poetbear68 said:

I have been an avid follower of his music since 1981 and he had continued to improve and innovate year on year to around 1989 at which point the music started to sound a little strained - D&P was a welcomer eturn to pop form and The Gold Experince Likewise, I loved The Truth and appraciated TRC, but I have to say that up to around 1998/99 I was convinced his "peak" was to come, I am now thinking he will continue to make music that challenges but maybe just maybe his hungry cutting edge is now part of his glorious past and perhaps Prince is actually comfortable with that and he now wants to express thoughts rather than stretch sonic boundaries, which is cool.

poetbear68 said:

Get crucial.

A successful greatest hits tour off the back of a commercial comeback album does not make a success 'peak'.

As soon as Prince does something left-field, the media will drop him like a hot potato.

If Prince released Musicology with no promotion, it would not have received the positive reviews it did, because there is nothing on Musicology he hasn't done a million times before, it sounds a mix of Emancipation and Rave.

It was the day he recorded "Good Love".

clarityman said:

The Gold Experience would have been another commercial peak - had both Prince and Warners cared enough to promote it.

For me the peak was 1992-96 [pre Emancipation]. It's the music I much prefer - which is mainly REAL instruments played by REAL people.

The period includes Symbol, Come [prefer the original tracks], TGE, the better C&D tracks and the undertaker sessions aswell as several tracks that surfaced on The vault and Crystall Ball.

commercial peak was Purple Rain

Creative peak Sign O' the times

But u can always rely on him to turn out some Gems:

Gett Off, Peach, Pussy Control, Baby Knows, Musicology . . .

yeah but whats next?

poetbear68 said:

I agree with you, that Purple Rain was not his best, nor his peak, but to say that Musicology made 3 times the gross of the PR tour???

Compare todays prices, with 1984 prices and think again.

Purple Rain Ticket: $15.00, LESS cities

Musicology Ticket: $100.00, MORE cities

To top it all off, Musicology was the Purple Rain tour part 2. His greatest tour? Lovesexy

guestie said:

vainandy said:

Vainanady- you think high sales= good music/art. Man you must really love New Kids on the Block. Is "Thriller" really the greatest album of all time?

That was me getting a shot in at how horrible music, in general, in the 1990s was. The majority of the stuff I was listening to in the 1990s was underground club/house type music and never even played on the radio.

NouveauDance said:

You said "Get crucial."

I have this overpowering urge to kiss you.

I see his peak as more of a mountain range. Lovesexy might not have been the highest peak, but it was the last of the Himalayas. There was a Mt. Kilomonjaro (), Mt. Whitney (Gold), and Mt. Fuji (TRC), but no more Everest or K2.

Peak? What is Peak? Commercial? Creative? isn't it all about one's personal taste? one might say the Black Album was his peak.. For an artist, there is no peak because one is always creative and always creating.. I have 4 kids.. I can't say that number 2 was the peak..I love them all equal...I think Prince could be the number 1 artist in the country if he wanted to, but for him it's about being creative and seeing where that leads him...Peak? I'd say he'd say it is today in his studio as he creates his next song...Peak?

FunkMistress said:

Heathers =


//

Also I think this was the creative peak:



Yes, 1999 ABOVE Sign O' The Times.

I agree with you, that Purple Rain was not his best, nor his peak, but to say that Musicology made 3 times the gross of the PR tour???

Compare todays prices, with 1984 prices and think again.

Purple Rain Ticket: $15.00, LESS cities

Musicology Ticket: $100.00, MORE cities

Let's get our facts straight:

The average price per ticket for Musicology wasn't $100, it was $61 (give or take $5).

The Purple Rain tour had 109 shows, Musicology had 96.

And the NPG website says that about three times the gross of the Purple Rain Tour.

Movie tickets are four times as expensive as they were then, so this is about par for the course.

MidnightFunk said:

Yes you are right that it can be a matter of personal taste but there is nothing wrong with appreciating an artist and considering what his creative and prolific peak was as viewed by the consensus against a backdrop of other similar status artists at the time. The same can be said of painters or classical composers, If the common feeling is that Sign O the Times was his peak, its probably because it was a piece of work that sound like a complete departure from his previous work, while feeling more substantial and yet acheiving cross over to a general audience. There is nothing wrong with the word Peak - the ball park feeling on the Beatles was that the Rubber Soul/Sgt Peppers period were the point where creativity was balanced with commercial pay off and critical acclaim.

Lets not sit on the fence and say what we think Prince might say, we are an audience and he performs for us and this thread wasnt about whats your fave album, it was the point at which creativity balances with commercial payback with I guess, critical acclaim. That generally is seen to be SOTT particulary when the press are waiting for the next SOTT as opposed to Purple Rain or TRC or Dirty mind. Incidentally my own fave Albums are Prince and Parade.

Off my soap box now !!

vainandy said:

seriously, how can you say that? Thats absurd

dreamfactory313 said:

His main peak was Purple Rain, then a few hops after that. He was done after D&P as far as peaks go with the general public.

clarityman said:

Fair Enough and Point taken...

His creative peak for me was 'Sign O' The Times'.

For a long time, everything that came after that was a bit of a letdown. I can honestly say (and I am one of the longtimers) that he made my jaw drop pretty much on every release from '80 to '87.

I've said this before, and I'll say it again. When you were listening to Prince in the 80's there was a sense that you were hearing the best that music had to offer at that time. Not that he was the only one making great music, but certainly there was no one better. This assumption was long gone by the time the 90's came around.

For opinion's sake, we can probably find someone for almost any Prince era and album but I maintain that when history remembers him it will celebrate his greatest works as the music made in the 80's.
[Edited 2/10/05 18:02pm]

I see it as a consistent plateau starting from 1999 through Lovesexy....every album had something different and something that showed growth.....after LoveSexy it was never the same