I'm personally sad the For You did worse than 20TEN.

Really?

Pretty amazing how much Controversy is appreciated these days. Just a decade ago it was taken for granted that it was a bit of a stain in his 80s output, like Batman.

CallMeCarrie said:

I'm personally sad the For You did worse than 20TEN.

Really?

Yes, that's true under all four completion rules. I haven't listened to the two albums back-to-back. I wonder if some of us grade For You on a curve, so to speak, because it was his first effort, whereas we expect more of 20Ten. Also there's the fact that I've probably listened to For You more than 100 times, so even the mediocre tracks sound very familiar.

I have no idea who voted in the poll, so I can't tell you whether there were more recent Prince converts as opposed to old veterans. People who just got into Prince recently might be more favorably disposed toward his more recent work; I don't know.

I really don't get why 'the Symbol album' is ranked higher then Diamonds&Pearls, I just don't get it.

Spinlight said:

I am convinced people need to break out their The Vault Old Friends 4 Sale CDs again and listen. How can someone rate that album so low? The material on it is slamming?

Yeah, I think it's ranked so low because a lot of folks just haven't listened to it. I really, really like this album. Great 'not-mainstream' music .

CallMeCarrie said:

I'm personally sad the For You did worse than 20TEN.

Really?

Agreed

[Edited 4/22/11 8:57am]

Nice to see Controversy and 3121 do well. 3121 is pretty amazing to me, every song starting from "Love" until "get on the boat" falls into either the "good" or "great" category. Black Sweat and 3121 are really good too. Thats the best possible album that Prince could have made at the time and i am surprised that some fans still dont like the album.

As far as the symbol album ranked higher than Diamonds and Pearls, come on Symbol has some excellent songs. The best stuff on symbol easily beats the best on diamonds and pearls. 7, And God Created Woman, Love 2 the 9's, and Blue Light are excellent IMO

Plus the rapping is less annoying on symbol than it is on diamonds and pearls.

hhhhdmt said:

Nice to see Controversy and 3121 do well. 3121 is pretty amazing to me, every song starting from "Love" until "get on the boat" falls into either the "good" or "great" category. Black Sweat and 3121 are really good too. Thats the best possible album that Prince could have made at the time and i am surprised that some fans still dont like the album.

As far as the symbol album ranked higher than Diamonds and Pearls, come on Symbol has some excellent songs. The best stuff on symbol easily beats the best on diamonds and pearls. 7, And God Created Woman, Love 2 the 9's, and Blue Light are excellent IMO

Plus the rapping is less annoying on symbol than it is on diamonds and pearls.

I just listened to 3121. I agree that it is a strong album by the standards of his current period. I don't listen to Prince's more recent music that much, and, to be honest, I couldn't remember which songs were on 3121 and which were on Musicology.

It would be interesting to do another poll in 10 years or so and see if people's opinions of the 2000s albums change over time.

hhhhdmt said:

Plus the rapping is less annoying on symbol than it is on diamonds and pearls.

That is the main reason why I gave the symbol a higher ranking that D&P.

CallMeCarrie said:

hhhhdmt said:

Plus the rapping is less annoying on symbol than it is on diamonds and pearls.

That is the main reason why I gave the symbol a higher ranking that D&P.

Also, D&P has "Jughead." Need I elaborate?

electricberet said:

CallMeCarrie said:

That is the main reason why I gave the symbol a higher ranking that D&P.

Also, D&P has "Jughead." Need I elaborate?

Oh lawd - watch all the Jughead fans come out of the woodwork to defend it!

CallMeCarrie said:

electricberet said:

Also, D&P has "Jughead." Need I elaborate?

Oh lawd - watch all the Jughead fans come out of the woodwork to defend it!

Right. Good thing the poll is closed.

What I found hard was realising how many great albums he had, virtually everything in the Top 20 is favourable, Top 12 is a great album, and the Top 5 are all bona fide classics. Even spots 21 to 30 are at least kind of okay, none of those albums is entirely weak. The Greatest Romance thats ever been sold is actually quite a good song, along with Hot Wit U.

Based on this poll, I would probably say that the top 11 are the consensus "great" albums, because those albums are ranked the same no matter which completion rule you select, and there are no ties. 3121 and Diamonds and Pearls are tied for 12th place using all of the completion rules except the one I reproduced in this thread, so there is some disagreement about the merits of those. But it's possible that 3121 will move higher in people's esteem as time passes and the stigma associated with the 2000s fades away. It takes a while for opinions to really form about which albums rank as "the best" in a particular musician's body of work. Prince may not be cranking out brilliant albums the way he used to, but some of them may be viewed in a different light decades in the future (as has happened with Controversy).

Spinlight said:

I am convinced people need to break out their The Vault Old Friends 4 Sale CDs again and listen. How can someone rate that album so low? The material on it is slamming?

I feel the same way about Chaos and Disorder and Planet Earth. WOW!! These two albums dont have a single bad song on them. The flow of Planet Earth is a little weird but EVERY song is GREAT!! and CHAOS....OMG...That cd is the bomb!! That cd freaking ROCKS!!

I love The Vault, C&D and Planet Earth.

But I'm also aware that as much as I'm drawn to them personally records like ATWIAD, TGE or Controversy are just better albums on the whole.