The Upcoming
  • Culture
    • Art
    • Cinema
      • Movie reviews
      • Film festivals
    • Food & Drinks
      • News & Features
      • Restaurant & bar reviews
      • Interviews & Recipes
    • Literature
    • Music
      • Live music
    • Theatre
    • Shows & On demand
  • Fashion & Lifestyle
    • Accessories
    • Beauty
    • News & Features
    • Shopping & Trends
    • Tips & How-tos
    • Fashion weeks
  • What’s On
    • Art exhibitions
    • Theatre shows
  • Tickets
  • Join us
    • Editorial unit
    • Our writers
    • Join the team
    • Join the mailing list
    • Support us
    • Contact us
  • Interviews
  • Competitions
  • Special events
    • Film festivals
      • Berlin
      • Tribeca
      • Sundance London
      • Cannes
      • Locarno
      • Venice
      • London
      • Toronto
    • Fashion weeks
      • London Fashion Week
      • New York Fashion Week
      • Milan Fashion Week
      • Paris Fashion Week
      • Haute Couture
      • London Fashion Week Men’s
  • Facebook

  • Twitter

  • Instagram

  • YouTube

  • RSS

Feature of the week

Happy 30th birthday Little Red Corvette

Happy 30th birthday Little Red Corvette
27 February 2013
The editorial unit
Avatar
The editorial unit
27 February 2013

Promo

SPONSORED CONTENT

It’s the track that catapulted Prince onto the world stage. And 30 years later this funk-rock groove still thrills like a grid of sports cars revving up under the starter’s flag. Little Red Corvette, we green-light your place in the list of all-time-great auto-themed songs.

Recorded in February 1983, LRC moved the Mineappolis maverick’s career into the fast lane. From the now-iconic album 1999, it was Prince’s first top-10 US hit, and the crowd-pleaser which opened his live shows for years.

Sleazy tale
As the lights went up Prince, draped across a scarlet Vette’s bonnet, would croon and scream this sleazy tale of his one-night stand with a beautiful but loose woman. Auto metaphors pour out – Prince urges his lover to “slow down” she replies “Baby, have you got enough gas?” The climax comes with the line “The ride is so smooth, you must be a limousine” – which in 1983, decades before Beyoncé or Rihanna strutted their stuff – had many choking on the dry ice.

MTV sensation
If you couldn’t get to see Prince cavorting on a Corvette live, there was always MTV. LRC was only the second video showcasing a black artist – after Michael Jackson’s Billie Jean – to play in heavy rotation on the  all -conquering music channel. Streaming the singer’s sound and look to homes around the globe.  

Three more to celebrate
Little Red Corvette isn’t the only great auto-themed song celebrating an important birthday in 2013. Here are three more:

  • Little Deuce Coupe, The Beach Boys, 1963. One of a fleet of auto-focused singles which, along with their signature tracks about surfing, steered the harmonising Californians into poll position in the early 60s pop charts. Fresh, like the Pacific air rushing through a sunroof; electric bright, like the flash of chrome in an LA rear-view mirror at noon; and 50 years young.
  • Racing in the Street, Bruce Springsteen, 1978. In this 35-year-old cut from Darkness on the Edge of Town, the Boss is a guy with a dead-end job whose only soulmate is a self-built ’69 Chevy which he rides “from town to town” in search of similar desperados who race him for money. Eerily bleak and beautiful.
  • Wheels, AC/DC, 2008. Who says they don’t write them like they used to? At just five years old, this titanic rocker starts in overdrive and the foot stays glued to the gas. “Rolling ’round my head, going through the red,” blazes singer Brian Johnson as Angus Young’s guitar flares like a hotrod’s exhaust.

Happy birthday to you all!

 The editorial unit
Photo: Courtesy of Warner Bros

Related Items

More in Feature of the week

Five dream travel destinations for this summer

The editorial unit
Read More

Why coffee should be the first thing you need to go for in the morning

The editorial unit
Read More

How to sell your art online

The editorial unit
Read More

What does the United Nations’ decision about medical cannabis mean?

The editorial unit
Read More

A beautiful home: Five tips and tricks for buying decor online

The editorial unit
Read More

Reduce, reuse, recycle: The case for the cardboard baler

The editorial unit
Read More

Autoclaves: Weapons in the fight against Covid-19

The editorial unit
Read More

Balenciaga footwear and the contemporary fashion industry

The editorial unit
Read More

Upcoming trends for fabulous weddings

The editorial unit
Read More
Scroll for more
Tap

Promo

SPONSORED CONTENT
  • Popular

  • Latest

  • TOP PICKS

  • Female filmmakers lead nominees for the London Critics’ Circle Film Awards
    Cinema
  • An interview with Ifrah Ismael: Tales from the Front Line and other stories
    Theatre
  • Persian Lessons
    ★★★★★
    Cinema
  • Jeremiah Fraites – Piano Piano
    ★★★★★
    Album review
  • Lonely the Brave – The Hope List
    ★★★★★
    Album review
  • Live Lab at The Yard Theatre: An interview with associate director Cheryl Gallagher
    Theatre
  • We Still Fax at ANTS Theatre Online
    ★★★★★
    Theatre
  • We Ask These Questions of Everybody: An interview with Amble Skuse and Toria Banks
    Theatre
  • Hello Cosmos – Dream Harder
    ★★★★★
    Album review
  • Public Domain at Southwark Playhouse
    ★★★★★
    Theatre
  • We Still Fax at ANTS Theatre Online
    ★★★★★
    Theatre
  • WandaVision: Marvel’s charming sitcom proves an astounding success
    ★★★★★
    Cinema
  • The Queen’s Gambit: A chess story that’s not about the moves but the motives
    ★★★★★
    Cinema
  • Undercover at Morpheus Show Online
    ★★★★★
    Theatre
  • Ten short literary collections to get you back into reading
    Literature
The Upcoming
Pages
  • Contact us
  • Join mailing list
  • Join us
  • Our London food map
  • Our writers
  • Support us
  • What, when, why

Copyright © 2011-2020 FL Media

Online sales figures hit all-time high
Computers to extract huge amounts of relevant data