In the summer of 1992, a young pop star from Australia was watching a musical giant rule the stage in London. Kylie Minogue stood backstage at Earls Court, completely amazed by the absolute magic of Prince’s legendary Diamonds and Pearls tour. She was already famous but standing near Prince made anyone feel like an underdog. When the show ended, she gathered her courage and asked the mysterious star what he was working on next. Prince smiled his famous smile and invited her to chat.
Prince Live – Diamonds And Pearls Tour – Earl’s Court, London – 24th June 1992
Soon, they were hanging out in a London hotel room surrounded by studio equipment and wild creative energy. Out of nowhere, the King of Funk looked at her and asked a simple question. “Where are your lyrics?”
Kylie was completely caught off guard. At that early point in her career, she did not write her own music. But she refused to lose her chance with a legend. She grabbed a piece of paper and quickly threw some basic words together for him. She wrote about paradise and being a baby doll. Prince loved the raw ideas. He took her notes, flew across the world and entered a professional recording studio in Sydney, Australia. He sat down with his band, the New Power Generation, to build a funk-filled groove around her words. He laid down a vocal track singing her chorus line. He packed the fresh demo onto a cassette tape and mailed it directly to her address.
Prince – Baby Doll 1992 (Unreleased)
But the road to musical glory is never easy. In a twist of fate, Kylie accidentally lost the physical cassette tape before she could ever step inside a booth to add her final vocals. Kylie’s record label at the time was completely uninterested in the wild idea of Prince producing a track entirely by himself. They wanted to control her pop image, so they completely blocked the collaboration. The song titled “Baby Doll,” was locked away inside Prince’s secret vault at Paisley Park. It became a myth that fans talked about for decades. In 2018, Kylie finally confirmed the lyrics in an interview, but people believed the music was gone forever.
What Happened to Kylie Minogue’s Prince Collaboration
In the summer of 2022, the project almost got its big second chance. The official Prince Estate was putting together an massive archival compilation album called Diamonds and Love. They digitized the old master tapes and prepared “Baby Doll” to finally see the light of day. But at the very last second, corporate executives downsized the project to focus only on material recorded before October 1991. Because “Baby Doll” was created in 1992, it was cut from the tracklist.
Because high-quality digital files of the song now existed within private circles, an anonymous source leaked the entire 32-year-old track onto YouTube channels like New Paisley Generation. For the first time in history, fans can hear Prince’s smooth voice singing those long-lost words: “Let me be your baby doll, sugar and spice and all things nice.”