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"Early on in his new live album, Prince admonishes his audience for what he thinks they may be expecting. "If you came here to get your Purple Rain on," he says, "you in the wrong house." He goes on to add that he's not interested in what his audience knows, but what they are willing to learn.}}}

That's a bold statement from a once-relevant artist like Prince, who hasn't had a hit in a decade. The general public, as a rule, doesn't like to be taught things, and also doesn't like to be reminded of how much they don't know. America remembers Prince for Purple Rain, 1999 and Sign O' the Times, and that's about it. They may remember his contribution to the Batman film, and might recall later hits like "Diamonds and Pearls" and "The Most Beautiful Girl in the World," but doubtless most of the nation's consumers are unaware that Prince has continued to make music during the last 10 years.

Not to feed the man's ego, but if you've lost track of Prince since 1993, you've been missing one of the most dramatic and experimental transformations afforded by pop culture. More accurately, the type of musical reinvention that Prince has undergone has only recently been made possible by pop culture, specifically the internet. More than any of his contemporaries, the Minneapolis wunderkind has seized hold of the 'net, gambling on it to float his artistic endeavors.

Prince calls his online home the NPG Music Club, and for years it's been his primary form of contact with his audience. Not only is Prince aware that his audience has diminished considerably since his commercial heyday, but he encourages it, shunning the marketplace and refusing to compromise his vision. Most often, it works: the general public has left him well enough alone since he changed his name to an unpronounceable symbol and started releasing three-hour albums at regular intervals.

Prince isn't content with just avoiding the public, however - he actively seeks to repel it. His major label "comeback" album, 1999's Rave Un2 the Joy Fantastic, was his weakest in many years, and conversely, his independently released 2001 record, The Rainbow Children, was a masterpiece. For the last 10 years, Prince has been all about his core fans, to the point of offering them whole albums through the NPG Music Club that are unavailable anywhere else, and giving club members the best seats at all his concerts. It's as if he knows there's only a select few out there who will get what he's doing, and he caters to them exclusively. The internet has granted him the opportunity to piss off everyone else and still keep his career going.

The kicker is that he's making the best music of that career right now, and very few people are hearing it. His transformation truly began in the late '80s, when Prince began working with Miles Davis on the trumpeter's ill-fated Doo Bop project. We've yet to hear the results of those sessions, which were among the great jazzman's last, but it was around that time that Prince started experimenting with jazz fusion on the spectacular Black Album. Those experiments have fully bloomed on The Rainbow Children, on which Prince embraced the (for lack of a better term) blackness of his sound - part slamming jazz club, and part Baptist revival.

During the years leading up to The Rainbow Children, Prince quietly assembled an amazing band, including mindblowing drummer John Blackwell and sax player Maceo Parker, who played with James Brown for more than a decade. He finally took that band on the road last year, and the results of that tour are documented on his first-ever live record, One Nite Alone...Live. Never one to do anything small, Prince has packed three CDs full of terrific music and packaged them in a lovely box, along with a thick booklet. If you want an excellent primer on where the man is now musically, as well as further evidence of his sheer undiminished ability, this thing is well worth your $50.

But if you're looking for the hits you remember, well, as the man said, you in the wrong house. The focus is on jazz-funk improvisation here, and Prince's band rivals Parliament Funkadelic in that respect. Disc one opens with the title track of The Rainbow Children, an 11-minute fusion workout that gives Prince the chance to shine on guitar. (A quick side note - Prince remains one of the most underrated guitarists currently working, jamming with the fire of Hendrix and the melodic agility of the best jazz players.) He follows that up with the mellow "Muse 2 the Pharaoh" before launching into the 12-minute improv assault of "Xenophobia." At this point, any hopes you may have of hearing "Little Red Corvette" should be dashed.

Disc one goes on to showcase his extraordinary band, and near the end he pulls out some golden oldies with "Strange Relationship" and "When U Were Mine." Then he sucker-punches you with politics on "Avalanche," a deceptively smooth piece about racism and slavery. Some may not be used to political statements from Prince, and this one is couched in ill-fitting light jazz, marking it as one of the few failures of his later output. Still, Renato Neto's piano solo is terrific, and Prince is in fine voice, letting his chilling falsetto carry the tune.

The politics return on the much more successful "Family Name," which opens disc two. A striking rant about the subjugation of surnames during slavery, the song practically explodes with energy. The band rips through "Take Me With U" and "Raspberry Beret," Prince's one concession to his hit-machine past, before careening into "The Everlasting Now," a sweaty funk exercise. (They recently performed a truncated version of this on The Tonight Show.)

Most of disc two, however, is taken up with a lovely medley performed by Prince himself on piano and voice alone. This is as intimate and unadorned as the man has ever allowed himself to sound, and it's fascinating. Here is "Adore," and "Diamonds and Pearls," and "Starfish and Coffee," and "Free," all coming off as classics reborn. Here too is Sinead O'Connor's hit "Nothing Compares 2 U," which Prince wrote, sounding like a lost child returning home. The medley culminates with "Sometimes It Snows in April," an underrated gem, and it's almost a shame when the band comes back in for the mammoth "Anna Stesia." But not much of one, since that song is given new, fully organic life.

Much has been made of Prince's newfound spiritual side, and it's in full evidence here. "The only four-letter word you're gonna hear tonight is 'love,'" he says at one point, and he keeps his promise - One Nite Alone is strictly PG. The later material includes songs about theocratic order, accurate knowledge of Christ, and above all, the enduring love of God. It's interesting to note, however, that this is not a new development. Prince has been singing about God all along, balancing it (as he still does) with songs about sexual union. Most striking is "Anna Stesia," from 1988's Lovesexy, which concludes (both the song and the concert) with the refrain, "Love is God and God is love, girls and boys love God above."

As fitting a closer as that is for the new Prince, he's not quite done. One of the benefits of membership in the NPG Music Club this year was an invitation to an after-show party, where the band took the stage again for a loose, funky jam. One Nite Alone includes a third disc recorded at these parties, called The Aftershow...It Ain't Over, and it's here that the band really cuts loose. Guests Musiq and George Clinton show up to lend a hand, but aside from those interludes, It Ain't Over is one hour-long groove, and a stunning one at that. It's the icing on an already tasty cake.

Through it all, what stands out most is how well Prince has managed the transition from brash young upstart to elder statesman. He's in a far better and more confident place than, say, Stevie Wonder was at this point in his career, and all the signs point up. Just three years ago, he was wearing glittering blue body suits and sounding ill at ease with his place in the world. Now he's tricked out in suits and hats and self-assuredly doing what he does best - playing great music. There's nothing tentative about One Nite Alone - rather, it's a document of an artist secure in his talent and his vision. Now more than ever, he's worth listening to."

HELLO, that's quite positive!

Wow - what a great, considered review. Thanks Wellbeyond!

well this revieuw is great.its telling the truth and its shows alot off respect 4 him.and it says if you wanna hear good music and not hits this is what u have 2 listen 2.amen

wellbeyond said:

Great review. You can tell this person is a music lover and not a charthound.

But where are all those 3 hour albums I missed? I have Emancipation, and liked that, but I'll be damned if I can find another...Oh, wait, Crystal Ball.

And ONA Live, too, come to think of it.

3 in 10 years...I guess those are "regular intervals"

At last - an in depth considered review - this is what I've been waiting for. Shame it is only on a website - where's Q or Mojo's reviews?

Someone should send this review to the NPGMC site - couldn't agree with it more!

Particularly like the reviewers reference to the Rave era - I was just talking to my girlfriend about how lame his live performances and tv appearances were back then, with Larry Graham gurning in the background with that stupid mike flailing around in front of his face, and Prince all dressed in baconfoil.

Always nice to read a review from someone that listened 2 the music, mulled it over, and then wrote a well-thought review on it. I couldn't agree more with this assessment. And despite some of Prince's misses, (C&D, etc.), in the past ten years, I'm more interested in what he's doing now than in listening to late eigthies/early nineties stuff over and over. BTW, Xpectation was gorgeous, the pun notwithstanding. Give the man credit, he's putting his heart and soul in2 it.

This is a really good review, not just because it is positive, but because it is well written and researched.

I swear I didn't write it.

lovesexy4u said:

nice to see that not much has changed in the Prince community: still, the only truthful review of a Prince release is a positive one. pathetic.

dumbass said:

Simply because the truth is that ONA Live is a beautiful album, dumbass...

+++NOWARISINMYNAME+++

NoSwan said:

please, enlighten me on how ones subjective take on an album makes it the truth. by that stance, if someone did not like ONA Live it would make them a liar.

Thank U for the most positive review. I can't wait to get my ONA Live Set!!! I saw Prince last April in NYC, my 7th show!!! Not enough times, but I was satisfied oh, so very much each time!!! I usually saw Prince in DC or VA since I'm a Maryland Native (from B-More), but recently moved to CT. I can't wait to see him again!! There will never be such a musical genius ever again aside from Prince! He has touched on every style of music, you can't really classify him into one group. These Disney singers out here today just haven't a clue. Poor thangs! So, GOD, Thank U for Blessing us with a Real Musical PRINCE! And, GOD Bless Price for Blessing us with his true gift of Music!

Luv 2 U!!!

OOOPS!! I left out the N in GOD Bless Prince. Sorry!!!

Great review. Thanks for sharing it WellBeyond.

Great Review!!! Thanks WellBeyond!!