I Feel For You [Acoustic Demo] Prince single

Warner Records

single

I was blown away

The original demo of I Feel For You was discovered by archivist Michael Howe during his cataloguing of the contents of Prince’s vault in result of the star’s death in 2016. This particular version was found among a vast collection of tapes stored in the underground vault at Prince’s Paisley Park home and is the original acoustic demo of the song.

Put directly to cassette, recorded at 5215 France Ave S., in Minneapolis, Edina, the first home Prince rented, between the winter of 1978 and the summer of 1979, and captured this raw, stripped down acoustic version which like the finished studio recording is sung in falsetto. Notably, the recording demonstrates Prince’s skill on the guitar even at this early stage in his career, when aged just 20 years old.

The Prince Estate released this recording, first as a digital single on 18 October 2019, to celebrate the 40th anniversary of the release of the original album from which I Feel For You is included – his self-titled second album Prince, released by Warner Brothers on 19 October 1979. On 18 October 2019 fans were invited to purchase this as a special limited 7-inch purple vinyl edition over the following 7 days and was shipped directly from The Prince Estate from 31 January 2020.

The most well-known version of the song is of course Chaka Khan’s cover of 1984. It charted 3 on Billboard’s Hot 100 and subsequently won Prince his first Grammy for songwriter in the category of Best R&B Song, in 1985.

Cover story

The image chosen for the artwork is the original contact sheet from the photo session in Los Angeles in 1979 by Jurgen Reisch when shooting for the cover for Prince’s second LP. A number of variations were considered, with Prince wearing and not wearing the leather jacket.

Performers

Vocals & Guitar

Prince

Data

Producer

Prince

Label

NPG Records

Distribution

Warner Records

Cover/Design

Jurgen Reisch

Released

6 years ago on 18 October 2019

Running Time

7:56

US Chart Peak

prince.com exclusive

UK Chart Peak

No release

Orig. Formats

Tracklist

Side A

1. I Feel For You [Acoustic Demo] (4:31)

Side B

1. I Feel For You

   Prince (1979)
   (3:25)

Running Time

7 min, 56 sec

I Feel For You [Acoustic Demo] review

The demo I Feel For You is as old as likely possible to find within the treasure stored within the Paisley Park vault. The recording, predating Prince’s 1979 debut tour, was created in the Minneapolis home he rented with then girlfriend Kim Upsher. Prince captures this intimate demo using a simple cassette, playing the acoustic guitar so deftly performs the song in its entirety. We hear his foot tapping to the infectious rhythm. I Feel For You was destined to be a hit and in 1985 was. So be blessed the studio engineer to having the foresight to stash this piece of history safely in the vault so a future audio archaeologist would one day rediscover and gift to the world on its fortieth anniversary.

I Feel For You [Acoustic Demo] is rated 3.5 out of 5 by Goldies Parade.

Related release

Prince

Warner Bros. Records • 1979

About this release and review