Hi all,

Devastated as I am at the passing of Prince, one thing I have enjoyed doing over the past weeks is re-visiting each of his official album releases and listening to them as complete sets, as a way of celebrating him and his amazing music, and reminding myself outside of his jaw-dropping live performances, what a fabulous artist he is/was. I feel no compulsion to mention the obvious greats, but I will - 1999, PR, ATWIAD, Parade, Sign, LSexy, Black, Gold - these stand as giants in his officially released catalogue. But I got to The Rainbow Children yesterday, and it totally blew me away, what a superb album, production is sweet as, the songs themselves are utterly brilliant, engaging and curious all at once, and the sentiment and teachings I enjoyed so much. I then remembered the gigs for that period I saw at Hammersmith, London and Le Zenith, Paris, then the ONA live set CD and DVD. What a period in his career, and perhaps one many outside his true Fams don't much recognise/recall as being an awesome period.

What period outside the obvious ones have you re-discovered or been reminded of at this sad time?

I have been through many different phases over the past weeks, I will miss his unpredictable, curious nature, his live appearances, popping up at short notice, his after-shows, his commentary and his 'sound', Prince did something no artist I have ever listened did, he created something utterly unique but the same time so brilliantly derivative. Most of all though, I think, and this is irrespective of posthumous releases that may come, I will miss his presence when a new piece of music found its way out (however that was), knowing that Prince wanted us to hear that piece, that release, gave him such presence to me, and that presence has gone.

I miss him now, and I will forever, but better to have loved and lost than not to have ever loved at all.

Life does move on, we look forwards, and as he once said himself, 'Life is but a parade'.

Chasing said:

You wrote to my heart. The tears falling down my cheeks are proof

You bring out a good point - rediscovering each album and phase in Prince's career. For me, I have to say I have really been looking at his more recent music lately, namely everything from Lotusflow3r to HitnRun Phase 2. But I have always listened to his music holistically. I listen to Dirty Mind, Controversy, 1999, Parade and my collection of 1980s singles a whole lot more, but oen stands out the most...

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And that album is Symbol, there is a lot of mixture on that album, sexy ballads, upbeat funky numbers, juicy pop and the pomposity of 3 chains o Gold. I love it more as it is such a deep album and it sums up all of Prince's ambition when it comes to music, he really tries to do everything. The most poignant individual song for me is Sometimes it snows in April off Parade though. Parade and Sign o the Times are two albums I never stop listening too.

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The saddest thing is, that we will never experience that anticipation that came with every new album, from the time you heard on the org, off Prince himself or somewhere else "There is a new Prince album coming out" or more likely "Prince has released another album". Unless its posthumous, there will not be any new albums and that I will miss the most. Think of it, the anticipation, the xpectation and the realisation of it. Even if the album turned out to mediocre it still generated interest and Prince was in the public eye. Despite the fact the album may have been mediocre, every Prince album had at least 2 or 3 songs that were "Oh wow, that just blew my mind" and we are not going to get that, unless they expunge the vault.