On Episode 57 of the Press Rewind – Prince Lyrics Podcast, Josh Norman from The Mountains & the Sea podcast joins me to chat about the self-fulfilling prophecy that Prince puts forth on the fun exercise that is “Baby I’m A Star” off the Purple Rain soundtrack.
“Take a picture sweetie, I ain’t got time to waste.”
Josh and I have a lot of fun discussing the at times inscrutable (e.g., the backward message at the beginning and end of the song, buried in the mix), but always enjoyable “Baby I’m a Star,” the penultimate track on the Purple Rain album. While not as lyrically deep or complex as multi-layered songs such as “Let’s Go Crazy,” “I Would Die 4 U,” or “Purple Rain,” it is maybe the most unabashedly straightforward and enjoyable songs about career ambition that we’ve ever heard.
Josh and I also highlight a couple of misheard lyrics from our youths that we wanted to put out there, for no other reason than to make sure listeners know they weren’t alone all the years they thought the echo in the chorus was simply repeating “baby I’m a star,” not “we are all stars.” I mean, it’s true, but I never thought Prince was telling us all that back in 1984.
Prince wrote this song as far back as 1981, meaning that it was written at a time when he wasn’t yet a Global Mega-Star, making the song even more interesting from the perspective that Prince always saw the star quality in himself, even when others didn’t. It’s a truly fascinating piece of history at this point, but it’s mostly just smile-inducing, funky fun to be enjoyed without overthinking.
The goal of each episode of Press Rewind is to:
- Take a track by track look at the lyrical content of Prince’s discography
- Discuss my own interpretation of each song’s lyrics along with any guest I may have
- If submitted, discuss listener’s interpretations of each song’s lyrics
Thank you for joining me on this journey through Prince’s catalog!
