Re: MisK.

[Mike.Gallaher@msfc.nasa.gov (Mike Gallaher)]

Andrew B Marvick says:
>which finally identified "WSILY" as the _only_ track with Prince on
>it (and even there, most of Prince's work had been muted or removed).
>And now we are hearing that You Want Alchemy, too, is a Prince/KT track!

   I was afraid that my musings would come across like they obviously have
to IED.  I began with absolute faith in the TRS credits and with Kate's
explanation of the extent of her collaboration with Prince.  There are still
some mysteries and facts that have caused me to further ponder the issue:

   1) Who is Gaumont D'Olivera / <John?> Gidman, credited with bass on 
      RBG and drums or bass (depending on source) on BSL?
   2) Prince has been known to contribute but refuse credit on records.
   3) There are no instrumentation credits for You Want Alchemy.
   4) Andy's conjecture that YWA was recorded after TSR is not firmly
      grounded; the apparent presence of analog elements in the recording
      would suggest otherwise, and it's hard to picture Kate diving back
      into the studio so soon after TRS, given what we hear of her work
      habits.
   5) There are aspects of some songs, most particularly YWA ("What Choo
      Gonna Do     -Hoo     -Hooo") that sound more like typical Prince
      than typical Kate.

   I am not saying that Prince masterminded TRS.  I do not seriously
believe that D'Olivera is Prince, since these parts were almost certainly
in-studio contributions, not the indirect tape-trade as described by
Kate and Del.
   What I am suggesting is that there may have been one or two other
tracks on the tapes sent to Kate, and that Kate may have built up new
songs around them, perhaps ultimately to the point where none of Prince's
efforts remained in the mix, but a few musical notions remained which had
been built on, and thus retained, Prince's foundation.  Is this an
unreasonable scenario?  Kate might feel entirely justified in not
crediting an artist whose work had been elimated from the mix, and may
have been so close to the music that she didn't take particular note
of those elements that still "screamed Prince."  After all the hours
of effort, these elements had become hers so far as she was concerned,
she had assimilated them into her style for that song.  We the listeners,
hearing it cold, say "That doesn't sound like a Kate touch, it sounds like
a Prince touch!"
   I am not at all a Prince fan, so I'm not trying to make this case
in order to steal Kate's thunder or anything.  And I don't want to make
this into something like a criminal investigation ("Now Mr. Palmer, you
claimed a Mr. Gidman played bass on Big Stripey Lie.  Isn't this in
direct contradiction to the liner notes, which credit Mr. D'Olivera?
And just who is this Mr. D'Olivera, anyway?  We know it's Prince, why 
not just confess and we'll go easy on you?").  My final opinion, unless
additional information is unearthed, is that the only significant and
extant audible contribution of Prince is on WSILY, and that if there
were any other tape collaborations between the two, they were either
not used or evolved into some form that did not incorporate Prince's
contributions, and that at the very least, the experience of making
WSILY suggested stylistic elements reminiscent of Prince in YWA.
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Mike Gallaher			"I never asked you, what's my best
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MSFC/ED13					-- Kelly May
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