Thread by @CaseyRain

Welcome to Day 4 of our #PRINCE #PurpleRain9on9 series of megathreads! Hope U caught the first 3 days from @NightEthereal @arrthurr & @antski74!

4 my contribution, we're going to look at a song I consider flawless in every form.

COMPUTER BLUE!

(Artwork courtesy of Reverend!)

Computer Blue is where Early 80's Minneapolis grinding rock guitars, synths and LinnDrums meet the future cybernetic sexual dystopian landscape of Blade Runner for one of Prince's most powerful grooves.

Recorded on 8th Aug '83 at The Warehouse in St Louis Park, Computer Blue is notable in that Prince had to figure out the difficult task of repeatedly cutting down a groove that don't quit into an acceptable length for an album. Longer jams were the standard on 1999, but not here.

At over 14 minutes long, the full version has never officially been released. However, fans rejoiced in 2017 as the vast majority of it, known as the "Hallway Speech" version finally saw the light of the day on Purple Rain Deluxe. In this thread, we'll refer to that version.

The only parts from the full version that aren't in the "Hallway Speech" version are about 2 minutes of guitar feedback from the beginning and the end of the song.

Where many Prince songs formed from the guitar, or the piano, it's key that this began with the bass synths of Minneapolis's most famous Doctor. Doctor Fink! @drfink1980

As with this entire era, Duane Tudahl's seminal "Prince & The Purple Rain Era Studio Sessions" offers additional backstory. @Duane_Tudahl

Juxtaposing sex and technology was something Prince had flirted with before - for example, his reference to the fictional "orgasmatron" device from the 1973 film Sleeper in 1981's "Private Joy"

With "Computer Blue" - Prince moved this radically forward, exploring themes of love, lust, sex, and emotion in the complicated relationship between man and machine.

It's often trite to try and name direct influences to songs, but it's clear to me that the common tropes of artists such as Gary Numan and Kraftwerk had some influence here - Prince's knowledge of these artists set him apart from many pop contemporaries.

In fact, Prince is on record as saying "There are still people trying to work out what a genius Gary Numan is" - a quote Numan himself would put into his press releases. @numanofficial

The music itself matches the theme - the cold, robotic programmed synths and drums meeting the wild, distorted guitars and screams for a tryst between human and computer. The digital lust can be seen as a direct evolution of Kraftwerk's "Computer Love" @Kraftwerk

I'll take this moment to say RIP to Kraftwerk's Florian Schneider who we lost recently😢

We can actually draw a direct line from Kraftwerk's "Computer Love", to Numan's "Are Friends Electric?" to "Computer Blue".

Let's break it down.

On "Another lonely night", where they "don't know what to do", Kraftwerk decide to "call this number, for a data date"

But Numan had already moved past that stage. Not only had he called the number, and been on the data date, but in doing so he'd already began to question the relationship between man and machine, in light of technical difficulties.

In, "Are Friends Electric?", Numan asks:

"You know, I hate to ask.... But are friends electric?
Only, mine's broke down. And now, I've no-one to love"

Prince picks up the story directly where Numan left off.

"Where is my love life?
Where can it be?
There must be something wrong with the machinery"

Could this be the same broken down electric friend?

Luckily, it seems that Wendy and Lisa have some experience here, as they explain:

"Poor lonely computer, it's time someone programmed you. Love and lust...both have four letters, but they are entirely different words" @wendyandlisa

But here's the twist - Are they talking to the man? Or the machine? Perhaps it's both.

Let's loop back for a second to the song's infamous opening. Although deliberately ambiguous, the projected image of Wendy and Lisa taking a bath together (Is the water warm enough?) drove home a sexually progressive utopia in a time where homosexuality was more stigmatised.

It's arguable that this was an even more progressive (though less blatant) statement than the widely controversial opening line to Darling Nikki. If female masturbation was considered offensive, it's amusing to think that the lesbianism in Computer Blue went over folks' heads.

Moving back to the story - after the second verse in the "Hallway Speech" version, and a blistering solo - Prince notes that "The computer's on the verge of a breakdown" - the solo's repeated notes indicating a crash loop!

That's Part 1 of the thread. As Twitter only allows 25 tweets per thread at a time, please allow me a few minutes for Part 2!

Alright, we're back!

After pontificating on his house, his hallways and the various emotions represented by them - Lust, Fear, Hate and Pain - Prince and the computer merge in feeling, as he screams "On the verge of a breakdown!"

It's here that he poses the question at the crux of this song - But now he's speaking both rhetorically AND as the computer. Could it be that Computer Blue only knows Lust, Fear, Hate and Pain?"
The question:
"What is life without love?"

The answer, is simple, as the band scream together:

"It's HELL, Computer Blue!"

As most of you know, we recently lost Little Richard, and it's hard to overstate his influence on Prince. I'll take this moment to mention that Prince's lifting "ooooo!" adlib on the Hallway Speech version of the song might be his most direct vocal nod to Richard Penniman ever.

Back to the plot.

In his digital despair, Prince cries out for his father, John L Nelson, who's composition Prince repurposed first into the breakdown of this song, and then into it's own piece - "Father's Song".

"Father, Father, the Sun/Son is gone!
Where is the dawn?"

The Computer Blue breakdown is perhaps Prince's most direct acknowledgement of his father's influence ever. Earning John a writer credit, Father's Song as a separate piece would also see a release in 2017 on Purple Rain Deluxe. (Cover courtesy of Noir Funk on YouTube)

Prince once said that his father's music was "like nothing you've ever heard", and yet, if it is truly mostly based on John's composition, then Prince in Computer Blue found the common thread linking his own music with that of his father.

Prince's solo piano work might bear a more direct influence, but in Computer Blue's breakdown we FEEL the clash and merging of the Father, the Son, and the Holy (Digital) Spirit in a way that the more direct familial narrative of When Doves Cry overtly describes.

Both methods are necessary in the context of the protagonist, whether that be Prince OR The Kid, understanding himself.

So to summarise, in Computer Blue, we have the full, grinding, raw Minneapolis funk rock power of both Prince AND The Revolution as a collaborative effort, a blatant reference to Wendy and Lisa's sexuality as a reinforcement of progressive sexual ideals.....

Nods to contemporary futuristic boundary-pushing influences including Kraftwerk and Gary Numan, as well as forefathers of rock n roll like Little Richard, progressive ideas perhaps decades ahead of their time around the ever-blurring lines of man VS machine......

and a direct compositional influence from his own father set to one of Prince's most jaw-dropping, hard hitting compositions to date.

It's pretty key that it was this song - along with Darling Nikki - in the movie that illuminated the scene when Billy Sparks tells Prince that nobody digs his music but himself.

With all due respect to the rest of the album, the myriad of themes contained in this ONE song offer a more complex story with far more nuance than some of the other more straightforward songs. It's for that reason that this is the song I've returned to the most over the years...

Even at times when I've been burned out by overplay and the constant presence of the gigantic hit singles on the album.

One wonders if Prince himself found it hard to reconcile all these ideas with his later beliefs. Sadly, the song rarely made an appearance in setlists in the 21st century.

Ironically enough, it might be the most 21st century song that he ever wrote.

Thank you all for joining me on the exploration of "Computer Blue" - hopefully the water was warm enough for you. Thanks to @deejayumb and everyone involved in this incredible Purple Rain megathread project - there's still more to come!

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May U Live 2 See The Dawn
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