I finally caught this on DVR.
Did anyone else see this? Jeez is he the Prince-est. I liked the featured girl singer on the first song - a great-sounding Rosario Dawson-type. And his band 3rdeyegirl were great - really liked the drummer and the guitarist was good, too…
I saw it, I was not overly impressed but I never loved his music.
Someone forgot to plug in his guitar. But that didn’t faze a pro like him. He just took care of it and kept going like it was nothing.
Talk about faint praise. He managed to unlock another, apparently more difficult achievement however, as he managed not to deliberately break someone else’s guitar on this late-night show appearance.
Basically, I should just quote “What Exit?”.
I was most struck by his third- eye sunglasses. Why has no one thought of those before? Brilliant.
That’s a reference to, what, I think Prince broke Capt. Kirk’s (from the Tonight Show band the Roots) guitar? Yeah, not okay.
But really, folks would rather see Ariana Grande or Iggy? Both were recent SNL music guests and both are pretty - well Grande looks like a 12 year old - but compared to the actual music made onstage by Prince?
I stand by my OP! 
I agree, it was spectacular. His two new records are terrific–by far the best thing he’s recorded 20 years, at least. 3rdeyegirl seems to have given him some new energy. He’s one of just a handful of lifelong favorites that I’ve never seen live (it’s pretty much him and Bowie at this point), so I’m going to rearrange my life around seeing him somewhere next year.
My only complaint about the show is that I knew he was doing an eight-minute segment but I didn’t realize that they were just pushing the usual two segments together instead of giving him extra time. So I sat through the utterly terrible rest of the show waiting for a second segment that never came.
I thought it was a great performance too.
I thought it was a great performance, but I saw it after two days of reading people squee about it on Facebook. People really have to stop overhyping things …probably, more eaily achieved, I should take responsibity myself and just filter out all the OMG Best Thing Ever!!! that, through social media, gets attached to anything even remotely good.
Actually, I’m pretty good about not buying into the hype but this time it was Prince. I know that Prince is awesome, so when everyone was going squee about this performance I actually allowed myself to believe I was in for something truly transcendent.
WordMan’s OP is not overly hyperbolic, but Prince giving a great musical performance is not amazing to me. If Rebecca Black were to give a great mucial performance- that would be amazing. Prince, I expect to be great so for a Prince performance to be amazing it’s really got to be a religious experience on a level with a handjob from The Flying Nun while one thousand cherubim dance on my glans.
This pretty much describes his - and, of course, the Revolution’s - performance of “Purple Rain” at the 1985 American Music Awards.
As far as this SNL performance, I indeed thought it was great, but not, as you said, truly transcendent.
two words, Super Bowl
Agreed. And thirteen more words:
Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Induction Ceremony, “While My Guitar Gently Weeps”.
Me, too!
I nearly turned it off during the girl-singer bit at the beginning. Off-tune staccato peeping of extremely low-grade poetry does not impress me.
“When you catch her singing in the shower,
go get a flower
and rub it on her back, on her back, on her back.”
WTF?!?
As always, I liked it once Prince picked up the guitar.
It’s up online.
I saw it and thought it was incredible. In this day & age of lip sync, back up tracks and auto-tune, it was so refreshing to see an actual band that played and sang. Someone mentioned Iggy above…really? Not even in the same universe.
Prince has more talent in his afro than Iggy, Justin, & Brittany on their best days combined.
EDIT : my comments were intended to further the point about Prince being more talented than Iggy.
Prince is fucking amazing and this performance was more of the same. Loved it.
That sketch w/ Chris Rock and Leslie Jones as the old married couple though? Ouuccchhhh… Worst thing I’ve seen on the show in many many years. And I’m someone that mostly loves SNL in all of its incarnations including this season.
I’ve seen it a few times now, and thought about starting a thread on it, but got lazy.
It was really good, not amazing for Prince, but he didn’t let you down at all, either. Really nice guitar work by both guitarists. I was really happy to see the bass player playing a Danelectro Longhorn, and she slapped on that narrow neck. Really, all the performances were top notch.
I’m not sure about the songs he played, though. They’re my first exposure to them, and if Prince is writing something other than his catchy songs, it takes me awhile to digest them. I’ll have to watch it a few more times to really know how I feel about this version of Prince.
I love the fact that we are jaded by the brilliance of Prince. Yeah, it was great - but we’ve seen Prince thoroughly own a performance. Cool.
Not going to argue the point - the music was new, his band was new, his 'fro was blown out more ;). But watching him is always supremely entertaining. As a guitar player, watching the unbelievable comfort and competence he shows, while laying down great grooves and lead fills - it always blows me away. The mis-plug bit was an obvious example, but watching him work the pedals, his volume and tone controls - it’s like watching a violin master work their vibrato - so smooth.
As some others here, when he picks up the guitar I love it. Truly great performance from that point.