The Music Room

Glad to see you Moon, hope things are well

astroth wrote:Well glad your doing well given what seems like a lot of health issues.  Keep fighting

Totally missed Moon in my hasted post. Its great to see you on again. Glad to hear you are fighting the good fight.

Great post Moon I'm a fan of The Time/ Original 7, as well as Prince from that era of music. I am liking the updated look a lot on the forum as well. Looks sharp.

Prince’s first side project to reach the public was The Time. The group’s self-titled debut album lists Morris Day (lead vocals), Jesse Johnson (guitar), Monte Moir and Jimmy Jam Harris (keyboard), Terry Lewis (bass), and Jellybean Johnson (drums) as the band members. The production credit is shared by Morris Day and Jamie Starr, who had been introduced as an engineer on Dirty Mind. Neither record nor sleeve contain any songwriting credits. Still, the music bore all the hallmarks of Prince’s synth-laden “Minneapolis sound” and it didn’t take long before stories began circulating in the press that Prince was behind the project: writing the tunes, playing most instruments, and producing the album, only drafting Day to sing over his own vocals.
Prince’s involvement in The Time album was strongly denied by the band and Day, who claimed credit for creating the group and
shaping its slick look and “cool” attitude. He was only willing to admit that Prince had offered guidance on the album. Jamie Starr, Day explained, was really an engineer who lived and worked in Minneapolis, while Steve Fargnoli did his best to support the story by pointing out in interviews
that Jamie was hard to get hold of because he was a “reclusive maniac.” The truth was, of course, that Jamie Starr was Prince in disguise and The Time was very much Prince’s musical creation. The pseudonym enabled him to distance himself from the project so it would stand or fall on its own, allowing the group to establish its own identity.
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Despite the fact that The Time had become a strong live working unit, the band’s second album, What Time Is It?, was in all essentials conceived and recorded by Prince. The Starr Company is listed as the producer of the album. Prince isn’t credited on the album but he wrote all the six tracks, barring “Wild And Loose,” which was a collaboration with Dez Dickerson (who wrote the lyrics). By this time, The Time members wanted to contribute more to the music and they were becoming increasingly frustrated by Prince’s firm control over the group. Jimmy Jam, Terry Lewis, and Monte Moir had started writing songs of their own and were beginning to contemplate independent careers. Following the Controversy tour, Jam and Lewis had gone to Los Angeles to collaborate on their own material, which they felt didn’t quite fit the image or sound of The Time, as they considered the band to be more of a vehicle for Morris Day. Prince was opposed to their outside production work, which he felt detracted from their commitment to The Time. Sessions for What Time Is It? began in Prince’s home studio and at Sunset Sound, Los Angeles, in January 1982, after the first leg of the Controversy tour (“Gigolos Get Lonely Too,” “The Walk,” “Wild And Loose”). The remaining tracks were taped in the home studio in May and June 1982 (“777-9311,” “Onedayi’mgonnabesomebody,” “I Don’t Wanna Leave You”).
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Prince’s next project was an album with The Time, Corporate World. He worked on the album throughout the summer, finishing it in early September 1989. The track listing was: “Murph Drag” / “Nine Lives” / “Donald Trump (Black Version)”/ “Love Machine” / “Data Bank” / “Shake!” / “Corporate World” / “The Latest Fashion” / “Release It” / “My Summertime Thang.” Several of the songs existed prior to the sessions.

“Data Bank” was loosely based on a jam that was taped with The Revolution in 1986. Four of the tracks were updated vault items: “Murph Drag” was recorded in late 1988 or early 1989, “My Summertime Thang” was a leftover from Ice Cream Castle sessions in 1983, “The Latest Fashion” was tracked in April 1987 and was originally intended for Dale Bozzio, and “Nine Lives” was fi rst recorded for use by Cat in early 1989.

Corporate World was set for release on November 14th 1989, with “Nine Lives” planned as the first single, but it was halted when Warner Bros. wanted to involve the original Time members. After a meeting with Prince, it was decided that Jesse Johnson, Monte Moir, Terry Lewis, and Jimmy Jam would participate and take an active part by writing and recording new tracks for a revised album, which became Pandemonium. Thus, another batch of songs was recorded later in 1989 and in 1990, this time without Prince’s involvement. The Time members decided to keep “Data Bank,” “My Summertime Thang,” and “Donald Trump (Black Version)” from Corporate World. In addition, they chose two vault items, “Chocolate” from 1983 and “Jerk Out,” which had been considered for both What Time Is It? and Mazarati. Four of the seven discarded Corporate World tracks survived to Graffiti Bridge: “The Latest Fashion,” “Release It,” “Love Machine,” and “Shake!” The remaining Corporate World tracks are still unreleased: “Murph Drag,” “Corporate World,” and “Nine Lives.”

I did notice that in the first Time cd, and you can definetly tell that Prince heavily influenced their music. I did find it odd that Prince cast his talents on the cd under a diff name though. But other then that not sure. I think I have all of the Times cds in my collection at this point.

One needs to remember that in these cases where somebody else writes stuff for another group they will use a different name, as some only use the name we know them by as a stage name but could use their real name for song writing credits. I also know that very few singers/bands actually own their own catalog of music. Prime example of the effects of owning rights to music can have, look into the Paul McCartney/Micheal Jackson relationship before and then after Jackson acquired most if not all the Beetles catalog.