Stand Back - Prince
 

Hey - as most people know Prince played the great synth intro to Stand Back..

What I'm not sure of, from reading accounts of that session, is what state the song was in
before Prince played?

Was there a chord progression and melody? Or did Stevie use Prince's synth as the basis of the song, and then sing her own tune and words on it?

2 very different things
in 1 case Prince is doing a great intro..
in the other, Prince really wrote the chords to the song..

So I'm interested..

the basis of the song is "little red corvette" by prince.

"I got married the day I wrote this song. We were driving to Santa Barbara and a new song by Prince came on, so we pulled over somewhere and got the tape. It just gave me an incredible idea, so I spent many hours that night writing a song about some kind of crazy argument, and it was to become one of the most important of my songs. I've been doing this song for years, Fleetwood Mac does it also, and I never get tired of it. 'Stand Back' has always been my favorite song onstage, because...when it starts, it has an energy that comes from somewhere unknown...and it seems to have no timespace. I've never quite understood this sound....but I have NEVER questioned it.

I become a different person, and I like that, because usually I make up my OWN characters...but the lady in 'Stand Back' was not my idea. By the way, Prince did come into the studio the night I called him and told him about the song, and he played incredible synthesizer on it...and then he just walked out of my life, and I didn't see him for a long time.

It was extraordinary..."

Thanks man - I feel lame - after I posted my q , I also went on Wikipedia and saw the story.

She basically just redid the melody of Little Red Corvette by Prince. With her own words
and vocal approach...

The only "music geek" question I have left on this one is

When she does the beautiful vocal fill "la la la la, la la lahhhh" - is she mirroring Prince's
riff ..or did she have that vocal fill already..and then Prince fed off of that when he created his intro..

Probably the first..since vocals are usually recorded after the track is done...

Thanks again!

The Synth Sounds of Stevie Nicks' "Stand Back"


In our previous season of The Synth Sounds Of…, William Kurk broke down the myriad synth parts of Prince's "1999," the self-titled track of his fifth studio album that would bring him wider fame and set the stage for Purple Rain.

Though the Purple One was just beginning to loom large over the pop landscape, Stevie Nicks was quick to pick up on his presence. While driving and listening to 1999's second single, "Little Red Corvette," she started crafting her own song. Soon, Prince himself got involved, playing keyboards on the sessions. "Stand Back," the lead single to Nicks' second solo album, The Wild Heart, was the result.

William starts with the arpeggiated bassline, originally played on a Jupiter-8, but he uses a Juno-106. Putting a saw wave through the arpeggiator will give the appropriate rhythm, but to get away from the "short and stubby" hits, you'll have to pull up the envelope's Decay to lengthen each note and turn the sub-oscillator on to add some heft.

Prince used the Oberheim OB-X to craft the chords of "Stand Back," but William has found the same sounds on the Dave Smith Instruments Prophet-6. The stacked saw waves give the "body and muscle to the sound," in addition to a certain alley cat "meow" quality, according to our esteemed host.

The Oberheim DX, another favorite machine of Prince's, is used to create the heart of the drum pattern. "If you notice from time to time, the hi-hat will double up, and that's not me actually playing a double," William says. The finicky machine sometimes has a mind of its own. "It's the beginning of Skynet."

Before the AI takes over, you can play around with the audio files in our Logic, Ableton Live, and Pro Tools sessions below, and download our free, exclusive presets for the DiscoDSP OB-Xd, Arturia Jup-8 V, and Roland Cloud Jupiter-8, which you can try out as part of a free trial with the Roland Cloud Instrument Suite.


https://reverb.com/news/the-synth-so...cks-stand-back

You can totally sing the words of "Little Red Corvette" to "Stand Back. The same way you can sing the words of "Dreams" to "Outside the rain." Same chords progression