With the possibility of remastered albums in the air, I wonder how Prince feels about re-releasing some of his older works. Does the new Prince still appreciate "Dirty Mind" enough to release it unedited? I know that many of the Ahdio shows have featured old songs with edits of the swearing. I hope that if the remasters come, the only changes are in the sound quality. Personally, I have no problem listening to "Dirty Mind" and then throwing in "Lovesexy". However, sometimes I get the feeling that Prince does not look back upon some of his earlier works too fondly. What do you all think?

Also, how would you feel if he threw on some unreleased songs at the end of the remastered albums? I believe it would be a good way to release some of his extensive vault. I don't think it would take away from the continuity of his albums if he simply put the unreleased tracks at the end of each disc.

IF Prince will ever have rights to re-release his own stuff, then it would be not respecting the journey through life if he edits off all the cursing.
Then it would be; "Girl, I Bleep U Off"????
*shiffers down my back*
I dislike the sexy mutha AUWAH already.
"Shut up, already BLEEP"?
Aw Lawd!

That’s a bit OTT.
If I was Prince I’d look back at my older works positively and proudly. Prince has never released any negative explicit music with the exception of Bob George which he tried to stop being released anyway. His music may have contained explicit words but they were mostly used in positive constructive ways. He never denied that sex didn’t exist but he’s always tried to get the message across that love and God are more important. Also those older albums show how Prince has grown and has prioritised more important things. I wouldn’t go as far as taking ‘Damn’ out of house quake, but if he does want to make his old stuff squeaky-clean he may consider:
‘I sincerely want to brush your teeth to take the taste out of your mouth’
‘I met her in a hotel lobby complaining about the noise’
‘My sister was 32, lovely and ……actually, he may have to remove that whole track.’
‘Tick tick bang bang, opps I accidentally fired my toy bb-gun.’

..i think they should be viewed as a sort of 'journal' or 'record' if you will...of where his head was at at the time...he did say something about not regretting anything, 'cos if you remove one stone the structure falls..' or something like that...
hopefully that will be the case when/if the remasters ever see the light of day..
i think he's more than shown that he no longer curses or whatever, so i don't think it should matter that he said certain words 20 years ago...
but you know..it's his call...

Ask prince, he knows

sexualfreak said:

Tell him that! He doesn't seem to understand. I liked your edits by the way, very funny

Any extras should be on a seperate disc, not stuck on the end. Imagine another track coming on right after Purple Rain, or Sometimes it Snows in April! No thanks.

I personally believe we're never going to get the remasters anyway.

Moonbeam said:

Very interestng Moonbeam. One could conceive that he would look back and say "I can't believe I did that" or "I can't believe I said that on that album". Just as we all evolve(hoepfully) as human beings then look back and reminisce and say stuff like...I can't believe I maxed out 4 credit cards within a year"or "I can't believe I got drunk and went to bed with THAT female"(smile). It's all part of growing up and growing wiser.


There were fans moaning and whining about P changing during the Lovesexy Tour. During inermission at the Lovesexy show I attended, I was in the restroom and some guy was raising sand stating "he wanted the raw Prince of Dirty Mind back because this new Prince is sucking some kind of awful" So this belly-aching and complaining about the new curse-free Prince of new didn't start with him hooking up with Larry Graham.

And I'm still somewhat intrigued by people who get upset because he doesn't come out on stage in a g-string bikini and/or doesn't swear in his music. The man has changed for crying out loud. How does that old song go... "Everything must change...nothing stays the same".

Great Thread Moonbeam!!!

* Brother 9/15 aka CR3

Brother915 said:

I'm totally bemused by people who don't mind that we might never get Housequake remastered and never hear Sexy MF performed live again and so on. I care more about the music than the man, on a personal level. (that sounds callous but I hope you know what I mean - his life is his own, his music is there to be enjoyed)

Saxjedi said:

Whatever is meant to be... will be. If it's meant for us to hear a digitally remaseted version of the SOTT album we will. If not...then we will not.

Peace and Chicken Grease,
Brother 9/15 aka CR3

Brother915 said:

Great points. I like to accept Prince through all of his many metamorphoses and see him evolve. I'm just happy to see him live or hear new albums period! However, I also agree with the earlier post that editing the content of the older albums would be like editing old journal entries with new insight, and that would be neither honest nor reflective of the journey!

Tough call.

He did remaster quite a lot of songs or re-record them and remix them since 1994. Like the new remixed bass-heavy version of "Head". But I think that as he progressed with the re-recording and re-mastering he got a bit lost in all those trax himself.

I can imagine him beginning 2 re-record his earlier albums and kinda losing interest in the whole project. It's difficult enough 2 get a new album in the shops, let alone a body of work as vast as his backcatalogue.

But that's only one part of the deal. We've all heard the ahdioshow edits of some of the old material. Now, Prince being the perfectionist he is, I just can't believe that he would be happy with all those bleeps and shhhhhwsss noises in his songs either.

Yet, if he doesn't want 2 swear anymore, and yet wants
2 re-release his older material he is faced with one of 2 choices. Either keep them as they are and not change anything OR re-do them completely.

Although, what about songs like 'sister' & 'head'? There's just no way you could ever re-write one or 2 lines in a song like that to go 'round the 'offensive' language.....

Like I said, it's a very tough call.

The best thing would probably be to view those albums as the works of art they are and not change anything, and not re-record them. Just remaster them and see them as a thing he did at a certain time, warts and all.

Well, that might be an option for a regular artist

But since I still don't have a clue as 2 what xactly Prince and Warners own from these recordings, I don't know if he would be able to just remaster them and sell them.

It's all very confusing. Since he released some of his old material in the ahdioshows in an unchanged form. And since we paid for the npgmc, he sort of 'sold' those tunes again. Eventhough it seems likely that he isn't really allowed to do that....[?]

The best thing of all might be to just leave the whole thing waiting and focus on the new music. He can always start re-releasing remastered or re-written versions of his old albums once he's 60 yrs old.

But with all this xciting new material in the can, who's waiting 4 the remasters anyway?

Warners still own the rights to Prince's back catalogue, but I'm pretty sure they'd need Prince's permission to change them in any way (that applies to remastering and adding bonus tracks). Prince HAS all his own master tapes, and can do what he likes with them,(remaster or remix) but he can't commercially release any of it without Warner's permission.

What he CAN do (and already has) is re-record songs from his back catalogue, and do what he likes with them (including sell them). Warners only own the rights to the recordings of the songs, not the songs themselves.

Prince always used to say he didn't care about his back catalogue, and was only interested in what he was doing now (though I doubt he really meant it).

Unfortunately I do think that if he did remaster his old albums, he would make certain changes with some of the lyrical content. ie: remove swearing & change 'The Cross' to 'The Christ' etc.

i think he sits, reminisces, and is just like, "wow." with a -like expression on his face.....