A review from the UK black music magazine - Echoes.

PRINCE
THE RAINBOW CHILDREN (NPG)

D’Angelo, Bilal, Maxwell, Alicia Keys, Macy Gray, Erykah Badu, Tricky, Ani Di Franco, Basement Jaxx, Beverly Knight, Common, The Roots, Beck, Timbaland, Lewis Taylor, Outkast, Me’Shell Ndegeocello. Sharing in common a desire to colour their craft with multidimensional expression, this generation of artists owes a deep conceptual, intangible debt to Prince. Symbolising genre bigamy at it’s most instinctive, Prince Rogers Nelson has pirouetted his heels all over popular music like it was his birthright. Yet as Prince’s spirit looms over some of the most interesting and defiant artists’ remoulding of his spherical grasp of disparate forms, the avatar of the current black alternative movement has instead been playing competitive kiss-chase with any new development that turns his head. Since Graffiti Bridge, Prince has rarely delved headfirst into the funk, resurfacing only with unfortunate remnants of hip hop, rave, modern R&B that aimed to stay in stride but instead laid down yet more steps for his creative downward spiral. Still, even when on the verge of burn out, Prince’s natural gifts can usually spark even his worst albums with moments of brightness; his Herculean strength and reach of songcraft and musicianship making the surrounding mediocrity all the more frustrating. More perplexing was the question of whether he could still create something of great inspiration. As the creation of an apparent religious and social awakening, The Rainbow Children does just that. Giving us one long Lovesexy-like act to take in one sitting, he is rhyming religious riddles like the fluid mind-game player who liked to ask as many questions as he would leave unanswered, preaching paisley poetry like “I’m not a woman/I’m not a man/I am something that you’ll never understand”. Pushed along by a heaving baritone narration, The Rainbow Children is a suite-like musical of sorts containing full-fledged flights into jazz fusion, his occasional forays into the genre more fleshed out than ever before, a credit to his current band, a lineup that includes a surprisingly funky Najee and new secret weapon – acrobatic drummer John Blackwell. There is an open affection for the warmth and versatility of the Fender Rhodes keyboard, the instrument so beloved to the new soul scientists. Having seemingly gained stimulation from his most vocal disciple D’Angelo and his Soulquarian sister Erykah Badu, the album contains some of the most abstract yet soulfully disciplined material of Prince’s 23 year long career. There is the divine What’s Going On-style ascending coda of the title track, the sanguine Joni Mitchell muse captured on She Loves Me 4 Me, an angelic solo vocal from a choir member that calmly begins the otherwise frenzied Everywhere and the floating flute-buoyed melodies of Mellow where he coyly enquires of his date “Where you wanna eat tonight babe?/I know this dope spot called ‘One Another’”. Well, it’s hardly likely to be in the restaurant guide. Despite a few production touches he could do well to leave alone, Prince has still managed to cohesively pursue funk and rock forms in a manner yet to find an equal coalescent. That makes this record along with the under-heard acoustic set The Truth (it bookended 1998’s Crystal Ball anthology) his best, most interesting and complete work of the last ten years. A renewal of faith in music and otherwise – The Rainbow Children returns to the fold Prince the aural auteur.
Sunil Chauhan ****1/2