leecaldon said:

RJOrion said:

NewPowerSoul is WAY better than 3121...or Musicology...or Rave

Yikes. The engineer on NPS basically said the album was released unfinished. And you can really hear it in the production/mix/mastering.

I don't remember this. Did HM Buff mention why?

imo, personally I never liked the album 3121,

Ok the title track is good when played LIVE! Black Sweat should have been a smaller hit for him, great song, and the extended version (like the Kiss 12 inch single with a second part) this should have been released from The Vaults.


The rest, is pretty forgettable, Love is Ok though.


Therefor since I really enjoy the Musicology album esp the first half (minus Life O' The Party) - then MY CHOICE:


"Musicology" the album is way better than "3121"..!


I can't wait for the 3 albums to be released all the 8th of feb. on PURPLE vinyl LP's (including Planet Earth).


Ps) FYI thedance is my username, not taken from 3121, it's short for the excellent The Dance Electric" (this was my username on housequake.com, back then many years ago)

SchlomoThaHomo said:

leecaldon said:

Yikes. The engineer on NPS basically said the album was released unfinished. And you can really hear it in the production/mix/mastering.

I don't remember this. Did HM Buff mention why?

This isn't the quote I was looking for, but is an interesting insight nonetheless, from RumAndRaisin of the org-

"Michael B Nelson from the hornheadz was very unhappy with the demo like quality sound of the album, sonically it was very rough and always sounded unfinished to a lot of the guys involved. Hans Buff who was the engineer on the album told a story about Michael B Nelson actually speaking to Prince on the phone saying "i'll pay for it to be re-mixed and remastered!" but Prince wanted it to sound that way, which links to why it came out as an NPG album..."

http://prince.org/msg/7/421582

I love both of these albums. But as of right now. I gotta go with Musicology. But then again, I've listened to it a lot more than 3121

im listening to 3121 and musicology on vinyl at the moment. And enjoying them both very much. More than i did when they were first released on CD. They both are different sounding so i dont know how you can compare them. Its just which sound you prefer. They might not be prince in his prime, but they are very enjoyable to listen too. And are good albums in my opinion. He wasnt going to record another Purple Rain or sign of the times. If you can get your head round that then these records, as well as others . were fine.

My opinion, fwiw, is that Musicology is much stronger and a more enjoyable listen overall. Especially if I listen to them back to back.

I find 3121 to be a bit of illusion, or a bait and switch.. or something. I'm not sure how to describe it. The 1-2 punch of the opening title track and Lolita is awesome, fun, sets a great tone, and overall makes more of an impression on me than any similar moments on Musicology... but it's all downhill from there. Black Sweat pops up early on try to keep things rolling along, but then, for me, things fall off and never really recover.

For the most part, I get very generic vibes from the album. It's not terrible. I can dig on Get On the Boat once in awhile, and Fury was good live (fairly flat here though). The generic R&B / adult contempory of Te Amo, The Word, Incense, Satisfied, Beautiful... I'm sure it hits the spot for some folks, but not for me. Reminds me of the worst of Emancipation.

Enjoy them both. I made a mix of my fave songs from the two.

Musicology, 3121 and Planet Earth are all good albums - but not great albums.

They all have some exceptional standout tracks but 3121 has the most standout tracks.

In fact select tracks from all three albums would make an exceptional single abums.

I put together 15 tracks for this week's gym playlist. They all work great as a single album.

darkroman said:

Musicology, 3121 and Planet Earth are all good albums - but not great albums.

I put together 15 tracks for this week's gym playlist. They all work great as a single album.

Agree with that, though for me each represents a step down from the preceeding one. A trend of diminishing returns that continued, bottoming out with Lotus and MPL (both mostly unlistenable for me). 20Ten has a few nifty tricks up its sleeve, but it's rough sledding between Musicology and Art Official Age. Art and the second HitNRun are both great in my opinion, but all I need is a highlight playlist for 3121 through 20Ten.

Difficult choice, but I think I'd go with Musicology. It has 6 songs that I really love (The Marrying Kind, If I Was the Man in Your Life, On the Couch, Dear Mr. Man, Call My Name and Reflection).

3121 has 3 that I love (Satisfied, Love, The Dance) and 4 that I like very much (Incense and Candles, Te Amo Corazon, Beautiful, Loved and Blessed, Fury).

[Edited 2/11/19 9:59am]