History Music / PrincesAssociates

* PissTakeRap: Ms. Electra herself raps for the full duration of the album. And it is ''awful''.

Martika was a pop singer and actress in TheEighties, mostly known for appearing on ''Series/KidsIncorporated'' and... uh, Mr. T's [[DemotivationalPoster motivational]] video ''[[OldShame Be Somebody or Be Somebody's Fool!]]''.

Somehow, presumably through his immense charm, he managed to convince them to record a few demos. He then met nude model and B movie actress Denise Matthews, famous for [[SarcasmMode her widely acclaimed roles in]] ''[[SarcasmMode Terror Train]]'' [[SarcasmMode and]] ''[[SarcasmMode Tanya's Island]]''. Also, a certain part of the body. An awestruck Prince kicked out Shoop and installed his new girlfriend Matthews as the frontwoman instead, giving her the StageName "Vanity". YouDoNotWantToKnow one of the stories about its origin. But if you do: [[spoiler:Prince wanted to name her "Vagina", clarifying that [[ItsPronouncedTroPAY it would be pronounced "vag-EE-na"]], because [[SarcasmMode that's how you pronounce it in Minnesota or something]]. She predictably went "dude, WTF?" and managed to bargain it down to "Vanity".]][[note]]Hey, we warned you.[[/note]]

Vanity 6 were a GirlGroup formed by Prince sometime in 1981, supposedly after watching ''Film/AStarIsBorn'' and thinking "Oh hey, that's neat. I wanna do that!" He managed to gather together three of his female friends, Susan Moonsie, Brenda Bennett and Jamie Shoop. We can only presume how awkward the meeting was when Prince told them that they would be named "The Hookers", would perform in lingerie and sing about sex a lot. The sheer fact that he wasn't comically chased out of the room is amazing in itself.

Vanity 6 broke up a year later in 1983, when Vanity suddenly dropped out of the Prince camp and gave up her role in ''Film/PurpleRain''. Undaunted, Prince replaced her with Patricia "Apollonia" Kotero and re-named them "Apollonia 6". Vanity went on to release two albums on the Motown label and dated Music/MotleyCrue's bass player, Nikki Sixx. She also started to abuse drugs, to the point where she was hospitalized and given a kidney transplant in 1994. From that point onward, Vanity reverted to her birthname and dedicated her life to God, becoming an evangelical minister in 1998. She died in 2016 at age 57.

* ''Fruit at the Botton'' (1989)

Wendy and Lisa next signed with Virgin Records and released a new album, ''Eroica'', a much more eclectic alternative-rock oriented work that didn't sacrifice the group's trademark ethereal atmosphere or memorable melodies. It met with strong reviews and became their biggest success... in the UK, natch.

Prince signed L.A. PowerPop band The Three O'Clock to his Paisley Park label in 1988, which released their album ''Vermillion'' later that year. The album's lead single, "Neon Telephone" was written by Prince himself. Prince was a huge fan of the band, who were figureheads of the "Paisley Underground" scene, whose jangly, neo-psychedelic sound inspired his ''Around the World in a Day'' album.

Prince signed L.A. PowerPop band The Three O'Clock to his Paisley Park label in 1988, which released their album ''Vermillion'' later that year. The album's lead single, "Neon Telephone" was written by Prince himself. Prince was a huge fan of the band, who were figureheads of the "Paisley Underground" scene, whose jangly, neo-psychedelic PowerPop sound inspired his ''Around the World in a Day'' album.

No, you didn't read that wrong. Prince is famous for being prolific when it comes to songwriting. This landed him in a bit of trouble with his record label in TheEighties - see, Creator/WarnerBrosRecords wanted him to do the same write-record-release-tour grind as everybody, but he was crankin' out tunes so quickly that they just couldn't keep up with his ever-expanding vault. As a means to avoid this, Prince wrote numerous songs under pseudonyms or gave them to others - Prince's musical ProductionPosse, if you will.

Now, if you're not a devoted Prince fan, this is just going to be more ArchivePanic for a man that already has a huge discography. But Prince had lots of talented musicians in his entourage back in TheEighties, and the records of his associates are mostly interesting, with the occasional stinker, and at best just as catchy and well-made as his own. Thanks to the lack of availability of these albums, one can even claim that these associates would [[SugarWiki/NeedsMoreLove Need More Love]], although exactly who does is an exercise best left to the listener. Indeed, barely any of the artists listed below actually garnered their own fanbase to sell albums to; many only listen to them because of Prince's involvement with their careers.

Also a fun note: many of these releases ended up out of print because they appeared on Prince's record label Paisley Park Records, and that was shut down in 1994 by Warner Bros. due to severe mismanagement from his managers Bob Cavallo, Joe Ruffalo and Steve Fargnoli[[note]]How {{egregious}}? They'd paid such exorbitant advances to signees (who were frequently signed behind Prince's back!) that Warner forced Prince to lend Paisley Park Studios to other bands in an attempt to recoup some of their losses[[/note]]. [[KeepCirculatingTheTapes Keep (mostly) Circulating The Tapes]] (you can go ahead and "lose" the ones for Vanity and Apollonia 6, for starters.) Also, keep in mind that this list is by no means complete: there are several projects that never saw any form of release outside of bootlegs (like The Rebels and M.C. Flash) and there are probably even more that we don't even know about, sitting in Prince's vault.

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[[caption-width-right:300:Morris Day and the Motherfuckin' Time]]

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[[caption-width-right:300:...with the wardrobe of the Old Generation.]]

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[[caption-width-right:300:Mazarati, seen here wearing clothes Prince thought were a bit silly.]]

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[[caption-width-right:300:Can ''you'' tell them apart easily?]]

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[[caption-width-right:499:Morris Day And The Motherfuckin' Time]]

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[[caption-width-right:500:The Family (not [[TheFamilyForTheWholeFamily for the whole family though]]...)]]

->''[[TemptingFate "A whole lotta people are gonna get pregnant off this!"]]''
-->--'''Prince''', [[http://www.last.fm/music/Bria+Valente describing Valente's album to the Los Angeles Times]] (clearly oblivious about his track record)

->''"[[SomethingSomethingLeonardBernstein Something something something]] toy soldiers!"''

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[[caption-width-right:500:Mazarati, seen here wearing clothes Prince thought were a bit silly.]]

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-->''[[Music/PinkFloyd "I've always been mad, I know I've been mad, like the most of us are. It's very hard to explain why you're mad, even if you're not mad..."]]''

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[[caption-width-right:500:Can ''you'' tell them apart easily?]]

Day left the band after an argument with Prince in 1985, focusing on a solo career. The Time disbanded right then, with its remaining members being amalgamated into The Family, and Jam and Lewis going on to be famous {{Record Producer}}s, mostly for their work with Music/JanetJackson. Jerome Benton also starred as Prince's sidekick in ''Under the Cherry Moon'', and similarly managed to out-act Prince and be considered the one character reviewers liked. Jesse Johnson put out a solo album named ''Shockadelica'' in 1986, which drove Prince to write a song called "Shockadelica" since he felt an album with that cool a title needed a title song, but Johnson had neglected to write one.

* BreakupBreakout: People probably know Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis better for their decades as hitmaking producers and songwriters than as members of The Time.

Staples collaborated with Prince for a few years, contributing the song "Melody Cool" to the ''Graffiti Bridge'' soundtrack and having two solo albums, ''Time Waits For No One'' (1989) and ''The Voice'', co-written and produced by him. And that's... kind of it actually. Prince
was a [[PromotedFanboy a huge fan]] of Staples, and wanted to help her mount a comeback to the music industry, which he more or less succeeded at.

was a [[PromotedFanbo a huge fan]] of Staples, and wanted to help her mount a comeback to the music industry, which he more or less succeeded at.

Staples collaborated with Prince for a few years, contributing the song "Melody Cool" to the ''Graffiti Bridge'' soundtrack and having two solo albums, ''Time Waits For No One'' (1989) and ''The Voice'', co-written and produced by him. And that's... kind of it actually.

* ''Oh What a Feeling'' (1979

The Three O'Clock are a rarity among Paisley Park signings in that Prince neither discovered them (they'd already released three albums), mentored them (again, he was ''their'' fan) or created them from whole cloth. Sadly, ''Vermillion'' was a flop and didn't take off with either the band's existing college rock fanbase or the pop audience they were now trying to attract; They imploded on themselves shortly after its release. Frontman Michael Quercio eventually reformed the group in 2013.

Prince was a huge fan of L.A.'s "Paisley Underground" scene, and its jangly, neo-psychedelic PowerPop sound inspired his ''Around the World in a Day'' album. In turn, he signed one of the scene's figurehead bands, The Three O'Clock, to his Paisley Park label in 1988; They were one of only a few acts signed to the label that Prince had neither mentored, discovered or had directly created. The group put out their final album, ''Vermillion'', on Paisley Park in 1988, complete with a Price-written lead single in "Neon Telephone". However, the song and album failed to catch on with either their college rock fanbase or the pop audience they were now trying to attract and they imploded on themselves shortly thereafter. Frontman Michael Quercio eventually reformed the group in 2013.

So, there's this guy named {{Prince}}, you may have heard of him...[[SelfDeprecation Skinny motherfucker with the high voice]], [[IAmTheBand played every instrument known to man]], made some really catchy tunes, quite the SmallNameBigEgo sometimes, [[AttentionDeficitCreatorDisorder wrote nearly a thousand songs]].

Vanity 6 broke up a year later in 1983, when Vanity suddenly dropped out of the Prince camp and gave up her role in ''PurpleRain''. Undaunted, Prince replaced her with Patricia "Apollonia" Kotero and re-named them "Apollonia 6". Vanity went on to release two albums on the Motown label and dated Music/MotleyCrue's bass player, Nikki Sixx. She also started to abuse drugs, to the point where she was hospitalized and given a kidney transplant in 1994. From that point onward, Vanity reverted to her birthname and dedicated her life to God, becoming an evangelical minister in 1998. She died in 2016 at age 57.

Apollonia played Prince's girlfriend in ''PurpleRain'' and the entire band made an appearance. An album, ''Apollonia 6'', followed in 1984 but by this point Prince lost interest in his GirlGroup, since Apollonia told him that she was OnlyInItForTheMoney. While ''Apollonia 6'' featured much better production values and backing vocals from Wendy & Lisa and Jill Jones, it suffered from even weaker material than before and even more over-the-top "explicit" lyrics that stumbled bravely into Narmland, as seen by the hilariously stupid "Sex Shooter" and the HotForStudent song "Happy Birthday Mr. Christian". You know you're in a bad position when what's most notable about your album is what songs ''didn't'' make it - reportedly, Prince had considered "Manic Monday", "17 Days", "The Glamorous Life" and his duet with Apollonia, "Take Me With U", for inclusion on ''Apollonia 6'' before he geave them to Music/TheBangles, himself, Sheila E. and himself again (on the ''PurpleRain'' soundtrack), respectively.

The group released one album, ''Vanity 6'' in 1982. Prince wrote and produced it almost completely (disguising this fact by crediting himself as "The Starr Company" and randomly assigning credits around, with Revolution guitarist Dez Dickerson managing to sneak in a credit for "He's So Dull", Jesse Johnson co-writing "Bite the Beat" and Terry Lewis co-writing "If a Girl Answers (Don't Hang Up)".) The album itself represented a pretty generic example of Prince's [[SignatureStyle Minneapolis sound]], with two forays into synthy PowerPop ("He's So Dull" and "Bite the Beat") and lots of exaggerated, {{Narm}}y lyrics about IntercourseWithYou sung by three women with average vocal talent. [[SexSells Needless to say, it became a hit and spawned a big hit single with "Nasty Girl"]]. "He's So Dull" also appeared in ''NationalLampoonsVacation''.

Martika was a pop singer and actress in TheEighties, mostly known for appearing on ''KidsIncorporated'' and... uh, Mr. T's [[DemotivationalPoster motivational]] video ''[[OldShame Be Somebody or Be Somebody's Fool!]]''.

The most successful Prince associates, and [[Franchise/TheViewAskewniverse Jay and Silent Bob's]] favorites. And probably the most famous too.

Mayte first joined Prince's [[strike:harem]] entourage in 1990 as a dancer, later graduating to occasionally contributing vocals in GratuitousSpanish. She then married Prince in 1996. They were due to become parents, but the baby died from a rare skull disease named Pfeiffer's syndrome a week after he was born. The marriage disintegrated after this traumatic event and Prince and Mayte divorced in 2000. Mayte has since returned to dancing and choreography.