Prince and the Super Bowl shuffle.

[jdmmobile]

I thought for all the disasters the past few years from Super Bowl Half-time shows, this one was pretty super. Pre-recorded tracks or just all out live, it sounded better. Last year was not good. Maybe Don M decided to go with a more pre-recorded show. I am not sure, but with the weather predictions and the amount of electric components getting wet, does anyone have any scoop how this gig went down?
I can answer some of my own questions, but they are only guesses. Sweetening, pre-recorded tracks, the marching band might have been pre-recorded (since we just recorded the same band last week). Anyway...I'd love to hear attack for this type of gig. Audience mic's by network or Don M people?


www.jdmmobile.com

[Remoteness]

While we wait for more information check these links out...



Prince rehearses for the Super Bowl halftime show

Prince rehearses for the Superbowl halftime show - end

Super Bowl XLI Halftime Show CBS CENSORED!




.

[wyndrock]

my guess: pro tooled with live vocals from a hidden wireless.

my opinion: no one electrocuted on live tv whilst i ate my chili-chips & cheese. ...thank you jesus. thumbsup


...of course you know i'm just being a slitty smartass.

[nd33]

I know Prince is all about the "real musicians playing real instruments" so it wouldn't surprise me if most of it was in fact live.

_

[wyndrock]

i've been around at these outdoor festivals when it's raining and coming around the overhead canopy. it's dangerous on those stages. imagine the danger at one of these events, with NO canopy overhead, fireworks going off, all that lighting underfoot AND you're holding an electrified instrument in your hands, with water under foot.

HOLY CRAP! i think that even prince would agree, it's time to lip synch. lol.

[d. gauss]

Originally Posted by wyndrock

i've been around at these outdoor festivals when it's raining and coming around the overhead canopy. it's dangerous on those stages. imagine the danger at one of these events, with NO canopy overhead, fireworks going off, all that lighting underfoot AND you're holding an electrified instrument in your hands, with water under foot.

um, how is that electric guitar dangerous when all you have is a 9 volt battery on your wireless guitar? ever see the footage of grand funk railroad playing live in a torrential downpour WITH guitar cords and most likely 2-prong cords on their 60's fender dual showman amps. now THAT was dangerous!

[jdmmobile]

and speaking of.. i did see the National Anthem and noticed Bill Joel was playing a wet piano. I suppose he had to remember the words, keep from sling off the keys and think about not being zapped.<P>
Steve has made me anxious I am missing a live broadcast, so i have taken a lesson from him and am constantly on the net looking for live performances. there are a good many both daily on TV and the net.. the Grammy's this weekend and i hope to actually do something i have never done..listen in 5.1.

[wyndrock]

Originally Posted by d. gauss

um, how is that electric guitar dangerous when all you have is a 9 volt battery on your wireless guitar? ever see the footage of grand funk railroad playing live in a torrential downpour WITH guitar cords and most likely 2-prong cords on their 60's fender dual showman amps. now THAT was dangerous!

uhmmm, i was unaware that everybody with a guitar strapped across their belly was in fact using a wireless system. thanks for setting that straight. now we'll know.

[LX3]

Thanks for reviving this thread, because I hadn't seen those clips that Steve linked to (and amazingly, those links are still live.)

Check out the "Rehearsal - end" clip. Even in soundcheck Prince is still electrifying. I love the comments of the guys standing near the camera -

The way it sounds on that clip is exactly the way Purple Rain sounds live these days. I can't see Prince bothering to perform to backing tracks in that situation, when his band are there and can do it in their sleep. Prince is very much about the playing, it's not really his style to fake it. The broadcast certainly wasn't lip-synced as far as vocals and guitar are concerned. Just a shame the rest of the band were so short-changed mix-wise.

If you make exceptions for the recording quality, I'd suggest it's a better mix on that camera than the one that went out on the broadcast.

For great live broadcast sound you should see/hear his performance from the Brit Awards a couple of years ago. People were talking about that for weeks.

[huub]

Well, I really respect Prince, but we had him on a tv show here in holland, he had a band with him, but only horns and vocals were live, rest was a backing track... So he does do the backing track thing..

[lips]

there was this one performance of him where he played the greates romance thats ever been sold and he was lip-synching all throughout the song. really.

[LX3]

Okay, there are exceptions. What I'm saying is, if the show he's playing is practical to play live on, he'll play live. Unlike the tendency for some R&B artists to lip-sync half their actual concerts because they can't sing and dance at the same time.

That'd be like paying to see BB King play air-guitar.

Slippery slope... if you're going to lip-sync some of your show, you may have to lip-sync the whole show, because the lip-synced songs probably sound much more in tune than the live ones. And if you're lip-syncing, you could put some extra keyboard and guitar parts on there, and why not some strings (that'll save money), and...

Screw it, just have the lights show up and put the album on really loud.

The one thing we didn't get an answer to about that Prince SB performance is how did they handle the marching band? Was that "on tape"? Or did they actually try to mic the stadium?! Might explain why the broadcast mix was a bit rough.

[Ruphus]

Prince was a very obvious example of how people eat media.
Promoted as whatever rocks your boat ( "new Hendrix" ... blahblah ) and sold as the unique talent ( "playing over thirty instruments" blahblah *what a BS*) some plastic music with a bunch of breaks in it as hot rhythm was accepted as the new genius´production.

All those poor peeps who never received truly genial stuff in the decades before that. Just sad.

What!!??? PRINCE could be lip-syncing??! Jikes

What do you expect.

Lip-syncing or not, what you hear remains the same.

Absolutely nothing special.

Ruphus

[sleestack]

And what have you written that can compete with little red corvette, rasberry berret, purple rain. You talk shite.