This song is about a sexual encounter with Nikki, a sex fiend the singer encounters in a hotel lobby "masturbating with a magazine." Prince released many songs that deal explicitly with sex, but many of them went unnoticed because they were not released as singles. This one got more attention because the album was so popular.
Prince wrote this song for his movie Purple Rain (the album serves as the soundtrack). In the film, he finds out his girlfriend, Apollonia, has taken up with his nemesis Morris, so he sings this song to her in a club to embarrass her, which it does - she runs off before the performance is done.
When Tipper Gore (wife of former US vice-president Al Gore) heard her 11-year-old daughter listening to this song, she became outraged and started the Parents Music Resource Center (PMRC) to fight against songs with offensive lyrics. Led by the wives of US politicians, the PMRC got hearings on the issue where musicians like Frank Zappa, Dee Snider and John Denver spoke against any form of censorship in music. Tipper was vilified by many who supported the right to free speech, and no laws were passed restricting lyrics. The controversy did lead to a voluntary system where record labels put warning stickers on albums containing explicit content. In 1991, when Walmart announced they would not sell any albums with warning stickers, many artists began releasing both clean and explicit versions of their albums.
See your Spotify stats (with number of plays and minutes listened) and discover new music.
Music data, artist images, album covers, and song previews are provided by Spotify. Spotify is a trademark of Spotify AB.