1. It's overrated because it's standard was always compared to his least appealing albums from that period after the 80's.

2. It's over produced, the operator segues are just too annoying now.

3. It sounds outdated and hasn't aged well at all... Come, Diamonds & Pearls, even Chaos & Disorder have all aged better.

Overall I feel it was so highly praised not because it was a great album as a whole, but because it was his most consistant album when his quality of albums decreased after his 80's output.

I think TGE is the last truly brilliant album that Prince released.I still love it

It was a consistent album and less of an attempt in trying to catch up with the times. And the material was strong enough to keep a live show standing based on a new album.

After that, only TRC was musically interesting enough to do this. All the rest ended pretty much in Prince goes Vegas Best off.

I think the status of the album was largely given based on the superb live renditions. Now that so much time has passed we rate it more by it's actual quality.

And yes, the segues don't help. He should really stop having these "storylines" and little parlando bits in his records. They're annoying and make albums sound really dated or cringeworthy. AOA suffers the same fate.

[Edited 5/3/15 11:18am]

It has that kind of blockbuster ambition... à la Diamonds and Pearls.

It has the shocking tune (Prince wants to keep up to its "Darling Nikki" status),

the hard rock tune ("Look Ma! No whammy bar!"),

the sexual tune,

the political tune,

the romantic tune,

the prog-rock tune,

the party tune,

the FM rock tune,

a ballad,

the R'n'B tune,

the sexual-romantic tune,

and an anthem.

It's basically shouting :

"Hey, remember me, you stupid public?
How come I don't sell as much as back in the days?
I'm fuckin' Prince !

I'm the Lizard King, I can do anything."

But beware, this is a tricky era.

The album may kinda slip, but the Michael B. / Sonny T. jams,

Come,
the Sacrifice Of Victor,
Exodus,
Chaos and Disorder,
and all of the live performances...

It was a very interesting artistic mutation.

You can't do justice to the TGE if you don't replace it in the full text of the Warner's debacle.

Taken out of it, well, it's basically to us fans what I said above : a brilliant display of pure talent.
The songs, the melodies ? Not so much.

No lasting value. 'The Gold Experience' and 'Diamond and Pearls' are my least two fav albums. Every other album through the present, I enjoy more... but then again, what do I know? I adore 'The Rainbow Children' and 'Lotusflower'.

Because its not very good.

TGE is in my Top5 of released Prince albums and a pure classic.

The whole era is one of the best he ever had.

Philly76 said:

TGE is in my Top5 of released Prince albums and a pure classic.

The whole era is one of the best he ever had.

Yup, I love it just as much as I did when it first came out in the 90s.

I still love it.

If I listen to it less, it's because it sort of symbolizes the end of an era.

It really started to go down hill fast after that one.

I mean, he still does great things, but that was maybe the last really mindblowing start to finish collection for me.

it's still in my top 3 Prince albums. love it

I've always thought it was overrated. It was like Prince was reaching, but never grabbed what he was trying achieve with this album. Some good songs, yes, but as a whole it was way too plastic for my taste. I dig Come way more than TGE. Like others said, it just aged bad and it was never in heavy rotation for me.

"Eye Hate U" is a classic...probably the finest single that Prince released in the 90s.

U gave your body 2 another in the name of fun

I hope U had some baby,if not,boo hoo

There is nothing groundbreaking-except for maybe dolphin. I may be in the minority because when I listen to music, mainly P's stuff. I cannot help but listen as a musician and not as just a fan. The Gold Experience is great in the sense that it was not trying to "say" something. The chord progression of Gold is beautiful and should not be compared tp Purple Rain, because the distinct difference is that there was once the hungry scraping by Prince and the bloated, wealthy self-involve Prince.

In the early years he was trying to get fans and hits. Just as he said during a Las Vegas show that he couldn't wait until he had so many hits that he could choose to play one at any time. The independent (leaving a major label) Prince at the beginning cared about his audience and wanted to acquire new ones (ONA show's usually during Raspberry Beret). The question really should not be if The Gold Experience has lost some of it's classic status in the cannon of Prince. But, more when did he realize that it doesn't matter what he puts out most of his fans will buy it.

I never understood the concept of pissing on something you have already purchased and can't take it back. It's a waste of energy. P has already been paid before the first CD is put on a shelf or is getting paid as soon as a download is available. And along those lines, why bitch about Hannah's vocal abilities, because until she is shipped off the paisley island she is still reaping benefits that many would give their left arm to be a recipient of.

Nothing ages well, especially people. Proof positive of this is that for all the years that people have been posting on the org we have not really evolved, it is always the same post with different words and the same tired reaction and responses. How many times can a person state that the org is a negative place and if they hate P's output beyond 1987 or whatever why do they still post here?

I saw the writing on the wall when ( I believe) the first website had little content and was taken down and replaced with something that was actually pretty good but, a bit pricey. I have not purchased not one thing regarding P since 1991. I have everything, and they have all been gifts, even my NPGMC subscription and concert tickets. I was also gifted the Lotusflower subscription for a birthday.

Until he is hit in his socket he will put out whatever he desires because he knows many will buy it and will still go to any concert with the same tired arrangements and then bitch about it while P is counting his cash laughing his ass off. My only gripe is that I still haven't received my freakin' Lotus Flower t-shirt, not because it's important, but because it was promised and became a waste of a good friends money.

Ps. Just reading the silly lyrics of the Baltimore song, it's not about Baltimore it is about press coverage because he will be relaunching his Hit N Run shows very soon. Think about it, where was his voice and talent during 9/11,Travon Martin and many other major cultural events? Yet will write a dirge for a freakin' football team! He cares more about some athlete returning to some Minnesota team and wondering when will he be paid for the work he's done regardless of how sloppy it is presented. Even Sheila pointed out that a lot of the stuff was raggedy and rushed.

7teenz said:

Shhh

Eye Hate U

BJB

Shy

Are all excellent IMHO and have legs to stay great even as he layers on album after album each with its own couple of stand out tracks. I think like most of his albums there are some clunkers - not that they are truly awful, they just stop the album from being in the top tier of his work.

The Gold Experience is still an exciting, absorbing record for me... there's just a THRILL to the sound, the performances, the attitude.

Musically, since this record, only The Rainbow Children and NEWS have reached the same level of musicality and inventiveness, I feel.

I've liked other stuff since then of course, but nothing else sounds as unbeatable, sonically.

In terms of pop music P. Control, Endorphinmachine, Shhh, The Most Beautiful Girl In The World, Dophin, Shy, Billy Jack Bitch and particularly Eye Hate U and Gold are all excellent pieces of music.

I'm still astounded by how fresh and brand-spanking-new Eye Hate U sounds every time I play it... it somehow manages to sound like classic soul and as if it's unfolding the moment you hear it... incredible musicianship, incredible song...

The remaining tracks on the album (We March, Now, 319) are more filler-y... maybe that prevents the album from being a stone-cold classic, but they're all fun, none of them are clunkers. And the segues are short and charming.... really don't understand how they can annoy anyone that much.

This is one of my favorite periods.... the namechange, the ridiculously prolific output... the unbelievable musicianship.

Loved it when it came out.... still love The Gold Experience now.

[Edited 5/3/15 17:01pm]

As someone who didn't become a fan until much later (I was born in 95), I've never really understood the praise surrounding the album.

The album feels so glitzy it sparkles. And it has the shimmering, caramlised, forced down and back up again, glitter-specked shit stain that is 'The Most Beautiful Girl in the World'. Then there's the segues... there's an orger who has something in his or her signature to the effect of 'you are now an official member of the New Power Genration you will recieve your NPG lunch box and gift card in the mail' or something like that, and that pretty much sums up how I feel about them. I don't know, maybe they sounded cool in the 90s but they've aged terribly.

The strange thing is, the album is full of really great songs: Endorphinmachine, Shhh, Dolphin (I never realised how good this song was until I heard the version he played at the Xenophobia celebration), Now, 319, Shy, Billy Jack Bitch... It's like something went wrong in the process of Prince translating them from his brain to the album. The delay in the album's release obviously contributed to a lot of tinkering and some songs, like 'Endorphinmachine' (which is still a brilliant song), lost their edge.

I usually think of The Gold Experience as a missed oppertunity. I always thought the Symbol-years would have been a great time for Prince to really reinvent himself (or at least for a while), as a raw funk-rock talent with focus on muscianship, in the vein of The Undertaker. At the time he was recording raw tracks like 'Calhoun Square', 'Da Bang' and 'What's My Name' and releasing TMBGITW. His live show at the time reinforces this. The Brussels 95 gig is my favourite Prince concert video-boot ever. An instrumental TMBGITW with Prince on guitar is beautiful, Gold slays. Seriously, had Prince replaced some of the covers (but kept 'People Get Ready' and 'I Believe in You' because they are too damn good, the latter being my favourite Prince cover) with some Gold Experience tracks plus 'Calhoun Square' and 'What's My Name' in the vein and format of that concert, it would be a classic, top-rank Prince album.

To summarise: I guess it's the production.

[Edited 5/3/15 17:18pm]

As great as this album is,if he had included "Days Of Wild","Hide The Bone" and "Ripopgodazippa".....it would have been even better.

TGE hasn't dropped in status to me. It was the first 0(+> album released and it was recorded with Prince on a mission to reinvent himself with a purpose, not just for the sake to be relevant again. I love it to this day.

Days of Wild belongs on that album, though. Removing it was a travesty.

I have never understood Prince fans fascination with "The Gold Experience". It had a few moments, but the cheese factor was in full effect, just like on "Grafitti Bridge" and "Diamonds and Pearls" and "O+>" and "Come" and...ad nauseum.

I blame the annoying sirens!!!!

One of the main reasons for The Gold Experience being the over hyped marketed piece of shit we didn't expect was having picked up bootlegs from record fairs then being four rows from the front at Wembley Arena in 1995 - having your ears blown square off with Prince playing his sodding symbol shaped guitar super fucking loud, then having to hear a bloody dissapointing album several months later.

Ok Prince, we get the pansy dichotomy of not being able to hear constant sound through all vibration of time. Do you want a M Night Symaline remix or something? Where the wind automatically triggers every drum machine on the planet at the same time?

Don't ask for much do you?

Cx

Just.... wow! Craziness up in here.

The Gold Experience is awesome. I want a Deluxe Edition with all the other tracks from the project that didn't make the cut!

Come, Exodus and The Undertaker are all fantastic as well. What a great time to be a Prince fan!!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xgkwOrUuMnc