A brilliant review.

sarkozyiszeman said:

I've seen it, and I respect his abilities. I personally just don't want to hear harmonica solos in certain songs. Ol Skool Company being one of them.

If you and Prince do, that is cool by me.

That damned gif is hilarious though.

Accujack said:

I love the fact that he's gonna tour with Prince for the next months at least and there will be harmonica all over the place.

It's a pleasure to know you guys who don't like harmonica are gonna be all pissed off.

sarkozyiszeman said:

I loved the harmonica last night on Dreamer. I definitely think it adds something nice to the mix

Gav said:

Stop trolling, it's very immature and against the rules.
[Edited 3/27/09 8:53am]

Bfunkthe1 said:

I'm tempted to try and mix it up a bit more so that the rock and funk tracks aren't on 2 seperate discs... like a true SOTT-type effort with a wide variety of sounds and styles. It would be an interesting experiment in sequencing. I enjoy doing stuff like that... yeah, I know, i'm a geek

From the lotus kind of reminds me of the outro of Dolphin from the undertaker home video

ok still listening..

Here's mah two zents...

FROM THE LOTUS - an instrumental track as an opener of an album is not something I would personally shun away from. Sounds a lot like TRC -material, but at least the use of reverb is more restricted this time around (he could have added a bit more to the electric piano sounds to make the entire thing sound more fusion-erta Miles / etc). The rimshot sounds he's been using on material like this for most of the decade aren't however working as well as they should, they add a bit of "cocktail bar" feel to his music sometimes to be honest. Not a major complaint here, though.

BOOM - this track surprised me with its relative mellowness, as I was expecting something a bit different. The way the underscored, barely audible "boom" -line is employed gives it a proper, more seductive "Axis: Bold as Love" - era hendrix feeling instead of being another "Endorphinmachine". It's not that complex a song as far as songwriting goes, but the elements he has constructed it off are interesting and varied enough. I like his guitar playing here a lot, and the use of the effects on the vocals does actually work quite well (there's autotune there, right?). What this track after several listens reveals that It's better than most of his 90s rockier output, better than "Endorphinmachin", "Peach" or "I Like It There". I've been lead to believe at least the retail version will have a longer version than what I got leeched off the internet?

THE MORNING AFTER - yes, it does indeed remind of "Teacher Teacher" with the clavichord -figure driving the entire song. It lacks a memorable chorus, but the female backing vocals are great and make up for it (is that a Wendy & Lisa -arrangement?). A little bit of the 60s, with a whole lot of the Dream Factory -vibe. Would this be a new bootleg leak from the 80s most would be drooling all over it by now ("man he really used to have it in the 80s, not so much anymore"). The palette of sounds used on the album is positively restricted to more organic-sounding instrumention, and the digital synth pads / strings that never really worked in the context of his music that well have been mostly omitted. It's quite possible the track originates from the same sessions as, say, "I'm The One U Wanna C", but this one's turnt out to be more tasteful effort I have to say. Could have been included very well on the retail version too. The only real downside is that the feel of "morning after" the song conveys is highly contradictory with what I'd associate with morning after's myself. Let's not give such false impressions to our young listeners, okay?

4EVER - one of Prince's problems more recently has been that he hasn't bothered to write proper choruses for most of his mid-tempo songs, and this one continues the tendency (starting with "The Greatest Romance Ever Sold" already). The verse melody is actually bordering on brilliance in more simplistic terms, but the single-line chorus is a bit of an anti-climax. The instrumentation is classic 70s rock, I was actually thinking of someone like Todd Rundgren when I was listening to it. Nice sounds employed, nevertheless.

COLONIZED MIND - this has been a grower for me personally, as I didn't really care for it upon the first listen. The chorus is admittedly quite endearing and "emotive" after getting used to it, but the excessive stacking of multiple vocal lines provides something of a NPGMC -material association (not a positive thing in itself). I'm not going to comment on the lyrics too much because I feel like I am not the right person to judge another person's world-view, especially as his own idealogies differ quite greatly from mine. I don't find the lyrical content overtly naive, though. It's just that... in Prince World basically any comment on social issues is seen as a really in-depth statement. Could have been a bit dirtier on the guitar-end of things, though. If this is the closest thing to "Purple Rain" he delivered during this decade I guess we'll just have to learn to live with it.

FEEL GOOD, FEEL BETTER, FEEL WONDERFUL - as the only proper funk track on the record he could have had chosen a stronger one (or perhaps indeed include F.U.N.K. on it in some form). A pleasant enough offering on its own right - his vocal delivery is positively raunchy and the arrangements, whilst minimal, are top-notch quality. As expected. Again, it's really just the lacklustre chorus that's sort of fighting again the rest of the music ultimately. I know shouting "Housequake!" several hundred times during a track does not count for a terribly complex chorus either, but nevertheless.

LOVE LIKE JAZZ - on the first listen it sounded quite different from anything I've heard from Prince before. I admit his rhyming dictionary could do with an expansion section added to it ("NAME!" ... "GAME!"), but this has turnt into one of my own favourites on the album during a string of successive listens. It's a great track if you're not expecting a mind-blowing pop song, and I would perhaps call material like this veering on "a musical study" really. The arrangements are interesting and I've always wanted to point out that Prince is one of the very few better-known musicians on the planet who is capable of producing a light-sounding yet at the same time artsy material. It's a whole lot easier to make Radiohead -type of pop / rock -music where the artistry relies on the notions of melancholy, schizophrenism or whatever. Of course this one doesn't classify exactly as high-concept avant-garde either, but the song manages to go in various different directions tonally and still preserve a good level of cohesion. The outro leans even more strongly towards the sounds on TRC again. Better than "She Loves Me 4 Me", I would have to say.

77 BEVERLY PARK - well... this one's different. For some oblivious reason listening to it makes me want to go to the kitchen, fix myself a cup of coffee and feel happy about the fact that I will enter my thirties in just a couple of weeks. Thankfully though, it's not soaked in digital effects, although it really is an odd inclusion on the album as it is. The second half of the track should have preferably developed into something more interesting musically (a little bit of jazzy dissonance, or even a run-of-the-mill guitar solo would have done the trick probably). I wouldn't desire to kick it out of the album's running order, but even with the slight hint at the "Parade" -era it is indeed a bit of a "wtf" -moment. Better being a "wtf" -moment than a "gtfo" -moment, obviously.

WALL OF BERLIN - don't really care for the vocal delivery, but I guess this is one of the "key" -compositions of the album as it binds together some of the other tracks by being a bit of an "in-between take" stylistically. I don't mind the silly lyrics, although let's admit it - would any of the artists deemed as his followers (D'Angelo, Maxwell etc.) ever title a track "Wall Of Berlin"? The "trashier" guitar breaks are what breathes more life into an otherwise a bit too goofy melodic morif on the chorus.The track ultimately makes a nice enough transition to the next one. By the way, does "going down like the wall of berlin" mean you're going to be smashed down in pieces or is it just an implication of oral sex? When was the last time Prince visited Berlin anyway?

$ - really love this. It's really nothing like Prince has done before, but the "Camille" -vocal effect grounds it to his sound (could he be using sped-up tape again instead of a crude pitch-shifter, because the sound is far softer than on the more recent tracks that employed the similar element?). Perhaps the closest equivalence would be "Baby Knows" in that regard, but this is so much better (and I actually enjoyed that track in question). A hint of "Courtin' Time" thrown in there too, but "$" is an entiry of its own in Prince's vast song catalog. Simple and effective, he should be rightfully proud of music like this still pouring out of him. Just lacks a Harmonica solo!

DREAMER - Oh, yes. I was surprised how his take on the "Hendrix" -esque stuff still manages to employ all types of classic quirkiness that you would associate with his own classic output. If you listen more closely you could hear some echoes especially of Prince's rehearsal / aftershow -material from the 80s here too ("Billy's Sunglasses", "Neon Rendezvous"). It might be just the type of a reverberation playing tricks in my mind, but what the hell.

... BACK 2 THE LOTUS - this is a more interesting take on the intro track. The mumbling included on it gives it a bit eerie vibe, and that IS a positive thing. I find it intriguing how he has chosen to include the flanger on his guitar - and even on guitar interference noise - so audibly in the mix (he used to do this in the 80s quite a lot, it's used even on Sheila E.'s 3rd record I recently noticed). I didn't first warmp up for the obvious use of basic guitar pedal effects on "Wall of Berlin" or "Colonized Mind", but they do in the end add a certain amount of rawness to the overall result. The outro track is one of the best ones on the album in my mind, btw, but then again I'm sort of a fucked up individual.

CRIMSOM AND CLOVER - a few comments on this too, as it's supposed on the final record. The use of the leslie / vibrato effect gives the track its own vintage bite, although Prince's vocals aren't as powerful as they should be. Still, his 2nd best cover after "The Case Of U", perhaps. The download version really would have indeed benefited from this one. Is the Hendrix -reference here really to "Foxy Lady" or "Wild Thing" though? I can't make up my mind.

VERDICT: far from perfect, but one of the best outings of his post-WB material. Could have done with a few stronger SONGS, but as it stands it proves that Prince can still deliver adventurous records (if you think about it, TRC was released already quite a long time ago already). The poppier tracks from the record aren't that drastic a departure from Planet Earth -material to be honest, but I'll take tracks like "$" over "Guitar" anyday. Shame about - what I consider - the unfitting cover art for the album, although admittedly he has had worse over the years as well. I like it how he has re-connected with some of his trademark elements from the 80s and mixed them up with material that also break some new ground for him too.

I give it 4 pineapples out of 5 pineapples. Thanks for reading.

(Fuck, I should have been writing my graduation thesis instead of this... only 2½ weeks left! Oh well...)
[Edited 3/27/09 6:43am]

While reading this review, I almost felt the urge to print it out and stick it in my American Pyscho-Bret Easton Ellis book, it always bugged me that he never had a chapter dedicated to Prince

Dreamer


"Dreamer" is absolutely hot. The lyrics are deep too. Replayed it about 5 times already.

Lawd have mercy, say no more, say no more.. I just listened to the track "Dreamer", Prince intertwines this track with some Sly funk and Jimi Hendrix rock, with a quick Betty-Mabry Davis vocal tease at the beginning, and if you're not listening carefully, you'll miss the banging BB King blues licks..all of this wrapped up in Prince style.

Dreamer is hot, nasty, Coco-rock with a mixture of blues and funk so hot, it's like taking a hot buttered biscuit and sopping it up with some gravy, and swishing it around in the plate until you get every last drop, because it so good. Love this track, it's so sizzling hot (ouch!) and nasty it makes me want to cuss and scream.

Prince will blow this track out of the water when he plays this live. I hope he plays it on Leno, if not I hope to see him play this track live someday.
[Edited 3/26/09 20:02pm]

I'ma retard....I can not seem to find where to listen/download lotus flower on the site. can someone please help me out here? when I click on the prince head I get the 3D globe thing...the pyramids get me crimson and clover video but...I can't seem to find the damn "look, listen, lyrics" page!

Shorty said:

You have to click on the flower itself that surrounds Prince's head

Shorty said:

You have to click on the flower itself that surrounds Prince's head

NoVideo said:

ah, the ridiculous things we find ourselves saying these days

2elijah said:

I dig the hell out of Dreamer I need to make a play list with Super Stupid followed by Dreamer and maybe Witness for the prosecution or something like that

Meloh9 said:

Dreamer's a hot track. I just love it and glad he did play it on Leno last night.
[Edited 3/27/09 12:36pm]

novabrkr said:

Thank you. The best, and most agreeable review I've read on the album.

NoVideo said:

ah, the ridiculous things we find ourselves saying these days

It is HIS best web site yet!Lots of great rooms!

How do you get into the site? The ticket pops up and wants me to enter something, but what???

UPDATE: Never mind. I figured it out
[Edited 3/24/09 21:17pm]

DMSRCMC12 said:

can anyone tell me how to access the lotusflow3r site? i can only get part of a tv and radio, a ticket and a blank newspaper page. how do iregister to become a member? please help!

Well I think this album is the best thing Prince has done in years, best thing since TRC. Loving it.

It just shows you how out of sync fans are from random journos... who were all saying that Lotusflow3r was kinda dull, with MPLSoUND being much more interesting. Couldn't disagree more.

I definitely think Prince is aiming for a Stevie Wonderesque classic with this one, even if some of it sounds like it'd fit on The Rainbow Children. It's all so eclectic, and 77 Beverley Park could easily appear on Secret Life Of Plants or Songs in the Key of Life.

novabrkr said:

[groovin' harmonica dude was here]