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Sign O’ The Times Tour

1987

It ain’t about the money, we just wanna play.

Sign O’ The Times Tour was Prince’s first tour as a solo artist again since his disbanding of The Revolution in October 1986. The rehearsals were conducted at his third and last rented warehouse, sited on Washington Avenue in Edina, Minnesota. Not large enough to accommodate the full set, the full stage rehearsals took place in April 1987 at the Birmingham NEC Arena over 10 days prior to the show’s opening in Sweden.

Sign O The Times Tour opened just eight months following The Revolution’s final live performance with Prince on the Parade Tour. A new backing band was assembled, the key introduction Sheila E taking Bobby Z’s seat on drums. Having been the opening act for Prince for his previous two tours, Sheila was a solo artist in her own right and received her own segment in the main show. Miko Weaver, guitarist in The Revolution’s extended line-up for Parade Tour filled the place of Wendy Melvoin on rhythm guitar; Prince taking Weaver’s former role on lead guitar. Newcomer Levi Seacer Jr was enlisted in replacement of Mark Brown on bass. Revolution’s last standing member Matt “Dr” Fink retained his place on keyboards, and was joined by Boni Boyer on second keyboards and supporting vocals. Boyer, Weaver and Seacer who were all introductions from Sheila’s Oakland based backing band E-Train, completed Prince’s vision to source a funkier touring band which he felt was lacking with The Revolution. Other’s keeping their places in Prince’s band were dancers Greg Brooks and Wally Safford, having been incorporated into the touring line-up since Purple Rain Tour. Sign O’ The Times Tour was also Prince’s first to add a dancer to the main line-up. TV talent show Star Search runner-up Catherine “Cat” Glover, having met Prince at an LA nightclub and originally hired as choreographer for Vanity 6, was enlisted to dance on the Sign O’ The Times Tour and became a fully fledged member of the band. She was notable for her dance shimmy the ‘Cat scat’.

The staging of Sign O’ The Times Tour was once again the brainchild of Prince’s long-term production designer LeRoy Bennett. The set formed an urban scene scape with a moonlit backdrop, the buildings bearing a mishmash of neon signs ‘Girls Girls Girls, All Nude’, ‘Hotel’, ‘Bar’, ‘Uptown’, ‘Loans’ and ‘Pool’, drawing a seedier reinterpretation of the theatrical production Guys And Dolls as seen on the LP’s cover. The props featured a large heart-shaped mirror that swung upright and down on hydraulics, placed on a high central rear riser accessed by a ramp stage right. Sheila E’s turquoise Yamaha drumkit with twin bass drums occupied a lower central riser positioned in front. The drum riser was fronted by a Pontiac Grand Prix car grill. Boyer’s keyboards were sited on the high rear riser stage left of the heart, accompanied by Prince’s grand piano. Fink’s keyboards occupied the riser stage right. This main riser sported industrial-looking girders fronted in mesh. A further riser, accessed by a ramp, stood stage left for Prince’s guitar solos, its railings interwoven with flower stems. Spotlighting was integrated into windows cut out in the street set backdrop. On the stage floor was a mock bar for Stafford and Brooks. The guitarists were located stage right, and Prince up front and centre. Rigged above the stage were two large neon signs ‘LOVE’ and ‘SEX’ and six aluminium hexagonal light boxes for dynamic effect.

Prince played a range of instruments in the shows, his peach coloured Cloud guitar, Hammond B3 Organ, even swapping with Sheila E on drums. Sign O’ The Times Tour was Prince’s boldest set to date, given its versatility to accommodate both indoor and outdoor venues. Prince’s latest spin-off group Madhouse provided the show’s opening act – and because she was performing in the main show, Sheila E, member of Madhouse, was stood in on drums by her own drummer Dale Alexander. Audio technician for the tour was Prince’s home studio engineer Susan Rogers. On one night, while performing Purple Rain, Prince turned to Sheila and proposed to her on stage.

Following the itinerary of 1986’s Parade Tour, in light of that tour’s success in Europe just nine months before, Prince staged the follow-up Sign O The Times Tour also in Europe only. Tickets went on sale just weeks after the album’s release that March and sold out immediately, a total audience of 350,000 attended its run of 34 shows. Feeling he did not wish to continue the tour to the US where sales of the LP were less strong, no US venues were booked.

That desire to focus the Sign O’ The Times Tour on Europe where his recent albums sold better marked a real shift in Prince’s favouring of Europe over the US which continued well into the 1990s. Fate would see Sign O’ The Times Tour inadvertently miss the UK as its two shows scheduled at Wembley Stadium on 25th and 26th June 1987 were cancelled due to poor weather. Earls Court was hastily booked in replacement but the permits could not be issued in time, and so with no suitable alternative indoor venue available, Sign O’ The Times Tour returned to continental Europe. This experience left Prince reluctant to play outdoor venues in later tours. Prince instead played an extra date in the Netherlands, but the weather continued to dog much of the remaining Europe leg. Its curtailment inspired Prince to have the show preserved on film and provide means for American and British audiences denied seeing the shows in person to watch it on TV – repeating what he had done to placate European audiences when abandoning the Europe leg of Purple Rain Tour in 1985. The resulting Sign O’ The Times movie was released with footage captured from the three performances of Sign O’ The Times Tour staged at Rotterdam’s Sportpaleis Ahoy, interspersed with re-recordings and extra scenes staged and shot as the first project undertaken at his newly completed Paisley Park Studios. Perhaps the real reason Prince wanted to race home.