How soon do we forget .

The Rave CD was shopped around to various record companies when Davis gave Prince his personal commitment to the project if Prince would do the promotional gigs. The album was altered like Boris and others stated to have more of an R&B flavor. The album was released and everything started going to plan..... until .


Arista forced Clive Davis out of his own record company and replaced him with a Prince rival L.A. Reid. Prince had already pulled his bitchfest with Clive over the release of Hot Wit U while Clive was in the middle of this process. Clive was axed and replaced with Reid.This started a shitstorm at Arista which still has not really calmed down 11 years later. Reid got around to calling Prince in to discuss the album and laid a line of shit on him saying the album was selling poorly etc,ect, and that the would give Prince two more album deals with the ususal strings attached. Prince stood up and walked out of the office with Reid telling him that he would not sell another "fucking" album again.

Reid pissed many more Arista artists off as well before they ran him off.

muleFunk said:

I guess he was sorta right... there hasn't been much sex on Prince's albums since

MattyJam said:

good. let's trade.

love but dont trust was great and should have been the lead single ... wherever u go was good as was the man o war remix ... everything else has the cringe quality .. especially the funk tracks ...

i think the reason it wasnt a big hit had to do with it being the 4th symbol non prince record ... and having followed emancipation a triple record and nps ... didnt even have his symbol on it .. so after many years sans the prince name one can expect the larger audience to dwindle ... he had a chance with gold but chaos killed the symbol brand pretty quick ... emancipation came off as a hit because he acted like it went platinum because there were 3 records but really it was another flop ... as was nps (even tho its a pretty good record) .... so it was the last in a long line of non prince name dwindling .. the fans didnt care and the non fans didnt know he even existed anymore

The joke is that it's been well over 10 years of Prince pointing fingers at record companies, radio stations etc. It's always someone elses fault why his music crashes out of the charts one week after the release date.

You would have thought by now the coin might have dropped.

Rave was a shocker of an album that sounded awful. Those who think it was 'over-produced' obviously do not understand the role of a producer.

three reasons

- Clive had him wreck the original CD and add songs to meet some formula. It's almost always a mistake for the marketer to tell the artist what to create.

- Clive got fired right before the release, which effectively ended the support from the label

- wrong first single

TheVoid said:

Yes it was pretty bad and no the promotion wasn´t that great. all that clive this and clive that. Fuck that: it was PRINCE´s album, not clives.

It does have some good songs on it, but like many other albums past Batman, Prince shouldn´t have sold out to the commercial sounds of that day and should have edited it to about 8-10 good songs tops. All that plastic production filler on it ruins it. Also he shouldn´t have butchered the title song.
[Edited 5/18/10 3:58am]

Tremolina said:

Butchered it? It's practically identical to the original!

nursev said:

yeah that's pretty much it right there. He could have fixed this by choosing a different first single, a better video, and worn a weave.

The remix of The Greatest Romance with Eve is awesome and should have been the version on the album. This got heavy airplay especially in Ohio. I don't like the original version as much.

TrevorAyer said:

Absolutely; during the 97-03 era, he was a virtual unknown for the younger generations...

a fact that MANY orgers around here will never accept (because it's too "painful" for them to admit) Folks, let's face it already, damn Prince during his dark 96-99 years : a forgotten 80s-early 90s pop star with some truly awful new albums that only the hardcore fans had the guts/patience to buy/listen (Chaos, Emancipation, NPS, Kamasutra, Rave...)
I don't like TRC but at least it was a noble/interesting record, but ANYTHING he released during the late 90s stinks, pure and simple...


Oh, and I'll repeat it again: Musicology and 3121 were true and strong comebacks. 3121 was a Nº1 album for a reason

JoeTyler said:

it was as if he finally "freed" himself as I had hoped he would do when he changed his name (but seemed to do the opposite in restraining himself with plastic pop--even Gold to some extent), and truly gave up the paper chase in favor of making interesting music again. But alas it did not last, though Lotusflow3r is a nice post script to it.

NDRU said:

Yeah, but I still think that Musicology was a R&B/rock album, not mainstream pop, and even 3121 had some soul, funk, prog here and there...of course, Te Amo Corazón and Black Sweat were poppy/modern R&B singles, but many of the tracks of 3121 are certainly not mainstream pop (title-track, Satisfied, Fury, The Dance, Get on the Boat, The Word, etc.)

So true!

JoeTyler said:

true. There are always moments that separate his music from top 40 artists (even in the 90's stuff). Those moments elevate him above it and they also keep him from finding a foothold in it.

NDRU said:

Frederick96 said:

I agree,the remix with Eve is much better than the original version.

i think it was because this was the album that scolded anyone who shaved a lamb for the wool on its cover. i think this really left a bad impression on all of the sheep herders who would have otherwise bought the album.

Plus as i said before, it was a shit album. one of his worst. one that should have never hit the press. did more damage for him than good. should have been called rave cause i want to end my careeeerr. rave.

I disagree with the masses here that call this album a "shit" album.

Rave is not one of my favorites and not one of Prince's best but not a god awful album considering the shit that was and is on the charts today.

Records are made and broken by the record company.

TheVoid said:

The feud with WB resulted in dual releases for several years. Rave was released in the same year as Old Friends wasn't it?

So far so pleased could have gone to #1 easily.

crazydoctor said:

That seems to be the general consensus on this site.I still can't believe that it wasn't released as a single.

I have been watching the 2000 DVD and it seems like Prince had a weird energy about himself at that time. Larry G was deffinately his new BFF but there was alot of Prince he wasn't quite ready to let go of. Who was the female dancer on that DVD? I can't find her name in the credits anywhere.

Rave was released in 1999!!! That should've been P's year. I have a friend who was a lapsed P fan who bought it on the day of release for that reason only. He listened to it once and then gave it to me, saying he's done with Prince (I think he's kept his word).
I put it on with a friend who was into hendrix, funk, blues and Beck and had naturally started to take an interest in Prince. I was SOOOO embarrassed, This friend totally lost interest in Prince and I had to agree - the album was SUCH a disappointment!

You can't defend the album by saying that there are a couple of great tracks (I love you.. , Prettyman) - by the time they come along, if you've weathered all the crap, you're so hard-core it wouldn't matter what he released!

The major problem I think was the SOUND (production, arrangements, songwriting). It sounded old and tired, not retro enough to be cool (and the 80s didn't become cool again anyway for a few more years) and NOT cutting-edge at all! I twas as if he'd had his head buried somewhere for the past few years (which might be true).

It was 1999. Prince had a much-hyped release. It was a disappointment: substandard, boring and lacklustre. End of story.

Deadflow3r said:

was it Geneva?

wasitgood4u said:

That was the oddest thing. 1999 WAS supposed to be his year.

Even the song didn't do as well as it should have. Chris Rock mentioned this on stage once about the fact that the song and Prince were essentially missing.

My opinion is that Prince was very unhappy during that period in his life. I admit this is only conjecture as who can really guess?

But let's look at the facts:

1) He had lost a baby just a couple years before
2) His marriage had fallen apart
3) His career was at a very low point
4) He had experienced continuous years of bad and lukewarm album reviews---something Prince used to NEVER experience.

It's surprising he bothered to release anything at all--honestly, most artists would have retreated and just laid low for 3 or 4 years. Prince marched on...with awful results, but he soldiered on despite.

Everything about this era was so out of touch and seemed so outdated in a William Shatner singing Beatles songs kinda of way.
It all just screamed old man wearing heavy Old Navy cologne trying to fit in with kids in the school yard.
It was just as uncomfortable to witness as to listen to.

I totally agree with the last 2 posts...