As the world mourns Prince and remembers one of most influential entertainers of all time, excerpts from the book, Prince: Chaos, Disorder, and Revolution by Jason Draper are emerging as evidence of Prince’s on and off relationship with Hip-Hop.
While Prince did try his hand at rapping on several occasions, in the book Draper writes that Prince felt Hip-Hop was “distinctly unmusical.”
“As far as Prince was concerned, hip-hop was distinctly unmusical. His feelings are summed up by ‘Dead On It,’ on which he laments switching on the radio to hear a “silly rapper talking silly sh*t.” The largely instrumental ‘2 Nigs United 4 West Compton,” meanwhile was intended as a musical swipe at the likes of NWA, whose Straight Outta Compton was just around the corner, and whose glorification of gang violence and misogyny Prince detested.”
In addition to the gangsta rap songs and dissing NWA, Prince added a rapper named Tony M to his backing group and featured Tony M prominently on his self-released project Goldnigga.
This project marked Prince as one of the first artists to bundle and sell his music as MP3s through NPG Music Club, which is partially why Prince cannot be found on Spotify or Apple Music.
Despite several collaborations with Tony M, the songs “Sexy MF” and “My Name Is Prince” were not widely successful in comparison to his other recorded successes.
He would later go on to tell Spike Lee, “he did” gangsta rap recalling his “half-sung vocals on tracks such as the 1982 B-side ‘Irresistible Bitch,” which can be heard below.
– Allhiphop
