[Disclaimer: of course the album versions are better. And of course, in most cases, the 12" versions are even better than those. But...]

I've always been an album person. In the cd days, if I didn't have time to listen to the whole album, I wouldn't put it on. Simple as that.

Then iTunes came along. Or more specifically, iTunes shuffle. Suddenly, my music listening turned into a juke box and I found I could go four or five tunes without even remembering what I'd just heard.

Except for Prince - he'd pop up a lot because in many cases, I'd have the 7", 12", and album version in my iTunes library. I'd hear Pop Life pop up three times in one hour and start to get a bit nervous; "am I going to get sick of these classics?". Something had to be done.

Enter iTunes's 'skip when shuffling' feature. A-ha! Now I can make sure I'm not getting bombarded by multiple copies of these songs. But which versions to skip when shuffling?

Against the voices screaming in my head, I clicked skip on the album and 12" versions. Seems criminal, right? I thought so too at first, but it's worked out great. I still hear the songs themselves (in edited form) when I'm on Shuffle, but if I want to hear the solo on Purple Rain, the coda on Alphabet St., or the "people call me rude" chanting on Controversy, I have to listen to the albums... and it's made listening to the full albums the treat it once was, before I got over-used to them. Now I relish the times I can sit and listen to the full intro on Let's Go Crazy, for instance, in the context of that wonderful album.

So anyway, thank you for letting me tell my little tale... and if you're getting trampled by too many copies of the same Prince tunes, I recommend you try it out!

[Periods because paragraphs don't work]

eyewishuheaven said:

Hey thanks, Paisley!

.

And I should add, in light of my redundant 'periods' thing, it looks like if you use a period as a paragraph break here, the forum will turn it into a paragraph break. So, there's a workaround!

[Edited 6/13/15 16:06pm]

One of the playlists on my Prince iPod is all 7" versions of the singles & b-sides.

Yeah even though, as the OP stated, the album/12" version is always better, I sometimes

like listening to the perspective of the edit version.

[Edited 6/13/15 19:10pm]

I don't like the 7" edits if its only fade out versions like When Doves Cry & Purple Rain, fading in the middle of the guitar solos..

But I have recently bought the Scandalous promo cd with a good 7" edit, 4:10 version.

[Edited 6/14/15 0:41am]

eyewishuheaven said:

Hey thanks, Paisley!

.

And I should add, in light of my redundant 'periods' thing, it looks like if you use a period as a paragraph break here, the forum will turn it into a paragraph break. So, there's a workaround!

[Edited 6/13/15 16:06pm]

Or

use

shift

+

enter

As for the subject of the same song appearing mutiple time on shuffle...

Not quite the same thing but one time I just pressed the remote button on my iPhone headphones and the songs started playing through my playlist in alphabetical order. If I didn't want to hear a song again I just skipped but that's not the point here. The point is that eventually I reached the S section and all I can say is, damn you Segue, damn you. I love Gold Experience, Exodus, The Dawn boot etc. But all those segue sections back to back, nooooooooooo!

7" Edits are among the last thing that I've collected regarding Prince's music. I used to not respect them as they were just edits of the full experience. Over time I've realized that some are uniquely intersting and all are worthy in regards to having a complete collection. Perhaps I should draw the line at collecting the mono mixes from the promo singles?

I like 7" edits a lot because I can fit more songs in the same amout of space when making compilations. And as has already been said, it makes me appreciate the album versions more when I listen to the same songs in album. Plus it gets boring hearing the same versions of songs over and over.