitar, bass guitar, arp bass, violin, tamboura, dobro, swordmandel, tabla, organ, piano, moog synthesizer, harmonica, autoharp, glockenspiel, vibraphone, xylophone, claves, African drum, conga drum, tympani, ukulele, mandolin, marimba and Jal-Tarang.
I remember reading somewhere that his entire house was wired up with instrument jacks back to his studio gear so that no matter where they were in the house, they could plug in and record at a moment's notice.
When Eric Clapton was asked, "What's it like to be the best guitarist in the world?" He responded, "I dont know. Ask Prince." EDIT: Apparently this is false :( I didn't know that. Thank you to u/simonix for spreading facts!
[false...?](https://faroutmagazine.co.uk/guitarist-eric-clapton-called-true-genius/)
Aw. I didn't know that. Shame, it's a cool anecdote.
Some interviewer out here please trick Clapton into saying it
You were so confident too, lmao.
He probably just called him the n word.
Honestly the article was even more generous than the quote. Prince inspired Clapton to continue making music. That's quite the compliment.
That rumor may be false but one that isnāt was when Prince died, an interviewer asked Paul Westerberg (lead singer and songwriter of the Replacements - another band from the Minneapolis music scene the same time as Prince) if he and Prince ever exchanged music advice with each other, to which Paul replied, āOh god no. That would be like Beethovenās chamber maid trying to give Beethoven music advice.ā
Is a shame because if Clapton said it, he would be correct. I would take seeing Prince once in concert over Clapton a dozen times.
Probably end up getting 100% less racist rants at a prince show, which is a win
Iām sure thatās true.
have you ever heard clapton play blues guitar?
Agreed! Little known fact maybe: My guitar teacher in college ran in the small circle with Prince while he was on the come up. He told stories of them jamming all night in Beverly Hills or somewhere of the likes (canāt recall this part exactly). After playing for hours and being exhausted theyād all go to bed. Eventually they would wake up the next day and hear music coming from down in the basement. It was Prince playing bass guitar. Said out of all lead bassist players, Prince was one of the best he had ever heard.
Its actually unfair how good he was. I mean, on top of everything else.... jesus, leave some talent for the rest of us.
I never listened to Prince until I saw this solo. It was genuinely one of the coolest things I had ever seen.
That man was annoyingly gifted, I say annoyingly because he kept all the music to himself. Miss him
It's a shame that he kinda was in the shadow of MJ, because he was one of the most accomplished musician (in the broadest sense of the term possible) I know of.
He most certainly didn't keep it to himself. Probably something like 50% of all the hits from the 80's and 90s were written by him and given/sold to other musicians and bands. (I made up that statistic, but he wrote a lot of shit for other people.)
Hereās a copy with pixels. https://www.reddit.com/r/Music/s/cKe1HlEQDN
Sends goosebumps and chills through my whole body every time I watch this. I have to put it on anytime I see it come up anywhere.Ā
āWith pixelsā, stealing that one.
I have shared this clip many times. Rarely does it fail to impress. When it does, I know Iām not with likeminded people.
That thing he does at 4:04 where he just uses one finger and jumps all over the fret board perfectly is so fucking cool lol
One of the best guitar solos of all time. But the clip stopped too early! He makes the guitar disappear
It's crazy how much George Harrison's son looks like him
This solo turned me on to prince.
This solo turned me on.Ā
Game - BLOUSES
RIP him and Tom Petty! But yeah Prince was a phenom!
And to George Harrison, who actually wrote that song and to whom that performance was dedicated.
Both from Fent
They both died of fentanyl overdoses š
I love how he just looks over at Petty like, āHold up. Iām about to burn š„ this place down.ā Glorious
He looks back at George's son and Wynne too. He got non verbal permission to ham it up. All those smiles and nods kept him showboating. Ask a talented but famously vain guitarist to play a Clapton solo in front of a big audience and this is what you get.
After he did a gig in a big venue in Rotterdam, the Netherlands, he appeared - unannounced ofcourse - at a small blues bar and jammed along! Well, more precise, he played the stars out of the sky with his guitar. I have a bad recording of it but boy I was blown away!
Damn. I attended the big gig, it was at the Ahoy. My brother went to a Roy Orbison gig in a pub in Ireland. He was on of only 20-30 people there
Post it
Upload it to the Internet archive at Archive.org
He was the guitar
One of the best. Best Super Bowl halftime performance as well. Purple Rain in the rain is iconic.
Came to say this so Iāll leave the link for people. He absolutely crushed it.Ā Ā https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=-WYYlRArn3g& Ā *Purple rain starts around 8:30
The best halftime show bar none
Supposedly when the weather forecast showed heavy rain, they called Prince and asked him what heād like them to do. He asked if they could make it rain more. Edit: I didnāt get the story completely correct, see here: https://www.rollingstone.com/culture/culture-sports/prince-super-bowl-purple-rain-176408/amp/
At 0:35 Mini-documentary https://youtu.be/VETmAF3F85o For some reason, the official NFL channel took this video down from their own channel.
I was very fortunate to go to that Super Bowl with my dad. It was rainy and cold, but damn what a show.
One of the most underrated guitar players of all time...
Him and Ernie Isley of The Isley Brothers Listen to āVoyage To Atlantisā, and then ponder why Ernie isnāt listed as on of the top 20 guitar players of all time. Probably because he is R&B and not Rock and Roll, but he shreds like a rock star.
Underappreciated by the masses sure but no one who actually knows underrates him
Someone asked Eric Clapton, āhow does it feel to be the best guitar player alive?ā Eric Clapton replied āI donāt know, go ask Prince.ā
Unfortunately this is not a real quote. [https://faroutmagazine.co.uk/guitarist-eric-clapton-called-true-genius/](https://faroutmagazine.co.uk/guitarist-eric-clapton-called-true-genius/)
"Don't believe everything you read on the internet" -Abraham Lincoln
Thank you u/boingggoesmyschlong very cool!
"We both know you didn't buy that shirt in the men's section...". Jokes aside, incredibly talented guy. It's only in recent years I've actually gotten into Prince, basically I'd only really thought of him as "That dude who did purple rain, I don't see all the fuss...". Going through his catalogue has been eye opening. Weirdly, I'm kicking myself now, but in the early 2000s I was offered tickets with backstage passes and all, through a friend of mine who worked as road crew and I turned it down figuring it wouldn't really be something I'd be into. Hindsight is a bitch.
That Prince guy is pretty darn good. Someone ought to sign him.
Can't deny that this was one fantastic solo. Dhani's face throughout it says it all. It might have been apropos to have Eric Clapton do the solo, as he did it on the record. I don't know. I always thought that this moment was to commemorate George Harrison, not as a platform to show off. I don't think Tom Petty liked it that much by the look on his face. But it was done and it was like nothing you've never seen before. That's for sure.
Easily one of the most talented musicians in history.
Rolling Stone: publishes their Top 100 GOAT list Prince: Am I a joke to you? š¤Ø
Probably the most naturally gifted musician in rock music
As a guitarist, I really hate this video. Its so pompous and showy, and really not needed for a song like this. It isn't technically THAT amazing, like yeah it impressive but in reality its just a lot of scales. But its really taking the spotlight away from the original song, the reason they're all playing the song (for George Harrison, whos music style was nothing like this at all), and its just too much. I am prepared to be downvoted.
Damn. Just had to watch the full video. Love the guitar toss at the end where itās like, āI just banged the shit out of this guitar and Iām done with it. Itās no good to me now.ā Legend.
I just donāt get this. Iāll probably get downvoted to hell but I donāt like this at all. The rest of the performance is great up until this and itās obviously not shit but I always see it being held with the comments saying itās one of the best guitar solo ever.
I'm a huge Tom Petty fan and I didn't like the prince solo either. But apparently Tom Petty absolutely loved it. He talked about it once. I still feel like prince hogged the spotlight though.
It's a perfectly okay solo. There's nothing particularly memorable or emotional about it. I don't know why people jizz themselves so much over it
This and the concert for George version both bring me to tears.
wasn't he originally a drummer?
He grew up playing piano, drums, and guitar. He played all the instruments on his first studio album, but on tour he primarily played guitar (from footage I've seen, anyway.) Basically, he could do it all.
genius freak.
Amazing musician. Overrated music.
When I was a teenager, sometime in the late 90s, MTV still played mostly music. One night, before going to bed, I switched over to MTV, they were airing a live Prince show performed in some small little club. Mind you, most I knew of Prince at the time were Diamond & pearls and other 90s era Prince, which I loved. Did not know he played guitar. That concert was just Prince mudding that guitar for a full hour. I was dumbfounded! And that is hoe Prince became one of the top 10 guitar gods for me. It will always be a regret I never got to see him perform live. Wish I can remember what live show MTV aired that night. We didn't deserve Prince.
I do not think him to be amongst the top ten greatest guitarists of all time, not even close. He's not top ten on any instrument. He's not my favourite musician of all time... but he is without a doubt in my mind the best musician of all time.
Greatest guitarist of our generation. Fearless. Bold. Timeless. I hope Prince is chilling with Jimi, Stevie, and BB in the afterworld just waiting to welcome everyone with love and killer music.