From their origins as
Prince's first pet project to their self-produced funk-rock oeuvre,
the Time has been a fascinating and outrageous congregation. Vocalist
Morris Day infused his cocky, swaggering personality into dance hits that would make
Rufus Thomas envious, and, unlike most of the competition, the band managed to do something unique with
Prince's genre-busting innovations. The Time temporarily disbanded in the late '80s, with
Day going on to a solo career,
Jesse Johnson crafting two dazzling solo albums, and
Jimmy Jam and
Terry Lewis becoming one of the most successful production teams this side of
Gamble & Huff, working with everyone from
Full Force and
Janet Jackson to
the S.O.S. Band and
Human League. The group re-formed in 1990 and released the excellent
Pandemonium, which hit the Top 20 in the U.S. Time spent much of the '90s with solo records, but virtually the entire band reunited in the early 2010s as the Original 7ven, releasing the album Condensate in 2011. ~ John Floyd