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Ice Cream Castle

Warner Bros. Records

Oh Lawd.

The Time’s third LP, which once again saw all the songs created by Prince (continuing under the production credit Jamie Starr), were written during the 1999 Tour, albeit credited to Morris Day. Ice Cream Castle is The Time’s first album to contain a song (The Bird) actually performed by the band itself, hitherto all instruments were performed by Prince himself, with Day dubbing his vocals over Prince’s. Ice Cream Castle accompanied Prince and The Revolution soundtrack to the movie Purple Rain in which The Time was cast as The Kid’s (Prince) music foil. As result Ice Cream Castle peaked at number 24 on Billboard’s album chart. Selling 1million copies it was the best-selling album, by double, of any Prince associated artist. Ice Cream Castle was certified Platinum by RIAA on 10 January 1985.

The line-up of The Time changed significantly between their second record What Time Is It? and their third, Ice Cream Castle. Caused by the sacking of Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis in 1983 after Triple Threat Tour out of Prince’s frustration they were produce material for SOS Band between shows, thus straining the relationship with Prince. Jam and Lewis became full-time music producers in their own right. With Monte Moir also out in an act of solidarity for Jam and Lewis, the situation necessitated a wholesale hiring of replacements: Jerry Hubbard was bought in on bass, and Mark Cardenas and Paul Peterson on keyboards to replenish the line-up that appear on Ice Cream Castle.

Although a studio version of The Bird was recorded, Prince asked The Time to perform it live. It was recorded at First Avenue on 4 October 1983 and became the version included on the LP and is the only track on which the full band appear in the entire record. The remainder of Ice Cream Castle was recorded by Prince in the studio at Sunset Sound in Hollywood, between the spring of 1983 and spring of 1984, setting down guide vocals for Day to overdub exactly.

Following the huge success of Purple Rain movie, Morris Day too quit The Time to follow a solo career, resulting from a fallout with Prince over the payment for his co-starring role in the movie. Despite playing a leading character Day received just $50,000, from which had to pay $30,000 to the remaining members of The Time. This, together with rifts within in the group caused The Time to disband. The band had felt Prince shunned their creative input and that their albums were in effect Prince records in all but name. Prince responded by creating a replacement spin-off project named The Family, rewarding the loyalty of three of The Time’s line-up (Peterson, Johnson and Benton) with places in that new act. Jessie Johnson likewise embarked on a solo career, taking with him Hubbard and Cardenas.

Prince’s production credit for Ice Cream Castle, like previous projects, was concealed under his pseudonym Jamie Starr (The Starr ★ Company). Prince’s original demo version of Jungle Love containing his guide vocals was released by Warner Brothers on its Originals compilation in 2019.

Cover story

The Time | Ice Cream Castle — Photography by Larry Williams

The photo shoot for the album cover took place at a villa called The Hollywood Castle, 3030 Hollyridge Drive in the hills overlooking the Hollywood Sign. Today a wedding venue, the faux castle was also the location for the filming of Katy Perry’s I Kissed A Girl. The photographer for Ice Cream Castle is Larry Williams, who also shot the covers for all Prince’s 1984 releases: Purple Rain, The Glamorous Life and Apollonia 6.

Key Performers

Vocals: Morris Day
All Instruments: Prince
Drums: Jellybean Johnson ^{The Bird}; Morris Day ^{My Drawers}
Guitar: Jesse Johnson^{My Drawers and If The Kid Can’t Make You Come}
Bass Guitar: Jerry Hubbard ^{The Bird}
Keyboards: Mark Cardenas ^{The Bird}; Paul Peterson ^{The Bird}
Percussion: Jerome Benton ^{The Bird}
Backing vocals: Jill Jones ^{If The Kid Can’t Make You Come}; Sharon Hughes ^{If The Kid Can’t Make You Come}
Violin: Novi Novog ^{Chilli Sauce}

The Time

Vocals: Morris Day
Drums: Jellybean Johnson
Guitar: Jesse Johnson
Bass Guitar: Jerry Hubbard
Keyboards: Mark Cardenas; "St." Paul Peterson
Percussion: Jerome Benton

Data

Production

Prince (as The Starr ★ Company)

Label

Warner Bros. Records

Distribution

Warner Bros. Records

Cover/Design

Larry Williams, Jeffrey Kent Ayeroff and Jeri McManus

Released

39 years ago on 2 July 1984

Running Time

38:16

US Chart Peak

UK Chart Peak

Did not chart

Orig. Formats

Tracklist

Ice Cream Castles [feat. Prince] (7:33) ¹
My Drawers [feat. Prince] (4:04)
Chili Sauce [feat. Prince] (5:45)
Jungle Love [feat. Prince] (5:29) ¹
If The Kid Can't Make You Come [feat. Prince] (7:33)
The Bird (7:40) ¹

Released as a single

¹ Cowritten by Prince and Morris Day.

Ice Cream Castle – review

The Time was the perfect choice as Prince’s foil in the movie Purple Rain. Morris’s even more pimped-up now overcoat donning gigolo heads up The Time, are this time an actual band performing on the album rather than purely Prince – albeit for one song it’s a peach nonetheless. Ice Cream Castle is the third instalment for Prince’s most successful side-project. It opens with the title track albeit pluralised, Ice Cream Castles is a fun opener to The Time’s most well-known and most crowd-pleasing album. Although it contains the band’s two most successful tracks, Jungle Love and The Bird, its best track is If The Kid Can’t Make You Come. And although The Time is great at the big set pieces, their true mark of quality are their ballads. Yet it is two songs that stamp The Time’s hallmark. As much as Prince is remembered for Purple Rain, The Time is remembered for Jungle Love and The Bird. These two tracks alone has paid their mortgages ever since. The Bird recorded live, is the first track in which The Time perform on record as a band, and it’s a thrilling experience. Such a shame that after this album, when the band had reached its commercial height and was at its most established, friction and turbulence saw them part company. Thankfully, the parting was not to last too long.

Ice Cream Castle is rated 4 out of 5 by Goldies Parade.