The Inspiration Behind The Classic Song

The Real Story Behind Prince's 'Little Red Corvette' 

It seems that Prince came up with the idea for the 1983 song while he was sleeping in Lisa Coleman’s (you know, from Wendy & Lisa) pink Edsel, after an all-night recording session. This comes from the book Prince: Inside the Music and the Masks, which was published in 2011. 

Another morning, after recording all night, Prince sat in Lisa Coleman’s pink Edsel. At this point, Lisa—a platonic bandmate—was sometimes staying in his home, or with one of his ex-girlfriends, and continued to appear in some of his songs. He was dozing off, but an idea arrived. “I guess I should have known by the way you parked your car sideways that it wouldn’t last,” he thought.
As more lyrics came, he jotted them down between short naps. He started creating a track filled with pensive synthesizer, and a lyric called “Little Red Corvette.”

That’s right, an Edsel. A pink Edsel. The sort of car you’re most likely to associate with the terribly cheesy art on the walls of some strip-mall ‘50s-style diner than you are with the lyrics:

I guess I must be dumb
‘Cause you had a pocket full of horses
Trojan and some of them used
But it was Saturday night
I guess that makes it all right
And you say what have I got to lose?

Right? I mean, “Little Pink Edsel” just wouldn’t have worked. Understanding that you need to swap the car to one more appropriate than the one you were dreaming in when you wrote this is what made the man such a pro.

(Jalopnik.com)