1999 - 2019 Remaster

Written in 1982 during the height of the Cold War, this party jam has a much deeper meaning, as Prince addresses fears of a nuclear Armageddon. Under the Reagan administration, the United States was stockpiling nuclear weapons and taking a hawkish stance against the Soviet Union, which he referred to as the "Evil Empire." This scared a lot of people, and Prince voices their concerns: Everybody's got a bomb We could all die any day He's far more optimistic though, responding by making the point that we should enjoy whatever time we have on earth while we still can, even if it all ends by the year 2000: But before I'll let that happen I'll dance my life away In this purple-skied world, life is just a party, and parties weren't meant to last.

Prince doesn't sing on this track until the third line. The first lead vocal is by backup singer Lisa Coleman: I was dreamin' when I wrote this Forgive me if it goes astray Next up is guitarist Dez Dickerson, who sings: But when I woke up this mornin' Coulda sworn it was judgment day Prince takes the next part: The sky was all purple There were people running everywhere All three voices come in on the next line: Trying to run from the destruction You know I didn't even care Originally, Prince envisioned the whole song as a 3-part harmony with Coleman, Dickerson and himself, and they sang it all together. Prince later decided to split up the tracks, letting each voice solo on a line (this is something Stevie Wonder did on "You Are The Sunshine Of My Life"). The second verse follows this same pattern, dividing the vocals amongst the three singers.

Prince gave a rare interview in 1999 when he spoke with Larry King on CNN. More surprisingly, he explained the meaning behind this song. Said Prince: "We were sitting around watching a special about 1999, and a lot of people were talking about the year and speculating on what was going to happen. And I just found it real ironic how everyone that was around me whom I thought to be very optimistic people were dreading those days, and I always knew I'd be cool. I never felt like this was going to be a rough time for me. I knew that there were going to be rough times for the Earth because of this system is based in entropy, and it's pretty much headed in a certain direction. So I just wanted to write something that gave hope, and what I find is people listen to it. And no matter where we are in the world, I always get the same type of response from them." When the new millennium approached, there was a great deal of concern over the "Y2K Bug," since programmers didn't always account for the change to 2000 in their code. There was minimal impact: When the new year hit, we still had dial tones and internet access, and no major networks were compromised. Prince had no fears. "I don't worry about too much anyway," he told King.