1989: Have You Ever Danced With the Devil in the Pale Moonlight?
Many people reading this probably weren’t there, or were too young to really remember what the early months of 1989 were like. I’m barely old enough, to tell the truth. I don’t even remember where or when I first heard a new Batman movie was coming, but soon, everyone at my elementary school knew. It was all we talked about, and as winter gave way to spring we all had Batman on the brain. I got my first copy of “The Dark Knight Returns” because my local K-Mart would sell collected editions of anything with a bat on the cover and my mother didn’t know any better.
It wasn’t for another twenty ears or so that I would realize that this awareness, this desire for a thing that did not yet exist was the result of one of the earliest and most successful viral marketing campaigns ever. In fact, I had been a bit brainwashed. Having said that, they didn’t get any movie tickets off my parents. “Batman” was PG-13, which was absolutely off-limits for fourth graders as far as my mom was concerned. I was smart enough to keep Frank Miller’s R-Rated version of Gotham from my mother’s eyes, which set a precedent that would carry through to this very day. What she doesn’t know can’t annoy me. No, my apparently innocent eyes had to wait almost a full year, until the next spring, when my exasperated 5th Grade teacher showed the pan and scan VHS tape to us to shut us up for a day. It blew my tiny mind. I’ve never been the same.
Yes, this is still a blog about Prince. I’m just trying to convey the extent to which, in 1989, Tim Burton’s first Batman film completely saturated pop culture. It was inescapable. There were even two music albums: a score provided by Danny Elfman and a “Soundtrack” album by Prince.
I put the word “soundtrack” in quotes because the Prince album does not exactly function as a soundtrack album in the most traditional sense. Usually, especially in the 1980’s, a soundtrack would be a collection of songs featured in the film. Often these would consist of new songs performed by a collection of well-known artists. “Top Gun” would be the classic example of this. Sometimes classic songs would get mixed in, giving you something like “Dirty Dancing”.
Prince’s “Batman” doesn’t neatly fit in either of those categories. All these songs are by a single artist, they are all new, and only two are prominently featured in the film. It doesn’t even sound like the movie, it sounds like Prince saw the movie, got excited like the rest of us and in a burst of enthusiasm, produced an album. More or less, this is pretty much what happened.
Hubba, Hubba, Hubba, Money, Money, Money
By the end of 1988, Prince’s finances were not good. “Lovesexy” had not sold as well as he had hoped, and while the tour had sold out arenas across Europe, it had not exactly made much money. The production values were absolutely insane. The whole thing was just monstrously expensive: it took place in the round, the set was a series of independently rotating turntables, multiple costume changes, an aesthetic that has been called “Liberace on acid,” and to top it all off either a working 1967 Ford Thunderbird or a full scale replica thereof. Either way, when you’re going into twelve countries with the thing, the expense is much the same.
Plus, Prince’s lifestyle was not cheap. Paisley Park was a $10 million recording facility that was always kept fully staffed, and when Prince was in Minneapolis, it was kept ready to go all day, every day. When Prince was staying in L.A., the same thing was done for chunks of Sunset Sound. On tour, local studios would often be reserved in case Prince wanted to record either before or after shows. The fact that he recorded constantly meant that this was an incredibly expensive lifestyle as opposed to an incredibly wasteful one, but nevertheless, he was quickly approaching the point where he could no longer afford to keep on as he had been.
In order to get things in order, Prince hired the director of “Purple Rain” Albert Magnoli to direct the flow of funds and restore equilibrium – to become Prince’s de facto manager. It was one of Prince’s better business decisions. He never really found himself in a similar position again.
The other thing that Prince liked to do was release music. Constantly. Warner Bros. was not as keen on this as he was. They were willing to go every other year without complaint, but they felt in order to recoup their investment, and prepare the next campaign, they needed at least that long. Prince either could not or would not understand this. So Magnoli had to find someone to give Prince money to produce an album, because Warner Bros records was not open for business .
Get the Funk Up
Meanwhile, in London, Tim Burton was going a bit crazy. When it came to actually making the film, Warner Bros. and the producers of “Batman” were largely letting him have his way, but when it came to anything that had to do with marketing the film, he was being pressured in ways that made him distinctly uncomfortable. One thing he and Prince had in common is a dislike of being told what to do with their work. Especially by Warner Bros.
One point of contention was the soundtrack album. As far as he was concerned, the soundtrack album was Danny Elfman’s score, full stop. The producers disagreed. They needed an album of pop songs with a bat symbol on the front to sell. Decades later, it’s easy to forget that this was Tim Burton’s third feature film. He had “Pee Wee’s Big Adventure” (1985) and “Beetlejuice” (1988) before this one. He was definitely an up and coming director and someone to watch, but he didn’t have a whole lot of weight to throw around yet. He needed this movie to be a hit, and to keep control of his film he needed the producers to stay happy. Anything that didn’t have to do with what ended up on screen (I imagine) was considered something he did not want to put up too much of a fight for.
The other problem was time. It was definitely getting late into shooting if they wanted an album of new songs. Because Jack Nicholson and Burton both liked Prince, a couple of the Joker’s set piece scenes had been edited to “Baby I’m A Star” and “1999.” Prince was easily reachable because he was a Warner Bros. artist. It’s unclear who actually made the decision to call his management, but he reluctantly agreed to come to the set and have a look around.
“Yes, Mr. Burton, what would you like?”
Prince saw the sets and watched some of an assembly cut of “Batman” and had the same reaction as everyone else. He immediately agreed to do the album, and he also knew what it was like to have the money people breathing down your neck. He seems to have had a great deal of sympathy for Tim Burton’s position. In 1990, he told “Rolling Stone:”
“There was so much pressure on (Tim Burton) that for the whole picture, I just said, ‘Yes, Mr. Burton, what would you like?’"
Ultimately, what Burton would most have liked would have been to not have a pop album in the first place. But the deal that was struck was almost as good, even if he still doesn’t see it that way. Instead of an album of songs featured in the film, there would be an album of songs inspired by the film that could be featured in the film – or not – at Burton’s discretion. The circumstances that led to the deal left a bad taste in Tim Burton’s mouth, and I get that, but it seems a shame that one of the very few people with whom Prince ever shared creative control – and a great deal of it at that – cannot appreciate it.
I Love Purple
The album’s sound is an interesting extension of “Lovesexy”’s sound with bits of Prince’s early 90’s sound beginning to take hold already. The upbeat and spiritual vibe of “Lovesexy” being blended with a much funkier style. The other new element was the addition of samplers as instruments. In fact, if anything, the samplers are far more overdone here than in any other Prince recordings. It’s as if he was teaching himself to use them as he was recording.
Not that there is no reason to sample. Many of the songs were written by watching a rough cut of the film on videotape. The samples of dialogue from the film on the album are taken from that videotape.
Tracklist
The Future
This song is present in the film, but I wouldn’t go so far as to say it’s featured. It’s also an outlier in terms of Prince compositions, more of an EDM song than most of his music. Almost all the instrumentation is a drum machine, pulsing synth bass line, one guitar and a few strings sampled from another song. It’s one of the last times the arid aesthetic from “Sign O The Times” would be utilized.
Electric Chair
Much as I like the “Batman” album, there aren’t many songs I feel should have stuck around in Prince’s live set over the coming years. “Electric Chair” is one. According to princevault, it got trotted out on the 1990 Nude Tour, and again in 2013, but that’s about it. Parts of it are featured in the “Casino Night” at Wayne Manor scene in the film, but not it seems they deliberately chose portions with no vocals, and they were probably right to do so. Of all the tracks on the album this one, “Vicki Waiting” and “Trust” I rate the highest and most worth tracking down if you can.
The Arms Of Orion
The first ballad of the album is a collaboration with Sheena Easton, and it’s a bit of an odd duck. On the one hand, it’s one of the most bog – standard ballads in the catalog. On the other hand, it’s easily one of his prettiest melodies, so why is it so forgettable? Still, for all of that, if you’re listening to this album, don’t skip it, it’s more worthwhile than I’m making it sound.
Partyman
This is the song that most prominently featured in the film. You probably remember it. Jack Nicholson kills most of the patrons of a museum, then wrecks the museum itself while one of Prince’s bangers plays in the background.
You remember this, right?
The story goes that this song was inspired by seeing Jack Nicholson walk around the on the set. It is probably the quintessential late-80’s Prince uptempo funk song, and I still keep it on several of my playlists, including the one meant to keep me awake on late night drives.
Vicki Waiting
This is one of my favorite songs of the late-80’s Prince discography. It started out as a song about a girlfriend Anna Garcia aka Anna Fantastic, and then it was called “Anna Waiting.” A few months later it was reworked for the Batman album. It has a wonderful, rolling bass line with keyboards on the to that give the whole thing a funky atmosphere with a healthy dose of whimsy. He did occasionally trot this one out live over the years, and it was always a delight.
Trust
The other heavily-featured song in the movie, this plays during the “Joker’s Parade” scene. It has the exact same tempo as “Baby I’m A Star” because that was the song originally used by Tim Burton as a temp track. It’s a great song, and I’m a little surprised that Prince never played it live. This is as far as the song ever went. It did receive a single release in Hong Kong only – a single-tracked 12 inch promo vinyl sent to a few radio stations. That’s it. Don’t let that fool you, it slaps.
Lemon Crush
Supposedly inspired by Anna Fantastic’s favorite cocktail, or perhaps her desire for a new flavor of the soda Crush, it’s not bad, but it’s definitely the low point of this album, and filler by Prince standards. Did he know these songs had little chance to be featured in the movie?
Scandalous
I’m a little split on this one. For one thing, as usual, ballads generally aren’t my thing. It does have an absolutely amazing hook. On the other hand, it does contain the lyric “touch it…and explode.” So there’s that. Interestingly, the hook was incorporated by Elfman into the love theme in the film’s score, which was the only time he used any of Prince’s music.
Batdance
So here we are at the final track. I won’t say it’s a song, because it isn’t really a song as much as it is a musical collage. It’s mostly just Prince noodling around on several samplers. It sounds far more like the Art of Noise got a hold of Prince’s sampler rigs than anything else. Is it awesome? Maybe. But is it a song? Probably not. Princevault says there was sheet music sold for this song. How? Should there not have been some kind of gleefully snarky lawsuit, like that dude who sued Pepsi for a jet?
Singles
Note: I’m still not sure how to deal with non-album tracks, so now I’m just going to try to give thumbnail reviews of the singles associated with each album and see how that goes for a while?
Batdance
Batdance (Batmix)
This is a weird one, because this remix is actually more of a traditional song than the album track, which is a complete inversion of what you usually get, especially in this historical period. Don’t get me wrong – this is still an absolute mess of sampled nonsense, there’s just less of it. There is is still the criminal abuse of samplers, but they are almost entirely samples of people (mostly Prince) singing, as opposed to movie clips. There are also clips from “Rave Un2 The Joy Fantastic,” a song originally intended for a house music project, then funneled into the Batman album until Tim Burton rejected it. We’ll see it again in 1999.
Batdance (Vicki Vale Mix)
Again, this is a remix that makes more sense than the album track, but bears almost no resemblance to it. It’s not so much a remix as a completely different song. Different structure, tempo, lyrics, everything. Actually has more to do with “Electric Chair” than “Batdance.” Probably ultimately a throwaway, but the highest quality of throwaway, for whatever that’s worth.
200 Balloons
Another track Tim Burton rejected. This one was supposed to be for the parade scene and got replaced by the far superior “Trust.” Someone once told me this was actually about condoms? I don’t see any evidence of this.
Partyman
Partyman (Purple Party Mix)
This is another single dominated by remixes of album tracks, this one starts with short clips of old Prince hits and then turns into basically a six minute breakdown of “Partyman.” Nothing wrong with that, but it’s almost like Prince was trying to figure out how to do this kind of remix while making these singles.
Partyman (Partyman Music)
Basically an extension of the prior remix, only more interesting because it’s mostly instrumental with Prince playing moody jazz guitar and piano over the backing tracks. It’s worth noting that these remixes also feature the first appearances on Prince recordings of Dutch saxophonist Candy Dulfer, who would play on and off in Prince’s band for the rest of his life.
Partyman (Video Mix)
Mostly the same as the album version, with some added bits, especially the excellent Candy Dulfer solo. Totally worth searching out the audio. Not so much the video.
Feel U Up
A slightly spruced up outtake from 1982, its appearance here is kind of a surprise, but apart from “200 Balloons” all the non-album B-Sides from the Batman album are good, but seemingly left-field choices.
The Scandalous Sex Suite
Scandalous (The Crime)
For the single, Prince took “Scandalous” and Kim Basinger, who he was dating at the time, and stretched the song into a three-track, twenty-minute monster. The question I have is…why? Why do this? What made him think this was the ballad to inflate to elephantine proportions? None of these “remixes” really even stand on their own, nor do any of them contain all the information in the original song.
The whole thing starts off with Prince and Kim Basinger doing dialogue that sounds a lot like Fred Willard and Catherine O’Hara’s audition scene from “Waiting For Guffman” interspersed with Eric Leeds sax solos and bits of vocals from the original song. Again, is this necessary?
Scandalous (The Passion)
This section is vocally focused, with another full song’s worth of lyrics going on while the original song’s melody and lyrics continue unabated. It’s less annoying than it sounds. But not much.
Scandalous (The Rapture)
This is the more instrumentally focused section, and has Prince doing a nice long guitar solo. This is probably the easiest for me personally to get into – but it’s still a question of is this really necessary? I don’t think it is. Plus more awkward Kim Basinger sex noises.
Sex
Guess what this one’s about? Just kidding, it’s about monogamy. No really. It was given to the group Lois Lane later on, and It was a minor hit for them a bit later.
When 2 R In Love
“Lovesexy’s” ballad makes a return appearance here as a b-side, see it’s entry for details.
The Future
The Future (remix)
The 12 inch single of “The Future” is the first Prince single to only be available in remixed form, and also have those remixes only be made by someone other than Prince, in this case William Orbit. They’re great, and they surprisingly do not lack that “Prince” quality that often gets lost when outside remixers get a hold of his stuff.
Electric Chair (remix)
Same story here, absolutely worth tracking down. It’s good to see such a great track getting some promotional attention.
NEXT WEEK: The Time return for a final victory lap and it’s PANDEMONIUM
Comments