Dirty Mind (1980)
Prince places a disco-funk flower into the rifle barrel of a Cold War-gripped country still reeling from Vietnam and the result is a bassline more devastating than any bomb. This one’s going out to the dancers, not the fighters – a rallying call for those who’d rather throw shapes than missiles. Morris Day wrote the music (or at least the groove) for Partyup and relinquished the dancefloor detonator in return for the gift of The Time. Which begs the question, if Morris had fire like this in his arsenal why did Prince write the first three Time albums? Maybe lightning doesn’t strike twice. Or maybe it does but it takes Prince to bottle it.