Minneapolis sound

The Minneapolis sound is a hybrid mixture of funk, rock, pop, R&B & new wave that was masterminded by Prince in the late 1970s. Its popularity was given a boost throughout the 1980s, thanks to his disciples, including The Time, Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis, Morris Day, Vanity 6, Apollonia 6, Ta Mara & the Seen, Sheila E., Jesse Johnson, Mazarati, & The Family. Prince's third album Dirty Mind from 1980 also earns credit. Some artists who came from Minnesota were influenced by his work and some came from other parts of the U.S. or world, such as Scottish star Sheena Easton, Flint, Michigan's Ready for the World, Augusta, Georgia's Le Klass and both Los Angeles, California's Janet Jackson and Cherrelle. The music is also known as funk-rock.

[edit] Identifying Characteristics

While the "Minneapolis Sound" was a form of funk, it had some distinguishing characteristics:

Synthesizers generally replaced horns, and were used more as accent than as fill or background.
The rhythm was often faster and less syncopated than traditional funk, and owed much to New Wave pop music.
Guitars, while usually (but not always) played "clean" for rhythm parts, were frequently much louder and more aggressively processed during solos than in most traditional funk.
The "bottom" of the sound was less bass-heavy than traditional funk; drums and keyboards filled more of the "bottom".
The drums were more highly processed than in traditional funk, and frequently electronic.