Commercial flop. Personally I think its great,not a masterpiece,but not every album is gonna be a masterpiece,thats impossible.

thedance said:

I have heard the Rave album sold 7.000 copies only in the UK back when it was released...

True, "Rave In 2" is far better.

I must confess I'm responsible for 2 of them.

If I remember correctly, the way the album was distributed made it ineligible for charting in the UK properly. Was it sold at a hefty discount on the week of its release, or something?

Tell what you want but TGRES is a great song and one of his most underrated singles. Album overall is weak for Prince standards (but whole period from mid-90's till 00's is weird). 'The Rainbow Children' is a big comeback.

I might be the only person who likes the album

Weak alright,

But the album did have some killer tracks:

The Greatest Romance is beautiful I agree..
Prettyman so funky..
I Love U But I Don't Trust U Anymore

And of course the brilliant Beautiful Strange on the Rave In2... wow..

sonshine said:

I have yet to make it thru the entire record from start to finish in one listening. I was embarassed for him. It was not up to par. At all. A hot mess.

That's the sentiment many on PPML ("pre-prince.org" site) shared on Prince's late-90s output: embarrassment.

I remember someone commenting that he didn't want his friends catching him listening to NPS and Rave.

Both records have their own appeal, but it's really not the type of appeal that a non-fan could really understand.

never understood the backlash against NPS, there's some good headbobbin' music there. Sure, not as good as Exodus, but then, few records are..

It was a flop for Arista.

But for Prince it was highly successfull : he earned a reported 11 millions dollars in advance for the album. He sold 500.000 in a few week on his name only : the commercial potential for this project was there, and this is too bad that Prince didn't play the game. Once he was paid, he didn't care anymore.

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As databank pointed it out, TGRES was the worst choice of single possible, and the late delivery of the music video didn't help either. It wasn't even eligible in the uk charts.

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So far so pleased was the obvious lead single, it was radio friendly at least.

And for the rnb market, Hot Wit U was also obvious.

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Personnally I always loved the album.

That album came out at a happy time in my life, so I have fond memories of it...

As others have said, after some good mainstream hype, having TGRES as the lead-off single was sooooo Prince. It was like Betcha By Golly Wow all over again.

I'm not sure how Silly Game made it to the album, that is one of Prince's weakest cuts all all time IMO

feeluupp said:

Prince had periods where his main objective was to gain his commercial clout back... The three most signifcant years for that were, 1991 Diamonds & Pearls, 1999 Rave, 2004 Musicology...

Batman.
If you splice Rave Un 2 with Rave In2, something I found myself doing more and mover with his releases over the years (combining Come with NPS, Chocolate Invasion with Slughterhouse, LotusFlow3r with MPLSound) you can squeeze a decet album of it. I never minded Undistputed (in fact it's one of my favorite tracks on the album) and the freaky corn rows as much as other people and loved the Rave DVD (minus the editing) but, yeah, not a great record. Or even a good one.

[Edited 6/26/17 8:48am]

flop..

tried to be this -----> carlos santana - supernatural.

I always liked the Rave album some gems on there & I'm big on Chaos & Disorder while many are not...& I was never big on anything Purple Rain so usually how the crowd flows on his music I am opposite...find what you like & stick with it with no regard what others say.

Flop, but I liked his look

It doesn't matter if you think the album is bad, that's not what prevent an album to be a hit. It wasn't worst than what aired on the radio at the time. Santana's album wasn't a masterpiece neither, I'm sorry.

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If it was promoted with good singles, good music video, and with the involvment of Prince, sympathetic and happy to promote his album, Rave would have been 2*PLATINUM in the states easily.

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Just like any Prince album in the 90's.

RODSERLING said:

It doesn't matter if you think the album is bad, that's not what prevent an album to be a hit. It wasn't worst than what aired on the radio at the time. Santana's album wasn't a masterpiece neither, I'm sorry.

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If it was promoted with good singles, good music video, and with the involvment of Prince, sympathetic and happy to promote his album, Rave would have been 2*PLATINUM in the states easily.

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Just like any Prince album in the 90's.

RAVE was one of the most promoted albums... Along with Musicology and D&P...

Check Prince's tv appearances that year, it's almost a third of all his tv appearances in his career.... I mean he was on TRL for gods sake... CNN Larry King, he was everywhere promoting it.. The album and his look just wasn't "in" for that time...

Bad job of putting Greatest Romance as the lead single smh. Should have been So Far So Pleased or Baby Knows. Fit with the times.

paisleypark4 said:

Bad job of putting Greatest Romance as the lead single smh. Should have been So Far So Pleased or Baby Knows. Fit with the times.

imho Greatest Romance is the best song on this album,

So Far So Pleased and Baby Knows..? as a single??



Those are bad songs imo, sorry I don't like those - we share different opinions for sure..

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[Edited 6/27/17 9:36am]

TKO said:

I might be the only person who likes the album

..no u r not....theres plenty of filler on it.....but the core is an excelent album

Commercially it was a flop. I remember the TRL premiere; the video wasn't even finished. However, it's got some great, great songs on it.

feeluupp said:

RODSERLING said:

It doesn't matter if you think the album is bad, that's not what prevent an album to be a hit. It wasn't worst than what aired on the radio at the time. Santana's album wasn't a masterpiece neither, I'm sorry.

.

If it was promoted with good singles, good music video, and with the involvment of Prince, sympathetic and happy to promote his album, Rave would have been 2*PLATINUM in the states easily.

.

Just like any Prince album in the 90's.

RAVE was one of the most promoted albums... Along with Musicology and D&P...

Check Prince's tv appearances that year, it's almost a third of all his tv appearances in his career.... I mean he was on TRL for gods sake... CNN Larry King, he was everywhere promoting it.. The album and his look just wasn't "in" for that time...

I know it was well promoted by Arista. But you can put millions dollars in promotion, if you are not releasing the good singles, with music videos, it won't work (as with Invincible).

I'm not sure why so many people the the In2 Special Edition is so much better.

I much prefer the Un2 versions of Rave (the song) and ManOWar. I don't think the extended versions of Prettyman, Tangerine and Baby Knows add very much. And Strange But True is missing (from what I read recently, it was his engineer who persuaded him to put it on the original album).

It's nice to have the addition of Beautiful Strange and the new version of Undisputed is an improvement (although it's still not a very good song) and the extended version of TGRES is a gem.

Anyone want to argue against that?

I still think Prettyman should have been the lead single. I think that song would have rocked the charts.

In fairness to Prince, the record industry as a whole was in freefall at that point. That was the peak of the Napster era, and the industry was still dealing with the notion that selling music via physical objects (CDs) wasn't going to work out, but there was no widespread broadband or mobile tech ready to replace it.

I always thought the deathknell of that album was the version of Rave that was released. I LOVED the version on the Small Club boot- that amazing guitar and driving beat. The version on RUTJF is a pale imitator. If YouTube had been a thing, his commercial hit that year wouldn't have been anything from that album- it would have been the collaboration with Lenny Kravitz from the Y2K show.

[Edited 6/28/17 16:14pm]

Rave is one of my fav Prince albums. He made this album after he broke free from WB, and it was a big turning point in his career. He seemed to really be blossoming during this time and after the painful breakup/divorce and loss of his newborn son. It was kinda ironic because at the time, I was also going through a breakup with my fiancee, and a lot of the songs helped me get through this very difficult time in my life.

I enjoyed the album. And reading what Mayte had to say about it, especially the line "I love you but I don't trust you anymore" made me appreciate what a bold writer Prince was. That song really stood out for me.

i love this album, enuff 2 pay the high prices to own the vinyl finally