On the influence of Prince

Vanity 6's most famous song, 'Nasty Girl', may be less well known than Prince's greatest hits, but it's among the most influential songs Prince has written.  It's easy to trace a line from Madonna, who in her earliest incarnation could have been a fourth member of the band, on to Janet Jackson, whose 1986 song 'Nasty' (produced by two former members of The Time) 



reverses the gender from 'nasty girls' to 'nasty boys', to Britney Spears, who claimed the track 'Boys',



from her 2001 album Britney, had 'a kinda Prince feel to it', but actually lifts directly from 'Nasty Girl' (the song is produced by The Neptunes, and its remixed version, 'Boys (The Co-Ed Remix)', 



features vocals from Pharrell Williams, a producer and rapper and diehard Prince fanatic).  Britney's 'Let's turn this dance floor into our own little nasty world', and repeated invocations to 'get nasty', are clear Xeroxes of Vanity's 'my own little nasty world' and 'dance nasty girls'. 




pp. 81 - 82, Matt Thorne's PRINCE.