That Was a Hit?!?: Prince, 'Batdance'

Soundcheck | Mar 18, 2013

Can you name all five of Prince's hits that have hit #1 on the Billboard Hot 100?

Go ahead, try.

If you guessed "Kiss," "Let's Go Crazy" and "When Doves Cry," you'd be right. But the last two are pretty tricky. One is "Cream" -- Prince's only #1 hit of the 1990s -- and the toughest of all... is "Batdance."

As music writer and pop chart columnist Chris Molanphy tells us, "Batdance," written for the 1989 Batman film, is more of a mashup or remix than an actual song. It jumps from tempo to tempo, theme to theme -- and includes a lot of maniacal Joker laughter. And, strangely enough, it went higher on the charts than some of Prince's other best known songs -- like “Purple Rain" or "1999."

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