Shit, that thread title reads like a thesis... anyway.

I have been in the privileged position to have earphones and the ability to listen to Prince's music on the walk to work, recently. One of the songs I uploaded to my acquired digital music experience was the aforementioned "I Could Never...". It is an age since I have listened to this tune on headphones and so I was quite taken aback and pleasantly surprised by the acoustic guitar that exists in the mix of this song. There it is, in all its rhythmic glory, right in the heart of this tune and, unless played on a superfunkycalifragisexy stereo it's hard to hear distinctly.

One of the pleasures of listening to Prince is that he is mostly a one man band. Sure, there have been musicians/band members that have featured heavily, but Prince, as we know, is entirely capable of putting out an album single handedly.

Now - I will qualify what I am about to say/suggest by stating that I have not listened to all of Prince's most recent output on headphones (Just Lotus Flower, MPLSound and 20Ten most recently - and probably Emancipation) but with the notable exception of The Rainbow Children the mix of Prince's albums have become less and less layered and less and less 'interesting' for want of a better word. The Rainbow Children is an interesting exception because of Femi Jiya's work on that recording. He worked with Prince through Lovesexy - an album that many criticised at the time for its overly complex, multi-layering. I found and still find Lovesexy to be among my top two Prince albums - so perhaps this commentary is subjective.

The question is, however, do you think Prince is becoming less careful re his studio recorded music because he is merely using it as a means to get people into stadia or am I harshly judging the recording quality of his later/latest album offerings?

I dunno, I think there are plenty of great 'headphone moments' that can be found on his later albums. I don't know if it's that he's putting less "care", as much as there is probably (ever so slightly) less inspiration - only due to the fact that he's been recording music pretty much non-stop for 35+ years. But despite this, I am constantly amazed at the level of music he is still able to come up with - even if it doesn't compare with his classic 80s material overall.

3121 and Lotusflow3r are great albums.
Planet Earth, MPLSound and 20Ten are solid efforts.

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[Edited 2/6/12 1:14am]

You're absolutely right. The quantity and, broadly, the diversity of Prince's musical output is incredible and I have absolutely no right to call into question his quality control/productin values - having put out only one album myself and that of a low quality 6th form comedy (ahem) troupe variety (ah, the sins of youth). But, I go back to this 'layering' thing - sort of.

I seem to remember during the Nude Tour, Prince would keep saying "ain't no loops on this stage" in reference to taped backing tracks and the like. He still uses the "real music..." refrain to this day. When you listen to his studio music, however, the loops have become much more frequent in the released versions of songs. 3121 is a great example; the title track feels like a live band, it sounds crafted. The studio version of Fury, however, is so lacklustre and reeks of edits - very unlike the live version.

I suppose there has been a change in emphasis in Prince's career. Listen to Annie Christian and the guitar that's going on under the surface, the keyboard refrain in Automatic that's played live throughout the song. You can just see the 20-something Prince focusing on each and every aspect of his recorded music. Now, of course, he has the audience, the respect, the mana. He just needs to fill theatres to make money; so he chucks out albums that lack the time spent on them - to these ears - than those when he was younger - and hungrier - and had something to prove to, well, not just him in the past.

Just my brain doing some thinking.

BoySimon said:

You're absolutely right. The quantity and, broadly, the diversity of Prince's musical output is incredible and I have absolutely no right to call into question his quality control/productin values - having put out only one album myself and that of a low quality 6th form comedy (ahem) troupe variety (ah, the sins of youth). But, I go back to this 'layering' thing - sort of.

I seem to remember during the Nude Tour, Prince would keep saying "ain't no loops on this stage" in reference to taped backing tracks and the like. He still uses the "real music..." refrain to this day. When you listen to his studio music, however, the loops have become much more frequent in the released versions of songs. 3121 is a great example; the title track feels like a live band, it sounds crafted. The studio version of Fury, however, is so lacklustre and reeks of edits - very unlike the live version.

I suppose there has been a change in emphasis in Prince's career. Listen to Annie Christian and the guitar that's going on under the surface, the keyboard refrain in Automatic that's played live throughout the song. You can just see the 20-something Prince focusing on each and every aspect of his recorded music. Now, of course, he has the audience, the respect, the mana. He just needs to fill theatres to make money; so he chucks out albums that lack the time spent on them - to these ears - than those when he was younger - and hungrier - and had something to prove to, well, not just him in the past.

Just my brain doing some thinking.

Hmm, I'm not sure that he ever spent much time on his albums/recordings. How could he when he recorded so often? For all we know he may have slowed down and is spending more time on his new music than he did on his "classic" songs/albums.

I agree with Toejam. There are still those little details in his music if you make the effort to hear them. Maybe not as common and as pronounced as they once were but there are plenty of subtleties in an album like Lotusflow3r. I don't think it is a fantastic song but I really love the sound of "Walk in Sand" from 20Ten. There's something about the mixture of the instruments on that one that I really dig.

You made a point about the sound of The Rainbow Children and I agree. Whatever you think of the music it is one of his best sounding albums and I would very much like to hear him do something similarly produced/engineered.

That sense of little details that made him so great from day 1 is definitely still there, just as much as ever before, in the composing/arrangements process.

When it comes to pure engineering, I don't have the skills to compare or judge, so I don't know.

The studio version of "Fury" is in many ways to the live version of "Fury", just as the studio version of "I could Never Take the Place..." is to the live mix of the same song on SOTT the movie.

Prince hasn't changed in some production ways, but he is making some of his released studio mixes even more minimal and dry than ever. I think he's trying to see just how simple and dry he can take it. I think this is progressive to him. The 80's studio stuff featured some simple mixes as well, but he would drench it in reverb and effects to make it sound complicated. That goes for the programmed drum beats too.

I wish I could take a recording/composition/production class just studying Prince's works. There's just so much to learn from.

"Hmm, I'm not sure that he ever spent much time on his albums/recordings. How could he when he recorded so often? For all we know he may have slowed down and is spending more time on his new music than he did on his "classic" songs/albums."

Conversely, I think he took more time on his older albums because he could record as and when he wanted to. This is all based on rumour and hearsay and inference, but I would argue that Prince spends less time in the recording studio now that he did when he was younger. When Prince was young he had the fire to produce music constantly and appeared to challenge himself continuously. Now he appears to have a method down pat and recording has become effortless - as I've said, I still think he's producing some great music, songs on Lotus, 20ten, Musicology and 3121(plus others) are all up there - but there's a cleaness to their sound that makes them feel sterile and 'hurried' for want of a better word, than some of the earlier stuff.

Don't get me wrong - I know songs like Jack U Off, Horny Toad, I Would Die 4 U all sound simplistic in composition and recording - but even a song like Take Me With U has so much going on in the mix that it is quite often possible to listen to it.

"The studio version of "Fury" is in many ways to the live version of "Fury", just as the studio version of "I could Never Take the Place..." is to the live mix of the same song on SOTT the movie."

I'm not so sure - I think there's a more considered progression in the studio version and the live version is a euphoric celebration of the confidence of playing a superbly crafted piece of pop music. Fury doesn't give that same feel.

Again - all this is just my opinion and as entirely wrong as it is correct.

BoySimon said:

"Hmm, I'm not sure that he ever spent much time on his albums/recordings. How could he when he recorded so often? For all we know he may have slowed down and is spending more time on his new music than he did on his "classic" songs/albums."

Conversely, I think he took more time on his older albums because he could record as and when he wanted to. This is all based on rumour and hearsay and inference, but I would argue that Prince spends less time in the recording studio now that he did when he was younger. When Prince was young he had the fire to produce music constantly and appeared to challenge himself continuously. Now he appears to have a method down pat and recording has become effortless - as I've said, I still think he's producing some great music, songs on Lotus, 20ten, Musicology and 3121(plus others) are all up there - but there's a cleaness to their sound that makes them feel sterile and 'hurried' for want of a better word, than some of the earlier stuff.

Don't get me wrong - I know songs like Jack U Off, Horny Toad, I Would Die 4 U all sound simplistic in composition and recording - but even a song like Take Me With U has so much going on in the mix that it is quite often possible to listen to it.

I agree that he probably spends less time in the recording studio now than he did when he was younger but as far as the hours spent on recording individual songs I don't think he is spending any less time on them. If it took him an hour to completely record a song in the eighties I'm guessing it takes him roughly the same amount of time today to record a song.

By most accounts he was always fairly fast when it came to recording.