Tonight. It was August 3rd, 1983, and Prince and the Revolution were back home in Minneapolis. On his previous tour, to supporthe had been crisscrossing the country, performing for bigger and bigger crowds, and his aspirations had multiplied. Now, he was back on familiar turf, playing his first full show at the First Avenue club in more than a year. At the last minute, he decided to call in a mobile recording truck and have his set taped professionally.
The success of “Little Red Corvette” the previous year had opened the door for the pop breakthrough Prince had longed for; guitarist Dez Dickerson described the audiences on thetour as a “tidal wave of white, getting whiter and whiter each night.” Prince began reconfiguring his sound, his style and his band in ways that would connect with the broadest-possible target.
The inspiration for “Purple Rain” itself was in some ways less biographical than professional. Out on the road, as he scribbled away in his purple notebook, Prince often found himself pulling into the nation’s hockey rinks on the heels of his fellow Midwesterner Bob Seger. Perpetually competitive, he wanted to understand the key to Seger’s appeal; Fink offered that it was the big, lighter-raising power ballads — “We’ve Got Tonight,” “Turn the Page” — that Seger’s fans loved.
Songs were added and dropped from the track list — “Wednesday” and “Electric Intercourse” both made it, then were cut. The most elaborate composition of the bunch, “Computer Blue,” expanded past 14 minutes, including a spoken-word section vaguely reminiscent of Jim Morrison’s recitation in the Doors’ “The End,” but was subsequently trimmed down.