McD said:

GirlBrother said:

I love 20Ten. It's a great album, and I don't understand why people don't like it.

If I'm being honest, I'm just back & forth with it. Sometimes I like the feel, other times I'm indifferent.

I have changed the track listing, a tad. I put "Cause & Effect" as track 1, and I insert "Hot Summer" just before "Laydown". For whatever reason, they fit well. I felt like "Compassion" was a weaker opening track, and "Cause & Effect" gives it a bigger opening punch.

TrivialPursuit said:

McD said:

jaawwnn said:

it could be fairly more blatant in fairness but fine, sling some insults sure.

Didn't you mean to say it could be more blatant IN YOUR HUMBLE OPINION? And, FROM YOUR POINT OF VIEW, you found my response insulting? Or do you expect me to work that out for myself? Yawn.

no.

Noodled24 said:

PeteSilas said:

maybe he just got tired of busting his ass to put out an album per year only to have people shit all over it.

Nailed it.

Things definitely escalated with fans around this time. Bria Valente got a lot of personal abuse. This is clear from watching her on Travis.

It doesn't seem out of the realm of possibility that Prince just said "fuck it". Perhaps hoping that with a waiting period between this and his next release fans might be more receptive/appreciative

What? You mean Prince finally took the advice WB gave him decades ago? Surely you are mistaken...

MMJas said:

TrivialPursuit said:

I think he addresses this in the 2009 Paris press interview. and he says something in the George Lopez interview about the industry going through some changes and he was going to wait for those changes to occur.

[Edited 5/30/16 13:07pm]

GirlBrother said:

I find that a lot of his post-TGE output suffers from poor sequencing. Musicology is great - it has a flow like the classic albums do. It's kind of weird how rearranging some albums makes them infinitely more listenable.

Interesting you say that.

I think of disk 1 of Emancipation. I've had that disk on shuffle more than once, and every time, those tracks work together quite well. For me, it's an album unto itself. The other two disks are spotty, albeit with a tad more good than bad songs. But disk one works in just about any sequence it can be played in.

HeavenMustBNear said:

MMJas said:

Was just organizing my Prince collection and this came to mind again. But because I was not on the forum around that time, i was wondering if Prince ever explained why this "hiatus"? I mean, there were shows, but no album releases. Previously there had been only 1 year intervals, but now there were 4 years. Does anyone have any insight into this?
Was he organizing the vault, cause some of the stuff on the albums after 2014 had some material that already existed, right?

Good question. I believe he gave some insight on this 2 years ago on the Arsenio Hall show. I would watch it or rewatch it if you haven't. He said that he liked to wait until he had other songs that went along with his favorites in order to complete an album (rather than compiling songs that don't fit) and that is why it takes longer to put out an album. He also said he does that because now that he's not under contract, there is no rush to put anything out. Makes me wonder if he felt pressured to put out an album every year while he was under contract. We know he was always making music and that putting out music that fast was a no brainer for him considering he had much more music than that. But maybe he would have taken more time to put out albums if he hadn't been under contract all those years. Who knows. It was once said that he never gave his best to the record companies. I can definitely see why. I'm sure there were other reasons too, but this is one that came straight from him. Hope that helped!. [Edited 5/30/16 3:13am]

Thank you, I watched it just the other day.

In the mid 80s, when he was young, he had two or three albums of material a year that he ideally wanted to share with the world. When he was much older, that creative spark just wasn't there as much and he just didn't have as much to say, via new compositions. So not unusual that he took that break. I always viewed him as semi-retired during that time, probably relaxing and enjoying life and not focused on recording and touring as much.

there is an unreleased album from 2011 recorded with John Blackwell, Ida, Shelby etc, with stuff like Black Muse and Welcome 2 America on it, very live and funky.

along with a few others he was considering, an acoustic album with Andy Allo, an NPG album in 2013, a live album in 2012 etc. 2010-13 was incredibly productive recording wise, just nothing came out.

RumAndRaisin said:

there is an unreleased album from 2011 recorded with John Blackwell, Ida, Shelby etc, with stuff like Black Muse and Welcome 2 America on it, very live and funky.

How do you know it's very funky and live?

RumAndRaisin said:

there is an unreleased album from 2011 recorded with John Blackwell, Ida, Shelby etc, with stuff like Black Muse and Welcome 2 America on it, very live and funky.

along with a few others he was considering, an acoustic album with Andy Allo, an NPG album in 2013, a live album in 2012 etc. 2010-13 was incredibly productive recording wise, just nothing came out.

Yes, like someone's has stated: he was still very productive, just not having the pressure of havihg to release material.

RODSERLING said:

LIke I explained it two years ago, the four years gap is because he fucked all his chances to release an album via a major recordig company. He fucked Warner, he fucked Sony (PLANET EARTH was released free in the UK), he fucked the retailers, he fucked former labels that was bought by major companies (BMG, ARISTA).

SO nobody wanted to sign with him anymore, because everybody knew Prince won't make any promotion after the initial release.

In february 2014, he tried very hard to sell PLECTRUM ELECTRUM, annoucing to various medias this album will be released soon. But he never found a deal.

When an artist release a new album, his catalogue is selling. But Sony, for some reasons, can't re-release MUSICOLOGY, PLanet earth, etc.

SO, his only chance to release PLEC ELEC, and any other new albums was to sign a deal with Warner, promising them the PURPLE RAIN remasters. ANd remember, this deal sucked a lot from the start because it din't include the music videos.

There were talk of making PURPLE RAIN 2014 huge, a tour, promotionnal tvs, etc. This was said from various insiders, including the FUNKU french internet magazine. BUt Prince said he wanted first to release AOA and PLEC ELEC, the same fucking day.

Everybody know the ending of this story : Prince didn't bother to make any promotion at all. AOA and PLEC ELEC were the biggest flops of his carreer to this date.

So they cancelled the PURPLE RAIN reedition, because without Prince involved, it would haven't make any sense.

Thank you for this answer I have been wondering what happened to the Purple Rain re edition

GirlBrother said:

HeavenMustBNear said:

MMJas said:

Was just organizing my Prince collection and this came to mind again. But because I was not on the forum around that time, i was wondering if Prince ever explained why this "hiatus"? I mean, there were shows, but no album releases. Previously there had been only 1 year intervals, but now there were 4 years. Does anyone have any insight into this?
Was he organizing the vault, cause some of the stuff on the albums after 2014 had some material that already existed, right?

Good question. I believe he gave some insight on this 2 years ago on the Arsenio Hall show. I would watch it or rewatch it if you haven't. He said that he liked to wait until he had other songs that went along with his favorites in order to complete an album (rather than compiling songs that don't fit) and that is why it takes longer to put out an album. He also said he does that because now that he's not under contract, there is no rush to put anything out.

Makes me wonder if he felt pressured to put out an album every year while he was under contract. We know he was always making music and that putting out music that fast was a no brainer for him considering he had much more music than that. But maybe he would have taken more time to put out albums if he hadn't been under contract all those years. Who knows. It was once said that he never gave his best to the record companies. I can definitely see why.

I'm sure there were other reasons too, but this is one that came straight from him. Hope that helped!.
[Edited 5/30/16 3:13am]

jaypotton said:

HeavenMustBNear said:

Good question. I believe he gave some insight on this 2 years ago on the Arsenio Hall show. I would watch it or rewatch it if you haven't. He said that he liked to wait until he had other songs that went along with his favorites in order to complete an album (rather than compiling songs that don't fit) and that is why it takes longer to put out an album. He also said he does that because now that he's not under contract, there is no rush to put anything out. Makes me wonder if he felt pressured to put out an album every year while he was under contract. We know he was always making music and that putting out music that fast was a no brainer for him considering he had much more music than that. But maybe he would have taken more time to put out albums if he hadn't been under contract all those years. Who knows. It was once said that he never gave his best to the record companies. I can definitely see why. I'm sure there were other reasons too, but this is one that came straight from him. Hope that helped!. [Edited 5/30/16 3:13am]

For me that argument does not add up at all. Prince's beef with record companies was that he couldn't release as often as he wanted (be that albums or individual songs). Prince's "excuse" or perhaps explanation at the time was the record industry needing to change to find a model that worked for him. I suspect he had burned too many bridges with record labels and nobody wanted to deal with him. He spent a long time trying to get Plectrumelectrum on a label and even when he did couldn't agree with Kobalt on what to do. Lo and behold he ended up back with Warner Bros but with what appeared to be a much improved deal that initially satisfied his requirements (although even now the actual details are still unknown except that Prince obviously used a remastered Purple Rain as the bait to get PE and AOA released).

Just an observation I thought would help. But what you said definitely makes sense too. To be honest, I think he could have put out way more than he did, but like other artists, I think sometimes he might have felt the pressure to put out his most commercial material at some point esp during the early 90s (even though his commercial stuff was still 10 times better than what others were putting out as far as creativity) but those albums didn't chart very well. I think both points are true as to why he might have had the hiautis. Like I said, putting out an album a year was most likely nothing for him. I honestly am not sure that there was ONE specific reason. He still had A LOT going on we don't know about. Who knows? Most everything is hearsay anymore anyway. At least the interview gives a little bit of HIS percpective even if there is more to it.

Hmm, I'm thinking it's combination of those projects taking more time, etc but I also believe there is some truth to the hip surgery considering the recent reports said he had scars on right hip/knee that one would only get from a surgery. That's the only time period that it could have fallen into - no i don't think it took over that whole time frame, but if he did have both a knee and hip replacement, that could knock someone out of commision for up to a year (combined of course). We will never know with 100% accuracy I suppose.

ForeverPaisley said:

avajane said:

ForeverPaisley said:

Hmm, I'm thinking it's combination of those projects taking more time, etc but I also believe there is some truth to the hip surgery considering the recent reports said he had scars on right hip/knee that one would only get from a surgery. That's the only time period that it could have fallen into - no i don't think it took over that whole time frame, but if he did have both a knee and hip replacement, that could knock someone out of commision for up to a year (combined of course). We will never know with 100% accuracy I suppose.

He wasn't releasing any new albums because he was working out a deal with Warner, which ended up with him getting his masters back in 2014. He was touring in every year between the album hiatus. By logic, it's more physically demanding to tour and perform then record, especially considering he had so much music in his vault that he could release albums any time he wanted. Case in point, he released HnR Phase I and HnR Phase II in September 2015 and December 2015, respectively.

Im of the opinion that the creative hiatus started in 2013 and not 2010. Upto the end of 2013 he was releasing a lot of stuff, just not in album form. 2014 and beyond we got an album made at least a year and a half earlier (Plectrum), an album produced, in part, by Josh with several older songs (AOA), another album seemingly entirely produced by Josh (HNR1) and an album consisting of old music (HNR2). The pain meds would have allowed him to perform on stage, but they may have also stifled his creativity....

I wonder what the last song he created in the studio was that he actually released? Baltimore? Free Urself?

Rebeljuice said:

avajane said:

Rebeljuice said:

Im of the opinion that the creative hiatus started in 2013 and not 2010. Upto the end of 2013 he was releasing a lot of stuff, just not in album form. 2014 and beyond we got an album made at least a year and a half earlier (Plectrum), an album produced, in part, by Josh with several older songs (AOA), another album seemingly entirely produced by Josh (HNR1) and an album consisting of old music (HNR2). The pain meds would have allowed him to perform on stage, but they may have also stifled his creativity....

I wonder what the last song he created in the studio was that he actually released? Baltimore? Free Urself?

How could pain meds stifle one's creatively, neurologically speaking?

I did say "may"... But I do know from personal experience that addiction can take away any desire to be productive.

A quick google found this:

"The myth that alcohol or drugs fuel innovation still lingers. A number of creative geniuses — from Ludwig van Beethoven to Vincent van Gogh — wrestled with substance abuse. But that doesn’t mean alcohol and drugs contributed to their accomplishments; in fact, as addiction spirals out of control, it becomes increasingly difficult to marshal the motivation needed to accomplish much of anything, let alone great creative works."

https://www.addiction.com...tive-side/

Which is more along the lines that I was getting at.

avajane said: