Album: Cold Blooded (1983)

Charted: 40

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Songfacts®:

• Rick James wrote "Cold Blooded" about his girlfriend at the time, Linda Blair, an actress who played the possessed little girl Regan in the 1973 movie The Exorcist. The title implies that she's heartless and cruel, but James had a different definition of the phrase "cold blooded." To him it meant sexy, and Blair knew that - she loved the song.
  
  A little backstory: In 1982, Blair was profiled in a magazine called Oui, where she said Rick James was sexy. James found out and had his people contact her, which kicked off their affair. They split up about two years later but spoke well of each other.
• "Cold Blooded" was released in 1983 around the time Rick James' career was at a peak. He was really funky and highly suggestive in his lyrics, which scared away MTV and most pop radio program directors, but he had a huge following in the Black community. "Cold Blooded" topped out at #40 on the Hot 100 but was a #1 R&B hit.
  
  Like Prince, James could do it all, and on "Cold Blooded" he played all the instruments in addition to writing, producing and singing the song. But unlike Prince, he couldn't get on MTV and never really crossed over despite having a real feel for music. Explaining how he would look for a commercial sound, he told Musician magazine in 1983: "I think I'm a musician who writes for people as opposed to being self-indulgent. I have to like it, but it's basically for people. I concentrate on that, giving them what I think they can dance to and what I think they would appreciate in their ears."
• Rick James' music was sampled a lot in the '90s. You can hear the "sexy, sexy" bit from "Cold Blooded" on the 1999 Ol' Dirty Bastard hit "Got Your Money."
• James liked to slip some sexual innuendo into his lyrics, and he did so here in the line, "In my dick... tionary, sexy, sexy, sexy."
• Most of the instrumentation on the song is synthesizers, which was the hot sound of 1983. When he was writing the song, Linda Blair was in the studio with him. "I started playing synthesizer because she wanted to learn how to write music," he explained in the Billboard Book Of #1 R&B Hits. "I told her anything you play is correct no matter what keys you touch... So I started playing this lick, 'Doom doom doom de doom,' that that's how the song transpired."

Comments: 7

• Black N. Stein from Black PersonvilleThe "n-word" is offensive. I didn't expect to just up and see it on this page. Can you all edit it using some stars like the N****a Please album, or something? Thanks. I would that the music could be clean, but the record companies won't sell a rap album unless it contains some vile elements to destroy Blacks. So...you have GREAT God-given talent, but then, you are given the altamatum--if you WANT to be on this label you need to add certain elements to your songs. Even DeBarge started out wanting to do Christian music/Gospel music, but when they were signed, their label said no. So they re-worked their songs to take the Christian-speaking-to-GOD element out and make them love songs or whatever between two people. But regardless, the word should still be edited in polite society. Thanks. Otherwise, it's like "Oh, we can call Black people that, it's cool!" No one says that about ANY OTHER words that are/were used to disparage an ENTIRE group of people, segment of the earth's population, etc. Off-subject, but I didn't see an easier way to ask for this to be edited. I'm no perfect, not even REMOTELY close--I COMPLETELY suck as a person, but the "n-word" being seen as no big deal is too much, and this has been ramping up in conjunction with the police cases (bad cops don't represent all or even most cops, I don't believe, by-the-way, as a Black person, myself) in which killers were filmed executing innocent people, and then they got off without so much as a slap on the wrist. That, coupled with all of these famous Whites getting "caught" with "found footage" of when they said this word...yeah....sounds like "a plan," to me, but please edit this word. Thanks.
• John from Nashville, TnRick James wrote this song when he was showing Linda Blair how to write a song.
• Jeff from Austin, TxMike from RI, that was HILARIOUS!!! hahah!!!
• Scott from Palm Desert, CaThis song and "You and I" are my favorite Rick James songs.
• Rick from Columbus, GaRick James was distantly related to Marco Polo. One of his ancestors was a slave owner of Italian descent, Enrico Polonomari, and he claimed he was a direct decendent of Marco Polo.
• Mike from Warwick, RiRick James and Linda Blair?? I always wondered how she could get her head to spin like that in the Exorcist - now I know....
• Scott from Bismarck, NdRick James died Aug. 6 2004
  RIP
  'I'm Rick James B***'

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