Janelle Monáe “Make me Feel” vs Prince “Kiss” 💋

Janelle Monáe vs Prince 😳 Prince was a mentor to Monáe and is widely rumored to have participated on “Make me Feel”; though exactly what he did is unclear. Prince's DJ Lenka Paris wrote (in a subsequently deleted Facebook post) that he had played her the synth line before his passing. Describing it as "so futuristic and so good," Paris said: "Last night I heard Janelle Monae's new song. As soon as the synth came in, I went, 'Oh s--t! That's it!' He gave that to her.” However contrary to popular misconception there is no specific credit, instrumental or otherwise, with his name in the liner notes, nor is Prince in the songwriting credits according to the public records (PRS, MLC, BMI and ASCAP). If nothing else he appears to have given it his blessing, and it is fun to note some of the similarities between the song and his 1986 hit “Kiss.” After matching key & tempo (“Kiss” here is dropped down 3 halftones & 3 bpm), we hear that both songs share an arrangement, mapping to each other exactly. But this is in no small part because they’re both a 12 bar blues, an old structure which has been heard in over a hundred years of recorded music. While the 12 bar blues is extremely common, by the late 1960s and early 1970s it already sounded dated, having been expanded upon by the electric blues acts of that era (Zep, Hendrix, Cream etc). Today it is a relatively uncommon song structure in pop music, and tends to evoke the early rock n roll era. So its use in both songs, alongside the many other rhythmic and instrumental similarities, are part of what helps Monae’s song evoke Prince’s. 💜 On the latest ONE SONG we break down the stems & stories behind Janelle Monáe’s 2018 single “Make Me Feel” ✨ please follow for more “inside the music” videos & subscribe to ONE SONG podcast to hear the full hour-long show 🥰

Added 9 Apr 2026