Music Tuesday: “When Doves Cry” by Prince

I’m sure everyone by now has heard that the pop music star Prince Rogers Nelson, commonly known as simply, Prince, passed away a week and a half ago on April 21.  Actually it was the same day my beloved uncle Val passed away as well, but that’s another story.  I’m not going to do a full blown retrospective post on Prince.  I don’t have the time and frankly I don’t know the depth of his music well.  I have a greatest hits collection, and I do think highly of a number of his songs.  Even though he’s a flashy, over the top showman, he really was very talented, both as a virtuoso and a song composer. 

The Washington Post had a fine obituary:

Born Prince Rogers Nelson in Minneapolis on June 7, 1958, the trailblazing performer sold more than 100 million records over his career, fusing rock, pop, funk and R&B and demonstrating an audacious, idiosyncratic sense of style and a willingness to court controversy. A Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductee, he won seven Grammy Awards and an Academy Award for original song score for the 1984 film “Purple Rain.”

Prince married twice, first to his backup singer and dancer Mayte Garcia in 1996, then again to Manuela Testolini in 2001. He had a son with Garcia; the boy died a week after birth. Before, between and after his marriages, he was romantically linked to many celebrities and musical collaborators, including Madonna and Kim Basinger.

A highly prolific and restless artist who blended androgynous sexuality with impeccable pop craftsmanship, Prince released more than three dozen albums over his four-decade career. He scored more than 50 Top 40 hits around the world since 1979, including such songs as “When Doves Cry,” “1999,” “Little Red Corvette” and “Raspberry Beret.”

Drawn to music from a young age, in part as a way to escape a turbulent home life, he wrote his first song on his father's piano when he was just 7 years old.

I do want to highlight this one song because it’s been one of my all-time favorite songs from the day it was released.  Sometimes you get tired of hearing a song after a while, even though it might be a great song, but I never get tired of listening to “When Doves Cry.”  

First listen to the song.

If you read the Wikipedia entry for the song, it says that Spin magazine ranked “When Doves Cry” as the “sixth greatest single of all time.”  Wow, that’s some accolade.  You know what, I don’t know about sixth but it’s up there as the greatest pop-rock song of all time.  Why do I think that?  (1) The layered melody is just outstanding, (2) the instrumentation is excellent, and Prince played all the instruments himself, (3) the lyrics are not only poetic and fascinating but have a psychological depth you just don’t find in a pop song, and (4) the syncopated rhythm just consumes the listener.  And it all works together, the melody and rhythm and instrumentation work into the narrative conflict between the singer and his lover, layered with the psychological transference of his parent’s personalities.    

Here are the first two stanzas of the lyrics to this great song:

Dig if you will the picture

Of you and I engaged in a kiss

The sweat of your body covers me

Can you my darling

Can you picture this?

Dream if you can a courtyard

An ocean of violets in bloom

Animals strike curious poses

They feel the heat

The heat between me and you

How can you just leave me standing?

Alone in a world that's so cold? (So cold)

Maybe I'm just too demanding

Maybe I'm just like my father too bold

Maybe you're just like my mother

She's never satisfied (She's never satisfied)

Why do we scream at each other

This is what it sounds like

When doves cry

Touch if you will my stomach

Feel how it trembles inside

You've got the butterflies all tied up

Don't make me chase you

Even doves have pride

How can you just leave me standing?

Alone in a world so cold? (World so cold)

Maybe I'm just too demanding

Maybe I'm just like my father too bold

Maybe you're just like my mother

She's never satisfied (She's never satisfied)

Why do we scream at each other

This is what it sounds like

When doves cry

Read the rest of the lyrics at| MetroLyrics

Talented, bold, unafraid, it’s a shame Prince died so young.  He wrote and played jazz, pop, gospel, dance, blues, rock.  He wrote music for the great jazz trumpet player, Miles Davis.  He was comfortable and exquisite in all musical forms.  May he rest in peace.