ts: morrissey vs prince

both 80s icons, effeminate/androgynous etc, incredibly narcissistic and in love with themselves and incredibly self aware about their images, better at acting/writing like teenagers than mature adults, both have terrible/indistinct session musicians backing them up since their peak periods, both fallen off, both have insanely sycophantic fans, basically theres lots of similarities, even though morrissey one said he thought prince 'said nothing' in his music. not sure what prince would think of the smiths. i imagine he would find them too miserable.

I know, but see, it's like...every other ILXor in the Seattle area besides me seems to think Prince is the ultimate shit. I mean no offense, but I think if one thing kept me from bonding with the Seattle ILX contingent is that I would not actually kiss Prince's toes.

Morrissey is more to my liking, though I concede he's had some shit in his career. That doesn't stop the fact that I played 3 b-sides and tracks from his first album on my iPod this morning.

But what...this isn't a poll? Oh never mind, Prince would have won anyway. Look, I have an appreciation for Prince, I don't hate him, but I just don't want to get into that argument about him with folks. I'm an anglophile, I'm sorry, and Prince has his own thing, and I respect that, but...

Why wasn't I born in the UK?

Actually it occurs to me, though, they do share some astrological crossover. Prince is a Gemini, Morrissey is a Gemini on the Taurus cusp.

Yeah, but there's no paticular sign Prince is more compatible with.

Hahahah LOL

Prince is a genius who redefined funk, pop, and dance music, wrote loads of classic tunes not just for himself but for numerous other artists, and despite his "falling off" can still come up with good tunes, though admittedly much less often than he did in the 80s and early 90s. Morrissey is a guy with a nice voice, has done some nice indie rock tunes and releases an album once in every 4 years. It's not very hard to choose.

I mean, Prince is responsible for one of the biggest ballads of the 80s ("Purple Rain") and the 90s ("Nothing Compares 2 U"), and one of the most brilliantly catchy funk songs of the 80s ("Kiss") and the 90s ("Sexy M.F."). What has Morrissey to that?

Plus he's probably the only mainstream artist who's managed to produce two uniformly brilliant double albums and an almost equally good triple album.

http://i307.photobucket.com/albums/nn306/Floridian_20/VivaHate.jpg

also, theyre both quite lyrically witty but take themselves v seriously.

"What has Morrissey to that?"

this charming man
its over

cant imagine prince ever conveying anything as desperately sad as its over.

Or even I Won't Share You, or scores of others Smiths songs.

Sometimes it Snows in April, guys.

Also yr conflating sadness w miserabislism

Haha. Maybe. I don't understand this T/S, anyway. These are two (great) artists who occupy very different areas of music. Being icons, narcissistic and better at writing like teenagers seems like something you can say about most pop stars, but it isn't grounds to compare/contrast them.

Is Prince all that teenage? He just seems really horny. Many men suffer this well into their 90s, etc

wtf at idea of Prince not being able to do sadness and desperation as well as Moz

other Geminis (in order of my preference) : Kim Deal (WOOT!), Mark Sinker, Andre 3000, Brian Wilson, Bob Dylan, Paul McCartney

Hmm...didn't know Kim Deal was one. That's cool, though! Don't know who Mark Sinker or Andre 3000 are. Of course I knew Bob Dylan was one. Don't really care about Brian Wilson, but okay.

wtf at idea of Prince not being able to do sadness and desperation as well as Moz

LOL oh my god. Holy hell, dude, I have nothing against you at all but um...we're going to have to agree to disagree here.

Okay, wait...why wasn't this a poll again?

Love Prince, have no use for Morrisey at all.

morprincey

I don't love Prince as much as most ILXors and I have some use for Morrissey, but the answer is: Prince, easily.

Morrissey's schtick seems quite a bit narrower. (I trust no one will make any bad puns here.)

not on ilx

i like the smiths & all but come the fuck on

deej otm

Also: Prince can sing, Morrissey can't.

I love Moz, and will take Your Arsenal over every nineties Prince album except The Gold Experience, but Prince's talent and appetites are vaster.

Okay woah woah woah woah woah. I will take a lot of criticisms of Morrissey but CAN'T SING?????

You better at least save that kind of criticism for people who can't hit the right notes, man.

...which Morrissey couldn't on those first two albums, after which, I'll admit, he learned from his idol Bowie how to sing around his limitations, hanging back slightly behind the melody and beat.

okay woah woah which two albums are we talking about, Smiths albums or Morrissey albums?

Also is Bowie really an idol of his??? I've never heard this. I know he loves New York Dolls, but that's irrelevant as far as his singing goes.

I think the vocals on the first Smiths are pretty obviously out of tune.

Not on every song but it is noticeable.

I'm leaning toward Prince for his guitar playing. I probably listen to the Smiths more often though.

"effeminate"? Morrisey? nowadays? ...in a big-muscled-woman-wrestler-kind-of-way, maybe.

Yeah you're right, actually, Morrissey is more macho than he's ever been these days, I reckon.

i would like a morrissey cover of "cream"

never was too inerested in either of these dudes' music but their personas are fun

would choose minneapolis over manchester as a place to live

i wz browsing around ILM for references to the kelley deal 6000 and stumbled upon a couple of posts that suggest that sinker had quite a bit of a crush on kelley deal (and kim too) which only doubles his coolness in my eyes, to something like infinity x 2...fitting for a gemini...

(ps Bimble here

)

Prince is better than Moz solo but Prince v the Smiths wld be pretty challenging...

whether morrissey can sing or not, i hate the sound of his voice.

said this on the poll thread, but yea, like are you even joking? prince by 10000000000000000000 miles, no question

Prince is better than Moz solo but Prince v the Smiths wld be pretty challenging... -Veteran of the Psychic Wars

Just out of sincere curiosity: in what kind of universe of how many/few dimensions would The Smiths' meagre, tho' admittedly sometimes sympathetic, output measure up to the omnidirectional galaxy of Prince's?
(No, I'm not even a Prince fan)

"Prince not being able to do sadness and desperation as well as Moz"

what are the prince songs that do this then?

"If I Was Your Girlfriend"

Just out of sincere curiosity: in what kind of universe of how many/few dimensions would The Smiths' meagre, tho' admittedly sometimes sympathetic, output measure up to the omnidirectional galaxy of Prince's?

Editorializing aside, that universe wld be the universe of my sadsack/romantic high school after-school hours.

The Smiths made very stirring music! And Tuomas points out "If I Was Your Girlfriend," which is stirring and inside-emotion-weirdening as the best Smiths songs (ie "What Difference does it Make"). That is a good example of an affect in anyone's music that will always smite me.

I remember Morrissey saying the only artist he liked in the charts (at the time of that interview) was Prince, because he was androgynous.

awww, that's kindof sweet.