After reading the Rolling Stone Review of Lotusflow3r, MPLSound and Elixer I noticed one of the comments by somenoe who bought the record made a very good point. Should his release really get 2 more stars tha Kelly Clarkeson or 2 less than U2 ( a band who irritated the crap out of me not just because Bono is a class a cock but because they have been releasing the same drivel over and over for years).

I think the reason why reviewers and fans alike are such hard task masters is because in amongst the pile of bland copyest stuff that Prince is very capable of producing there always gleams a true gem that reminds us all just why we fell in love with his music in the first place. The new ablums are another example of this though I have to say that if you give them enough time to sink in there are more great songs than mediocre. I honestly can't remember the last time listened to a new Prince release that did it for me the whole way through.

I have bought music by artists who I considered to be sure fire and hated everything on the record to my total surprise. I have never bought a Prince album since first falling in love with his music (at the tender age of 11 in 1984 while sat on a hotel bed watching MTV in florida while on holiday with my folks - When doves cry was the song) and ever experienced sitting through the whole thing without going 'Wow' at least once.

How can an artist with so many strings to his bow satisfy everyone? Its just not possible. Somebody is going to be dissappointed. There are fans of his rock, his funk, his Jazz (ie News and Xenophbia though I use the term Jazz loosely), his soul, his RnB etc etc etc. I think Prince can be criticised for having a 'Plastic' sound on occassion, which works if you're Basement Jaxx when its intentional but not in the context of our hero's music but in reality I think the huge expanse of his work is amazing. Why he can't record the songs then re-visit the studio with a live band and record it warts and all like half of Purple Rain was I don't know. Sometime the little mess ups are the things that provide the Charm but his pursuit of perfection often backfires and dilutes the attitude and hard edge that some of the tunes really need. Speaking as a producer myself, I have agonised about whether to leave the sound of the upright bassplayers heavy breathing in the mix (amognst other oddities) so I know the hard choices and how being a little less precious can add a new dimension.

Anyway, to all the heavy handed critics, give the bloke a break. Most stuff that dribbles out of the radio these days is so carefully postured and pretensious that it might as well be white noise as far as my ears are concerned! I think all three of the new discs have real gems and some fillers alike but I'd hazard a guess that my fillers are somebody elses gems and vice versa so the whole argument is a waste of time.

kidsherriff said:

Yes, this is always the case with Prince. Always has been, always will be and that's the real beauty. Would anyone rather he had released 1 album now instead of 3? The disc could have included every song I don't like, or it could have included every song that you don't. It's amazing that we get presented with a wealth of material like this and you gotta love him for it.

I feel truly lucky with this set though, there's not a track on Lotus Flower or MPLSound that I feel the need to skip. I even like a few on Elixir too. This hasn't always been the case with his multi disc releases.

TheEnglishGent said:[quote]

kidsherriff said:

THIS.

I think he could have passed on the double ablum thing and just done one good one. Although Lotusflow3r works alot better with Crimson and Clover in place of that other track which I admit I do not like @ all. Still we float in a sea of mediocrity in today's music, it's nice to have an island to land on.

terribleg said:[quote]

TheEnglishGent said:

And that's exactly the point made by the op. I love The Morning After and think it fits much better with the flow of the album. Love Crimson too but just not in that place.

Honestly I think if Prince did not have his brilliant past - nobody would be talking about this new 3CD release. Only about 1/3 of it is decent and even that decent stuff does not compare to his best stuff from the past. Colonized Mind is a classic though. And the new U2 is great and I have been following them for more than 20 years now. Way better than their last 2 releases.

japanrocks said:

japanrocks said:

You just demonstrated my point beautifully. There is no right or wrong in music taste; there is only opinion!

kidsherriff said:

Why don't you kids grow up and realize that some of us haven't switched on a radio in ages and are listening to the tons of great stuff that doesn't get airplay.

Also, it still doesn't change the fact that Lotusflow3r doesn't contain a single thing that is worthy of being mentioned in the same breath as 90% of the stuff Prince put out in the 1980s.

kidsherriff said:

Lemme point you to PRINCE's opinion: how much did he play from these discs at his recent concerts?

BartVanHemelen said:

So now you're Prince's psychologist?!!!! He played back catalogue stuff to try and satisfy all quarters. Music is about opinion not definites. Why would reviewers be so divided otherwise? One mans meat is another mans murder!

BartVanHemelen said:

you have a point. he hardly played songs from planet earth at his london concerts. only a snippet of guitar, and sometimes planet earth and chelsea rodgers at one of the aftershows, but that's it. the songs from his new cd's should work fine live

tomds said:

He has been doing that since 1996. How many songs from Emancipation did he play? How many from Rave? Etcetera. And before someone mentions TRC: the amount of TRC songs was rapidly reduced during the tour, and by the time they hit Europe the Hits were once again back in charge.

kidsherriff said:

So you admit he's an oldies act, and that he wouldn't please anyone by playing his new music?

FYI: Throughout the 1980s, Prince's concerts focused on his CURRENT albums. Most fans would agree that those are the legendary concerts, coupled with the 1994/95 era, in which he mainly played new music and B-Sides.

Prince knows damn well that his current music is bunk and that no one gives a damn about it. Hence: he doesn't play it. Not even at concerts that are largely populated by fan club members.

BartVanHemelen said:

In the 80's Prince's back catalogue was a tiny fraction of the size it is now. His fans span several generations so in order to appeal to a wider audience he has to hedge his bets and play material from each era. As for the ONA tour, I was in the audience at two shows and have to dissagree about the amount of material played from the Rainbow Children album. As for the 21 nights in London gigs I was there for three nights and 1 aftershow and have to say the same thing happened there too. He played a huge chunck of it. The last time Prince performed gigs that were mainly new material was back in the Beautiful experience era and that was to make a point about the Warner Brothers bollocks that he was bangin' on about at the time.

I personally would like Prince to throw the rule book out the window like he did between Dirty Mind and Lovesexy and just get completely self indulgent but I put that largely down to the fact that I'm a thirty five year old bloke who was going through a period in life when music was everything to me so I associate that as Prince's 'Golden era'. Now I'm older, new music rarely has the same impact on me. Occassionally I hear something that knocks me flat on my ass but I'm not a teenager any longer so I don't place the same value in new records. That and the fact that music is my trade so as a musician/producer you tend to deconstruct music which often takes away the magic.

My personal view is that nothing for years has impressed me the way the early stuff did but as I said before that is down to the period of my life I'm in now and personal taste.

I just wish the arty farty Prince would rear his head every now and again.

BartVanHemelen said:

All a matter of taste, but I've got the feeling that if, for example, Dance 4 Me would have been released in the 80's it would have been just as praised as Shockadelica and other Camille tunes. I can't see it being beneath those songs in any way. I think that a lot of those that don't like anything of Prince's "new" material don't really know what it is they long for. The kind of songs you love might be so brilliant because you (I mean "you" as in "people") were much younger when you first heard them, because the times were different, etcetera. I'm not sure if, say, When Doves Cry (although there are better examples) would be such a success if it were released now.

BartVanHemelen said:

Oh God Bart (I'll use one of the words you love to use) you sound "pathetic". Prince could handle playing his new material at his recent concerts it's some of the fans that would be disappointed if he didn't play his hits. And regardless he played all of his new music at all three Leno performances (national TV) as well as a few at the LA shows.

BartVanHemelen said:

You have a good point that he would play stuff of his current albums in the 80's but in the 90's it was the lame ass fans who would take their seats during the new material songs that Prince would play so I'm sure through Prince's eyes if he played songs like KIss he could get them out of their seats and get the place jumping again which he did. People don't go to Prince concerts to sit and observe new music they go to groove and dance to the music.

PEJ said:

Mm, when you have been in the biz for so long and have the status Prince has the majority of people expect you to play their favorite oldies. But we all know that. How often don't people complain when a musician played more new than old songs? It's obviously different with the hard core fans but plenty of people that go to the shows aren't on that level. I was at a Bob Dylan concert a while ago and people in the audience even booed because he refused to play any old songs.
Now of course, balance is always important so if P did 50/50 it would probably go down well. Now that he has 3 new (imo high quality) CDs out he can do that.