Can you take me through your process of mixing the songs from this album for the 1986 movie Under the Cherry Moon ?
us while laughing. Some guy would be wiping his head and saying “What the hell?” After a couple times, one of the guys called the waiter over and said, “You know, your air-conditioning is broken. It is leaking all over me.” [ laughs ] We laughed our asses off. It was typical of the fun we had together. It was so hard because we couldn’t burst out loud laughing. They would’ve known something was up, if we did. We couldn’t stop smiling during the whole dinner. It was great.
David Z: To mix songs for a film is different than mixing them for an album. To mix for a record, you mix left, right, and stereo. For film, you mix left, center, right, and then surround. Back then, we were using something called a Dolby box, which routed some of the sound to the surround speakers in the back of the movie theater. Anything you pan left to right is going to be shadowed in the surround speakers a little bit. It’s kind of a different kind of mix because we had to have eight channels. We premixed down to an eight-track machine. We had drums left and right. The guitar parts were on two tracks. The keyboard parts were divided on two tracks. The background vocals were divided on two tracks. The lead vocal was on one track and the effects were on two separate tracks; so when we went in to mix the movie, there was only eight tracks that were like submasters. Then you can mix it in a theater setting. We mixed it at Todd-AO Studio back then. It was a movie theater that didn’t have any seats in it. We mixed music on one board, dialogue on another board, and sound effects on the other board. There were three sets of people working to combine all the elements. It was pretty fun. During the mixing of the movie, I walked up to the mix studio one day, and I had to walk through the movie lot. At that time, I saw Prince talking to somebody. The person’s back was towards me. As I got closer, I was holding these big, heavy reels of tape, and as I walked up, I saw it was Michael Jackson. [ laughs ] I was in awe. Prince said, “David, do you know Michael?” I replied, “No. I don’t.” Michael said, “Hi, how are you?” I shook his hand. But I was still carrying these heavy tapes, and I didn’t want to interrupt their conversation. I said to Michael, “It was nice to meet you.” As I turned to leave, I heard Prince say, “Michael, he’s too busy to talk to you.” [ laughs ] That was his sense of humor. He said it so I could hear it. It was funny. I don’t know what they were talking about. After they were done talking, they both walked into the movie mix studio with their bodyguards. Prince had that guy named Chick, and he was huge. Michael had his bodyguard too. The mix and movie were looking and sounding good. Prince was happy. There was a Ping-Pong table set up in the middle of the big screen and the board. This was a huge, movie-sized theater room. Prince was very competitive, and he loved Ping-Pong. He asked Michael, “Do you want to play Ping-Pong?” Michael replied, “I don’t know how to play, but I’ll play.” So they started playing Ping-Pong in front of us while we were working. I was in the process of mixing, and it was really distracting. It wasn’t just two regular people playing Ping-Pong. Everybody looked at each other, and we were like, “That’s Prince and Michael Jackson playing Ping-Pong!” At one point, Prince asked Michael, “Do you want me to slam it?” Michael replied, “Yeah. Okay.” Prince slams the ball and Michael drops the paddle and puts his hands in front of his face to protect his face. The game was over then. Michael walked out with his bodyguard and Prince was strutting around saying, “Did you see that? He played like Helen Keller.” He was so proud. [ laughs ] It was just the way he was. He was a very funny guy. He had a great sense of humor. We used to do all kinds of practical jokes, which if he was still alive, he wouldn’t want me to tell.
Do you have another one of those stories?
David Z: I have a few. I’ll give you a short one. One day, he called me out to his house. He had a studio in his house on the lake in Minnesota. I drove out to his house, and for some reason, it was ninety-eight degrees that day. I wore a really loud Hawaiian shirt with palm trees, toucan birds, island greens and blues. I never wore stuff like that. I came into the studio and he said, “We’re going to edit ‘Erotic City.’ ” That was the name of the song he was working on. We had to cut it down because it was really long. So the tape machine I was cutting on was underneath these big, huge speakers that were in the ceiling. I was trying to cut on the bass drum and make splices. I said to him, “I’m having a rough time hearing the kick drum under the speakers like this.” He responded, “Well, that’s because your shirt is too loud.” [ laughs ] As you look back on the significance of the album three decades later, how do you feel about Prince and being involved in the making of such a compelling album? David Z: I’ve been involved with a few hits, but when a song gets so big, it is something you never expect to happen, especially after the conversation I had over the song “Kiss.” I never thought it would have such a huge impact on music. But it did. It’s almost like, when you hear the song playing on the radio or in the club, you’re like, “I didn’t have anything to do with that.” [ laughs ] You take a step back and say what the hell. The power of the media made everyone aware of it. That’s what was amazing to me was the power of the media. When you create a song, you’re doing it for yourself. Making music is something we do for ourselves as musicians. If it makes us happy, then that’s great. Luckily, it coincides with the public’s taste. It’s amazing how everyone gets inundated with your song and the power of the media was fantastic. Whenever I’d work on something, I’d always think about what Prince would think. He was the guy I compared everything to. His opinion on things was my beacon of goodness. I really miss him. Susan Rogers: The outpouring of attention, respect, and affection that we’ve seen after his passing is something I never would’ve imagined in my wildest dreams. What he received in public adoration is what I thought he deserved. I wished he would’ve had more of that during his lifetime. I’m very grateful to see that the public is recognizing what an important figure he was in American music. I was grateful then and aware of how lucky I was every minute [of] every day to be working with that guy. It was not lost on me at all. I was a fan of his before I began working for him. I believed he was great very early on. To look back on it now, I think the public got this one right. There is no mistake in recognizing the importance and brilliance of this American musician. He is dearly missed by all of us. .
What was one of the practical jokes that you guys pulled off together?
David Z: We’d go out to these fancy restaurants with these white tablecloths. We’d bring a mini squirt gun, and we’d take turns lifting up the tablecloth and squirting up in the air over the tables next to
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( opposite ) Photograph by Jeff Katz. Courtesy of Warner Bros.
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