For me it's the third best of the 1990's, The Gold Experience and Graffiti Bridge being the best.

I realy liked it on it's release. I think it suffers from being too long and maybe would have worked better being a little stylistically diverse and stuck with the more pop funk stuff. And Should have included Beautiful Strange on the major label release.

I prefer the first version over the remix version. The new version of the title song on Rave in2 is amongst the worst stuff from Prince I've ever heard.

Again I ask, where were you guys when I started a review thread for the album?

There's so many good comments here. I could use them on my thread. It'd make it seem so much better.

I only got 12 replies (and 2 of them were mine).
http://prince.org/msg/7/248244

I'm gonna add more today or tomorrow... but please check out some of the comments here 2.

haha... don't make me beg

And what's the assumption that the 1990's was Prince's crap era anyway? Diamonds and Pearls was wicked, but like Purple Rain it suffers from sounding very dated now because it was contemporary then. 0+> is great despite having 3 Chains of Gold on it. The Gold Experience is Prince's best rock album. I love the Vault for being so live and organic and if you put tunes like When the lights go down and Sarah on a CD with similar live sounding songs from Crystal Ball like Calhoun Sq and The Ride, it makes for a great record. If only Emancipation has been two CDs? It could have been so much better.

eightiesmusicculture said:

Can't say I have many complaints about the 90's. I love 's music. Come & TGE are in my top 4 favorite albums.
Emancipation is still the #1 album I still want to have in my collection, then I can really go thru it and decide which songs I like and don't (and also how many discs it "should" have been... but Prince wanted to do 3-discs... so I think he has full right 2 do so.) I read somewhere recently... the transcript of the Oprah interview, that he said it was the set he was born to make.

The 90's have their own little spark. But if anything, I think Rave kinda takes the "extra" out of how extraordinary is. There's no really stand out tracks against the rest of his musical repetoire... but shouldn't be underestimated either.

DreamyPopRoyalty said:

Just read your thread Can't say I agree with all of your statements. But that's what Prince is all about. He has so big a range of styles, there's something there for everyone. This is why I do not understand why people do not like Rave. It's such a typical Prince album with plenty of stuff to choose from.

eightiesmusicculture said:

Well, glad u at least read it and were honest.

I'm gonna make a more improved review of the diff. tracks either today or tomorrow so keep watching.
Then we can compare notes

Well, when I posted that thread for this album, that entire week, it was the only album I listened to.
I bet nobody here has done that

Anyway, 7 listens, once a day for a week, can get tiresome after a while, so I understand why some people are so down on it a lot.
The songs are really good, but none of them really make a huge statement.
The cover of "Everyday is a Winding Road" infuriated just about everyone except me and that might have had something to do with it.
A couple of the R&B songs, Sun/Moon/Stars and Silly Game, don't get much love either.
It does feel like 's paint by numbers throughout the album. There's nothing too spontaneous except for in the really good songs ( love u, but don't trust u anymore) and those that are excellent in my eyes, but others are kinda hard on them (Strange but True).

I still don't think its a complete lost cause, though. Because after 8 listens, I only found one song I disliked so much that I had to cut it out of the line-up. That's what I call a success. But as far as re-play value, not sure if that's too good, considering I spent a week with it, but I guess we'll see.

DreamyPopRoyalty said:

ive always loved RAVE, just reminds me of the great year 1999 and the big party at the end of it! not his strongest output, but he sure put a lot of himself into it and some of it worked, some didnt - at least its not sloppy like Planet Earth.