To compliment the show with Prince last week, let’s take a look at one of my favorite Prince side projects, The Time. We’ll begin with the 30 minute “opening band” performance they did just prior to Prince’s show last week.
Yes, this is video from the same night, at the Capitol Theatre in Passaic, NJ, in January of 1982.
This show has most of the original line-up, quite young, such as Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis before they took off and created hits for Janet Jackson and others. We hear Jesse Johnson on guitar, and Morris Day out front acting very cool.
The Time was one of the funkiest bands of the early 1980’s. What other band has a valet, Jerome, to bring towels, mirrors, and combs to the lead singer? They were well-dressed, choreographed, and musically adept. And funny.
Here The Time are touring in support of their first album, so it is just a bit before they hit big with their amazing second album, and years before the masses learn about the group from the movie Purple Rain. Their big songs at this time were The Stick, Cool, and Get It Up.
As a bonus, we can check in with The Time in 2014. After years apart and solo projects, the original members reunited in recent years. Due to legal issues, they couldn’t use the name The Time anymore, so they go by the much less interesting and somewhat corny name, “Original 7ven.”
Together again, they put out new music and have been performing a bit. Here is a documentary they’ve put together to tell the story of the group. Not a lot of performing, but some interesting interviews about them working with Prince, and so on.
http://youtu.be/hx_yIs9y-8s
