Paris 17 June 1987

 This week's blog has taken much longer than usual to write. Not because I couldn’t find anything to say about this show, but rather that this show is just so good I listened to it several times before I could sit down and write a single word. I have listened to it four times in the last two days, each time playing air guitar along with it, and drumming on my desk as it played. The music is so lively and infectious, it’s been a struggle to get myself to sit still and listen, this is music that you feel as much as you hear and I have spent several good hours dancing around the room as it plays. The show itself is one of the most well-known and much-loved bootlegs in circulation, a magnificent soundboard recording from Paris during the Sign O The Times Tour. For many years I haven’t felt the need to listen to shows from this tour, after wearing out the VHS of the Sign O The Times movie when I was younger. Aftershows from this era I gave plenty of attention to without ever dipping deeper into the main shows themselves. This is generally hailed as one of his greatest tours, and listening now I can see why, everything about this show is fantastic, the music, the performance, costumes, and the songs themselves. There is not a single weak point in the whole show. And this bootleg is the best bootleg of the tour, ranking it as one of the best of the best.

17th June 1987, Palais Omnisports de Paris-Bercy, Paris

There is no better sound in the world than the throaty, guttural sound of Prince’s guitar opening to “Sign O The Times.” It completely changes the sound of the song from the record. Sure, the cold electronic beat is there, as is Prince’s headlining lyrics, but the guitar adds a new dynamic, giving a passionate response to those cold soundbites. It howls in anger, weeps with sadness, and gives a human reply to the chilling news Prince recites. Whatever I feel about those lyrics, Prince manages to capture with his guitar playing, and I spend most of the song playing air guitar before I add some air drumming to the mix as the band drums themselves in at the end of the song.

 

The band is all on-board and to the front, as we next hear “Play In The Sunshine.” The recording is beautiful, and it sounds as if the band is right here in the room with me. It’s a beautiful wall of sound, and my head spins listening to it all. Things are still coming thick and fast as Prince plays his guitar break, and listening to it thirty years on I am amazed at how tight this band is, and how well this recording has aged. There is some sax in the left speaker that is so crystal clear, that I could swear Eric Leeds is right in my ear.

We slow and I come back into the moment with “Little Red Corvette.” The band and vocals sound good, but it’s the piano sound that is unique this time, and that is what I cling to as it plays. It’s an early carrot for those that have come to hear the hits, but Prince pulls the curtain on it with a sharp “Shut up already, damn!”

“Housequake” has been heard in many forms over the years, they are all good but nothing comes close to the original arrangement such as we have here. The song is great, the band is on fire, and the recording does it all justice. I want to sit and listen, I just can’t – the song is too good, and it’s all I can do to resist the urge to get up and dance again. Eric Leeds has never sounded so good, and again the sound in the left speaker is fantastic- this time a guitar is coming in crystal clear.

Eric Leeds is all over “Girls and Boys.” After the foreplay of a couple of verses and chorus, he gets his big moment and as a funky guitar plays, Eric plays a delightful solo that has me smiling every time I think about it. One of my favorite Prince songs, and in this live setting and with Eric on top of his game it’s a thing of beauty.

 

After Eric, it’s Atlanta’s turn as his trumpet croons us into “Slow Love.” Prince may be the center of attention, but it’s the little things and the rest of the band that make this song what it is, be it Atlanta Bliss and his trumpet, the drums of Shelia that seem to accent every point, or the divine vocal of the girls in the band that provide fullness to Prince's vocal performance. It all comes together in a way that feels so natural and as if everything has its place and is as it should be. Prince’s vocals alone are worth the price of admission and feel as warm and inviting as a soft pillow.

“I Could Never Take The Place Of Your Man” is so familiar, and yet I do still get that thrill of excitement when we hear the longer intro as played on the Sign O The Times tour. That talk, a twinkling of the piano, the horns all building to that moment when Shelia drives us forward into the song, and the band is unleashed.  I am sure most people have like me seen this hundreds of times on the Sign O The Times movie, and it’s hard not to sing along with it as it plays. It’s story-telling in a song at its best, and the drama of the song unfolds with the music as well as the lyrics, culminating at that moment when words can no longer express and Prince resorts to some of his most inspired and uplifting guitar playing. He swoops, he soars, and he turns the solo into a celebration. Am I playing air guitar right now? Yes, I am. The music pulls back and Prince plays some mournful guitar that has me furrowing my brow trying to listen to it and not miss a single note. As the band comes back and drives us to the finish it feels like the song was barely a couple of minutes long, when in fact it was closer to ten.

 

I do so love the organ at the beginning of “Hot Thing.” And it just gets better from there, with firstly Levi and Prince doing their spoken interplay which sounds fun without being distracting. I must admit that having played the movie to death, it is great to hear a different variation of this chat. The mix on the song is also very good, the guitar is more forward, and I love the robotic funk of it. The song becomes fuller late in the piece when again the horn lines lift it beyond this cold, electronic sound and takes it to another level altogether.

The band comes into their own with “Now’s The Time.” At this stage, we can see this band is its own animal, and what they are capable of it. Every band member contributes something, and all of them hold down their corner well. I couldn’t say if one is better than the other, although I will say I enjoyed Levi immensely in the brief bass solo he gives us. We close out the song with several minutes of Shelia playing a solo. It gathers momentum, much as any drum solo should, and at the end, I give up my air-drumming along with it and cheer just as much as anyone else on the recording.

I should be tired of “Let’s Go Crazy,” the keyboard swell that signals the opening to it gives it a new feel, and the rest of the performance is equally uplifting and it never once feels stale. The guitar sound is neutered, with this band and this show it doesn’t matter at all, this is a different band with their own sound and they make “Let’s Go Crazy” fit with their unique personality. I could take or leave the outro with Prince and the crowd exchanging “let's go, go, go” but that’s a minor quibble that fades into memory as Prince’s last searing guitar notes are heard.

 

I have mixed emotions about “When Doves Cry.” I am glad to hear it, and I do like the arrangement. My only issue it is only a couple of minutes, and the song doesn’t have a chance to breathe and be itself. The lead line still gets my heart jump-started, and I do love the way Prince intones the lyrics, and then it's gone, just as I was beginning to feel it.

“Purple Rain” seems to be early in the setlist, and it highlights that this isn’t the full show, we are missing several songs, and the recording itself only just runs over an hour. Prince doesn’t play around with it, he heads straight for the solo after a verse and chorus. The solo is lively and energetic without ever offering up anything new. I still like it of course, and it’s the cue for me to engage in more air-guitar.

It’s always a surprise to hear “1999” after “Purple Rain,” just as I am coming down it raises me back up. Like everything at this show, it’s more horn-infused and much more colorful sounding. There is a lot more sound crammed into the song, and I can hear most of the band having some input. True to form it ends this part of the show on a high, and signals the first break before the encore.

And what an encore we get, with “The Cross” taking the concert and recording to yet another high. The comparisons between “The Cross” and Lou Reeds ‘Heroin’ are valid, but by the time “The Cross” reaches its zenith all comparisons are moot. I don’t know which is stronger, Prince’s vocals or his feverish guitar playing. He may be singing about god, but he plays guitar like a demon, and the final couple of minutes are electrifying. The way the guitar quiver and shakes and sounds in a frenzy against the more measured sound of the horns and the band, it doesn’t get any better than this.

 

With a simple call of “Encore”, we fly into “It’s Gonna Be A Beautiful Night.” This show just gets better and better, and the band chews up “It’s Gonna Be A Beautiful Night.” I listened to this with headphones, and then without, and the recording is sublime. There are some fantastic noises and sounds that I pick up that I had never noticed before. The wondrous thing about Prince, in his live shows and his recordings, is he gives you so much that even after all these years I am still hearing new things hidden away in the songs. Prince name-checks Jill Jones with “The Jill Jones crawl” which I find pretty cool, asides that it’s the music itself that I immerse myself in, it is funky, thick with sound, and has me dancing where I am, I cannot help myself. The song is in full bloom, as the show is finishing at an all-time high that even I couldn’t have predicted. There is even a chant of “I can’t get enough, of that funky stuff” and I couldn’t agree more. I am going to go out on a limb and say this is the best version of “It’s Gonna Be A Beautiful Night” that I have ever heard, and I’ve heard a lot.

What a way to finish the show, I am breathless as it finishes, and I find it takes me a couple of minutes to cool off after, I was right into it. This recording is much revered in the Prince community, and I can well see why. Although incomplete, it still delivers a knockout, the performance is unbelievable, the recording is sublime, and it is truly one of the great bootlegs and worthy of all the love and praise that it gets. I know I am preaching to the converted, but this is one that every Prince fan has to have, it’s magnificent.

Phew, I am going for a lie down