.

Prince Parties With Naomi Campbell, Whoopi Goldberg Onstage at MSG

Welcome 2 America Tour continues with Sheila E. cameo

December 20, 2010 12:15 PM ET
Prince Parties With Naomi Campbell, Whoopi Goldberg Onstage at MSG
Kevin Mazur/WireImage

On Saturday night, Prince continued his Welcome 2 America Tour with a show at New York's Madison Square Garden. The career-spanning setlist included a few songs with legendary drummer and frequent Prince collaborator Sheila E., a raft of hits from Prince's seemingly bottomless catalog and a show-closing onstage dance party.

Rob Sheffield reviews the first night of Prince's Welcome 2 America tour

The show opened with "Welcome 2 America" and went right into a cover of Sylvester's 1978 disco classic "Dance (Disco Heat)," then veered into the Purple Rain-spawned declaration "Baby I'm a Star." Ballerina Misty Copeland, who performed in Prince's 2009 video for his cover of "Crimson and Clover," then came out to accompany Prince's performance of the intense ballad "The Beautiful Ones."

The Hottest Live Photos of the Week

And then a dance party broke out, with Prince tossing out hits like "Delirious" and "Let's Go Crazy" and a cover of "Cool" by his Minneapolis cohorts the Time. Sheila E. came out to duet on "U Got The Look," perform her Prince-penned 1984 hit "The Glamorous Life" and show off some of her drumming skills.

Random Notes: Gaga, Lil Wayne, And More

The show's first encore was an extended take on Prince's legendary 1986 track "Kiss"; for the show's second (and final) encore, Sheila E. returned and Prince invited up celebrities who were scattered around the stage, which was shaped like Prince's trademark glyph. ?uestlove, Whoopi Goldberg, Dr. Cornel West and Naomi Campbell were among the VIPs who boogied to an extended version of Prince and Sheila E.'s duet "A Love Bizarre."

On Sunday, Prince promised that he had plans for his New York fans before his next show at MSG, which is scheduled for December 29. "Sit Still 4 9 days? Expect surprises if U'r in NY," he posted late Sunday. He then added, "Got a cool place 4 U 2 chill B4 the 29ths show at MSG. Details soon."

Welcome 2 America Live [LiveNation.com]

To read the new issue of Rolling Stone online, plus the entire RS archive: Click Here

prev
Music Main Next

blog comments powered by Disqus
Daily Newsletter

Get the latest RS news in your inbox.

Sign up to receive the Rolling Stone newsletter and special offers from RS and its
marketing partners.

X

We may use your e-mail address to send you the newsletter and offers that may interest you, on behalf of Rolling Stone and its partners. For more information please read our Privacy Policy.

Song Stories

“V.T.T.L.O.T.F.D.G.F.”

Fishbone | 1985

Quite a few musicians have utilized initials for song titles -- Michael Jackson's "P.Y.T.," Abba's "S.O.S.," Donald Fagen's "I.G.Y.," etc. But the more curiously initialed tune has to be "V.T.T.L.O.T.F.D.G.F.," short for "Voyage to the Land of the Freeze-Dried Godzilla Farts." Fishbone's original guitarist, Kendall Jones, explained to Rolling Stone, "When Norwood [Fisher] wrote it, he introduced it to the band saying, 'Man, I've been hearing about all these Nazi right-wing groups on the news saying the Holocaust was staged. So what if America said it never dropped two atom bombs on Japan, that it was actually Godzilla popping a couple off?' Only Norwood would come up with something that out." The same year "V.T.T.L.O.T.F.D.G.F." was released, the film Godzilla 1985 appeared in North America.

More Song Stories entries »