February 11, 1983, Hartford Civic Center. I’ll never forget it.

It was cold and the snow was coming down, but I didn’t care. Prince was the headliner but I really wanted to see THE TIME! They blew Prince away with this show and was one of the reasons why they got kicked off of this tour. The 1999 tour was the debut of Vanity 6.On this tour, Vanity 6 along with The Time were the opening acts. The Time was forced to play as Vanity 6’s band during their 40-minute set with only a small increase in pay.

The Time were further slighted by having to play behind a curtain, while Vanity 6 performed out front on stage. As time went on, the tension between The Time and Prince escalated. Prince was getting increasingly insecure with The Time’s nightly ass kickings which led to Prince dropping them from the tour completely.

Poor Prince. He created a monster with this group. Prince recovered and his shows got better. He had much better players and material as the years went by, but man, The Time…they were firing on all cylinders on this tour. I’m glad this is on youtube: