Last week, after the tragic departure of legendary recording artist Prince, we wrote a story exploring the origins of the hit song “Little Red Corvette.” According to our source, the song was originally inspired by – and written within – a pink Edsel.
This, it turns out, is not the case. Jalopnik acquired that information from the biography Prince: Inside the Music and the Masks, but while author Ronin Ro’s account of the story behind Prince’s “Little Red Corvette” was mostly accurate, he misreported the make of Lisa Renata’s personal car.
How do we know? Because Ms. Renata’s wife and manager, Renata Kanclerz, contacted Jalopnik to set the record straight.
“‘Little Red Corvette’ is actually a 1964 Mercury Montclair Marauder,” said Ms. Kanclerz. “Prince helped [Lisa] buy it at auction in 1980 in Minneapolis. Lisa still owns the car. (Although, we need to restore it.) It’s still essentially original… Prince even gave it a few dents.”
So, there you have it; Prince did not write the song “Little Red Corvette” about a Chevrolet Corvette, and he didn’t even write it about a pink Edsel as we reported last week. He wrote it about a Mercury Montclair Marauder like the one pictured above: a V8-powered vintage muscle car with at least twice the “cool” factor of any Edsel.
A big thanks to Jalopnik and Ms. Kanclerz for setting the record straight.
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