I remember talking before about how I was shocked when Warrant revealed that Prince had tried to sign them but wanted Jani Lane to dance around like he (Prince) and they talked about how they respected Prince as a musician but felt he was not a particularly good guitarist.

Of course, it's hard to take comments like that too seriously because it's *Warrant* for God's sake, but it did make me think about whether more rock-intensive listeners heard Prince differently. Like, I've been a rock fan all my life, but at this point I'm too ensconced within the "Black music" that I probably cannot truly think like a hardcore head.

One thing I will say though is that I have never heard Prince's rock efforts and confused them for "real" rock... To me, it's more like an interesting pastiche of rock (and there is nothing at all wrong with that).

But I've long been more impressed with Prince's rhythm guitar playing than his lead.

You're right about the kind of "rock" musicians who revere Prince being the older, middle-of-the-road sort, but what about the likes of Dave Grohl? Did you see that video where he talks about playing with Prince and he is totally over the moon about it? You think that's more of him being a guy who grew up in the 80s?