RIP Prince

Yesterday we lost one of the most talented musicians the world has ever seen. Since hearing the news that Prince has died I've recalled just how many of his records were truly great.

My first memory of Prince was collecting a sticker of him in my Smash Hits sticker album. In the early days of me listening to the top 40, I used to tape the records I liked. In the beginning my parents had to show me how to record the music onto the tape, but the first record I taped of my own accord was Batdance. My favourite Prince record from that era though was The Arms of Orion, a collaboration with Sheena Easton.

A couple of years later came the excellent Diamonds and Pearls, it was actually through looking up this record in the early days of YouTube when I learned about how much Prince didn't like his music being on the internet.

Also in the early 90s, I remember watching an episode of Challenge Aneka where she was gathering musicians and non musicians such as Timmy Mallet to record Tommys Tape. Prince was doing a gig at Earls Court at the time, and she attempted to get him to partake in the recordings. Unsurprisingly, she wasn't successful.

I also remember hearing Kiss for the first time. I heard the Tom Jones version first which I wasn't a fan of. Initially I thought the Prince version was an excellent cover before discovering the Prince did the original version. Speaking of covers though, he did a very good cover of Betcha By Golly Wow. It didn't sound that different to the original, but you could tell it was a Prince record.

He remained active in recording and performing right up until his death, but his last UK charts success was a re-release of 1999 in  1999. The last new hit he had was The Holy River in 1997.

Then there was the hits for other artists which he wrote, including the excellent Nothing Compares 2U, a number one for Sinead O Connor. I've posted Prince himself performing this song. A truly talented musician, RIP.

Guru Josh dies

This week brought the news that Guru Josh has committed suicide. He was best known for his 1990 hit Infinity, though he did have a follow up single, Whose Law (Is It Anyway?) and an album also called Infinity.

I remember watching Infinity on Top of the Pops in 1990 but soon forgot who it was and what the tune was called. In 1994 I bought a best of techno compilation which had the remix I've posted here on it. It was possibly my favourite tune on the compilation and remember thinking it was similar to the tune I saw on Top of the Pops 4 years earlier without realising it was the same tune. It was when I was looking in my Guinness Book of British Hit Singles some time later that I saw it was a top 10 hit in 1990 that made me realise.

In 1997 I read an article in Dream Magazine that he was planning a comeback but nothing really happened then. In 2008 there was a trend for remixing tunes from the rave era of the late 80s/early 90s and Infinity was one of those tunes to get that treatment. Personally I thought that remix was terrible but it ended up charting higher than the original. There was another remix in 2012 which I was not aware of which reached the top 10 in Austria.

However this 1994 remix is in my opinion the best of the lot. RIP Guru Josh.