Phase 2 by a country mile.

Phase 1 is one of his most disappointing albums. I gave it another spin this week thinking I might hear something new, and I was wrong. Other than "Hardrocklover" and "1000 Hugs & Kisses" (which I consider a masterpiece), the rest is highly skippable.

Phase 2 on the other hand is just a solid fun album.

Phase ONE.

I have to say I have always said :

Phase One for the Daytime

Phase Two for the Evening.

I think a huge part of what I loved about Prince was him doing things that were not expected and Phase One had a really frenetic club pace and Phase Two had a much more Old-School Classic Prince.

so far...

HNR 2 = 16

HNR 1 = 7

"Both" aka "Douches" = 5 ( )

PHASE ONE.

the last half of PHASE ONE brings more energy than the whole album of PHASE TWO.

personally HARDROCKLOVER, 1000 X'S & O'S and JUNE in my opinion are the three strongest songs out of both albums, with REVELATION coming next.

"Phase 2" for me. "Baltimore" is starting to grow on me. I expected a darker vibe ("The War", "S.O.T.T") but I'm slowly digging it.

Hey I didn't really vote, I'll say phase 1

ufoclub said:

Hey I didn't really vote, I'll say phase 1

Congrats. You are no longer a "douche"

Phase Two

Phase 1

Phase one.

Phase Two, but I love Phase One too.

Phase Two. Phase One is unpleasant and the features underwhelm me.

Phase 2

violectrica said:

I only have phase one and love it. It's a 35 minute drive to the 3 towns in any direction...sold-out. Is this online anywhere?

Yes. Here

http://www.amazon.com/HITNRUN-Phase-Two-Prince/dp/B01DMSHO78?ie=UTF8&keywords=prince%20phase%202&qid=1462766891&ref_=sr_1_1&sr=8-1

Phase 2 By a mile for me..

Phase 1 I only really dug "June" & "1000 x's & o's" ..."hardrocklover" honorable mention.

These two albums together (Phase1&2) kinda remind me of 2009's LotusFlower & MPLSsound - One is an organic record with real live insrtuments, drums, guitar solos, etc - the other is more a snythesized album aimed at making current dance music...

I feel at the later stage of P's career (2000 -2016) he fared better more often at creating organic songs & albums with real instruments, a-la LOTUS & Phase 2, also...Andy Allo, Judith hill during his final 5 years.

Early in his career (late 70's and entire 80's) he was the MASTER & innovator of dance/synthesized music. Whenever he tries to "catch up" with whats going on in urban music, I feel is when we find him at his weakest...(example - early 90's when hip-hop rose to prominence, his attempts at hip-hop weren't considered on par with his classic songs)

The one time where I feel he nailed the more production laden heavy synth-produced sound later in his career, was on "ArtOfficialAge". I felt that album took some ideas and vibes production wise & musically that didnt work well on MPLSSound, tweaked it & nailed it, delivering IMO, the best album he'd released since 2004's Musicology...

eitherway, he's the MAN & I own all his albums - & miss the fact I can't look forward to what he was going to cook up next...

homesquid said:

Definitely Phase Two.

But Phase One has grown on me. I steal a few tracks from there to build Phase Two into a Super-duper Phase Three.

“Phase One” is ahead by light years. It’s very much a sister album to AOA: exciting, futuristic and brilliant.

-

Even though I’ve warmed up to “Phase Two,” it’s still a rather disappointing swan song album. I always thought Prince’s last album would have been a grand magnum opus on a scale hitherto unimaginable to all of us mere mortals.

Phase Two

so far

HNR 2= 24

HNR 1= 14

TheBoneRanger said:

“Phase One” is ahead by light years. It’s very much a sister album to AOA: exciting, futuristic and brilliant.

-

Even though I’ve warmed up to “Phase Two,” it’s still a rather disappointing swan song album. I always thought Prince’s last album would have been a grand magnum opus on a scale hitherto unimaginable to all of us mere mortals.

I have voted already, I just wanna say this reply gets the prize for best post so far.

And I agree (about Phase 1) - with u, Boneranger.

An easy one for me: Phase Two is Prince's best album for a long time, whereas Phase One may be his worst album ever.

phase 2. Although, I have barely listen to 1 or 2. I've spun those discs about 4 times each.

TheBoneRanger said:

“Phase One” is ahead by light years. It’s very much a sister album to AOA: exciting, futuristic and brilliant.

I can't see in which way Phase1 is an extension of AOA, being it more a vault collection than a proper album.


Musically talking, apart from 3 tracks (100 hugs - June - Hardrocklover) that without surprise are the saving grace, all the rest of the CD sounds like a "Josh feat. Prince", and not a good one.


And while I agree with U on AOA as "exciting, futuristic and brilliant" (the last great classic P album), I can't see how Phase1 is "exciting, futuristic and brilliant".


That said, back to the question, between Phase1 and Phase2 I strongly prefer Phase 2.
But I don't look at them as proper album, just as vault collections.

BoraBora said:

rainbowchild said:

I consider it a double album.

It's all a matter of significance.

To me every release is not automatically an "album" only because of its release.

"Crystal Ball" 1986 was a proper album, "Crystal Ball" 1998 not.

[Edited 5/9/16 8:52am]