PurpleYoda3121 said:

One of the highlights of his later years

!! This, i love this song so much and HNR P2, what a great ending to a magnificent career.

TKO said:

PurpleYoda3121 said:

One of the highlights of his later years

!! This, i love this song so much and HNR P2, what a great ending to a magnificent career.

djThunderfunk said:

H&R 2 had some of Prince's strongest song writing in some while. I liked AOA but that had more to do with the style and cohesiveness of it.

The name alone is cool. I like the swing underneath the groove and the horns. Prince was never one to pass up the potential for a delicious double entendre. Like the man says, I've learned my lines and I'm ready to play my part.

We've got the groovy potential
C'mon baby
Let's keep it down

Really Love this Song

Lianachan said:

luvsexy4all said:

surprized at all this love....hate it

Indeed. After seeing this thread, I listened to it again last night to see if I'd missed something. Nope, still awful.

is it possible we just didnt get where prince was trying to go with this?

IstenSzek said:

SchlomoThaHomo said:

My impression is that “groovy potential” refers to music, and the potential a piece of music has to become a solid groove. And that he’s using as a double entendres in the song to describe a relationship.

ding ding ding!

Yes, that! Also agree with those who pointed out the word's nostalgia and charm, and that it's aged better than some others.

herb4 said:

H&R 2 had some of Prince's strongest song writing in some while. I liked AOA but that had more to do with the style and cohesiveness of it.

He called them Hit'n'Run for a reason. He was aiming at writing good ol' 45 rpm singles.
Paisley Park, as a one-man Brill Building?
HNR2 has a signofthetimish quality to it, like London Calling (not comparing), it's a collection of singles.
Each part is great in itself, but the sequencing makes it a greater sum.

The overall flow makes it feel like a proper album, with peaks and needed valleys: took me a while to appreciate the smooth minimalism of "When She Comes", which is a kind of "Adonis and Batsheeba" that doesn't need an orchestra and all the pizzaz to make its point. Prince was back to imagining what silence looks like ("Revelation").

Finally he started to write again like he got nothing left to prove.
It's hard to pinpoint, but there is really an inner peace, even in "Stare". Well, it's post AOA, right?
It makes his demise the more infuriating: he was entering a new stripped phase, a synthesis between the exuberant blind faith of the fifties ("Rocknroll Loveaffair"), the nylon guitars social consciousness of the seventies' Flower Power ("Baltimore"), and from the same decade, the spiritual cosmic awakening ("Black Muse", "Revelation"), open hats and Wurlitzers drenched in dry horns ("2.Y.2.D.", "Stare"), climbing decades of pop up to post-modern '00s, knocking out every clown that tried to steal His Royal Badness' thunder, Bruno Twix®, Justin Lumberjack™, stuff like that ("Look At Me, Look At U", "Groovy Potential").

And as for the shitty Trump-coming-of-age Reagania phony money eighties, since he dominated them from start to finish, why not cover himself while giving the high five to the Fam ("Extraloveable")? Long gone are the days when the Sheriff was giving us fans the finger, it was just a bad dream after all.

I think you're unfair about cohesiveness. There's this predominance of acoustic/real instruments from start to finish (that is why SCREWDRIVER, all electric yet not as good and loud as the punkish video version, could have been better left a part of a possible next 3rdEyeGirl project).

OK, it's not all acoustic, there are electronic artefacts here and there, but by now we've learned to accept them as part of his sonic palette, and they're more mastered than, say, the sound effects on "The Truth". Even "2.Y.2.D." has grown on me: I thought the only thing "ruining" it was this reverse effect on the background vocals, but no, it's part of the shuffle, he plays with the effects, like he used to. The Fender Rhodes is like the glue that holds electronica and old school together.

What baffles me is Prince turning off most of the effects on his voice on this album (very little chorus, almost no compression, using the natural reverb of the studio). There's an old school approach so genuine that it makes the one tried on Musicology forced, even if that album has its own merits. Pay attention to his humming at the beginning of "Baltimore". You think it's a synth pad doubling the guitar line? Nope, that's him. Sampled and replayed as a synth pad.

Ah! You read us when we were bitching about preset sounds, confess now Jamie!

What a drummer, what simplicity, so much groove with so little ("Revelation"), or so much ("Black Muse"), but it's never "too much".

Ahh, "Groovy Potential": that fantastic bridge with the nod to MPLS, and the slow burn until the end. These horns!
This one is the most hybrid of the batch, with this perfect and joyful blur between electronic and acoustic.
The ad lib, Prince out of his lungs reaching cloud nine.
The whole album deserves a high end audio system and high resolution.
Leave the basses alone, just push the high ends to get sprlnkling pianos ("Big City") and ride cymbals like rain drops ("Revelation").

Who was (were?) the sound engineer on these songs?

Enough of this critic shit.
This album on 11 is a rope to climb, that ultimately leads to heaven.
"When U go, U will know" and all that jazz.


"Baltimore" alone grabs you by the eardrums and never lets go,
and finishes you with flashes of the Kilimandjaro at dawn. Knock-out on the 1st round. By cowbell!
The few still standing will be on the floor before Round 2 ends.


High five, Christopher.
Shit, your hand's too high.
Comeback here.

[Edited 6/1/18 2:24am]

I can't believe we were a bunch of cretins, me included, that barked at "Stare" for being a clone of "Let's Work" when it came out.
Now I can't remember how in hell I got this delusion, as the songs couldn't be further apart, except for the common exploded funk-o-meter.

I'm gonna listen to PFunk right away as an act of contrition.

Oh, fuck. Leave "Screwdriver" in.
It's too fun. This kind of kazoo at some point...

One day we'll have to count how many original guitars sounds the man created.
I mean with genres and sub-genres. I get a hard on just thinking about it.

bonatoc said:

herb4 said:

H&R 2 had some of Prince's strongest song writing in some while. I liked AOA but that had more to do with the style and cohesiveness of it.

He called them Hit'n'Run for a reason. He was aiming at writing good ol' 45 rpm singles.
Paisley Park, as a one-man Brill Building?
HNR2 has a signofthetimish quality to it, like London Calling (not comparing), it's a collection of singles.
Each part is great in itself, but the sequencing makes it a greater sum.

The overall flow makes it feel like a proper album, with peaks and needed valleys: took me a while to appreciate the smooth minimalism of "When She Comes", which is a kind of "Adonis and Batsheeba" that doesn't need an orchestra and all the pizzaz to make its point. Prince was back to imagining what silence looks like ("Revelation").

Finally he started to write again like he got nothing left to prove.
It's hard to pinpoint, but there is really an inner peace, even in "Stare". Well, it's post AOA, right?
It makes his demise the more infuriating: he was entering a new stripped phase, a synthesis between the exuberant blind faith of the fifties ("Rocknroll Loveaffair"), the nylon guitars social consciousness of the seventies' Flower Power ("Baltimore"), and from the same decade, the spiritual cosmic awakening ("Black Muse", "Revelation"), open hats and Wurlitzers drenched in dry horns ("2.Y.2.D.", "Stare"), climbing decades of pop up to post-modern '00s, knocking out every clown that tried to steal His Royal Badness' thunder, Bruno Twix®, Justin Lumberjack™, stuff like that ("Look At Me, Look At U", "Groovy Potential").

And as for the shitty Trump-coming-of-age Reagania phony money eighties, since he dominated them from start to finish, why not cover himself while giving the high five to the Fam ("Extraloveable")? Long gone are the days when the Sheriff was giving us fans the finger, it was just a bad dream after all.

I think you're unfair about cohesiveness. There's this predominance of acoustic/real instruments from start to finish (that is why SCREWDRIVER, all electric yet not as good and loud as the punkish video version, could have been better left a part of a possible next 3rdEyeGirl project).

OK, it's not all acoustic, there are electronic artefacts here and there, but by now we've learned to accept them as part of his sonic palette, and they're more mastered than, say, the sound effects on "The Truth". Even "2.Y.2.D." has grown on me: I thought the only thing "ruining" it was this reverse effect on the background vocals, but no, it's part of the shuffle, he plays with the effects, like he used to. The Fender Rhodes is like the glue that holds electronica and old school together.

What baffles me is Prince turning off most of the effects on his voice on this album (very little chorus, almost no compression, using the natural reverb of the studio). There's an old school approach so genuine that it makes the one tried on Musicology forced, even if that album has its own merits. Pay attention to his humming at the beginning of "Baltimore". You think it's a synth pad doubling the guitar line? Nope, that's him. Sampled and replayed as a synth pad.

Ah! You read us when we were bitching about preset sounds, confess now Jamie!

What a drummer, what simplicity, so much groove with so little ("Revelation"), or so much ("Black Muse"), but it's never "too much".

Ahh, "Groovy Potential": that fantastic bridge with the nod to MPLS, and the slow burn until the end. These horns!
This one is the most hybrid of the batch, with this perfect and joyful blur between electronic and acoustic.
The ad lib, Prince out of his lungs reaching cloud nine.
The whole album deserves a high end audio system and high resolution.
Leave the basses alone, just push the high ends to get sprlnkling pianos ("Big City") and ride cymbals like rain drops ("Revelation").

Who was (were?) the sound engineer on these songs?

Enough of this critic shit.
This album on 11 is a rope to climb, that ultimately leads to heaven.
"When U go, U will know" and all that jazz.


"Baltimore" alone grabs you by the eardrums and never lets go,
and finishes you with flashes of the Kilimandjaro at dawn. Knock-out on the 1st round. By cowbell!
The few still standing will be on the floor before Round 2 ends.


High five, Christopher.
Shit, your hand's too high.
Comeback here.

[Edited 6/1/18 2:24am]

I'm in the office on my feet applauding.

In the words of Sonny T; 'Yes MF Yes'

dodger said:

bonatoc said:

He called them Hit'n'Run for a reason. He was aiming at writing good ol' 45 rpm singles.
Paisley Park, as a one-man Brill Building?
HNR2 has a signofthetimish quality to it, like London Calling (not comparing), it's a collection of singles.
Each part is great in itself, but the sequencing makes it a greater sum.

The overall flow makes it feel like a proper album, with peaks and needed valleys: took me a while to appreciate the smooth minimalism of "When She Comes", which is a kind of "Adonis and Batsheeba" that doesn't need an orchestra and all the pizzaz to make its point. Prince was back to imagining what silence looks like ("Revelation").

Finally he started to write again like he got nothing left to prove.
It's hard to pinpoint, but there is really an inner peace, even in "Stare". Well, it's post AOA, right?
It makes his demise the more infuriating: he was entering a new stripped phase, a synthesis between the exuberant blind faith of the fifties ("Rocknroll Loveaffair"), the nylon guitars social consciousness of the seventies' Flower Power ("Baltimore"), and from the same decade, the spiritual cosmic awakening ("Black Muse", "Revelation"), open hats and Wurlitzers drenched in dry horns ("2.Y.2.D.", "Stare"), climbing decades of pop up to post-modern '00s, knocking out every clown that tried to steal His Royal Badness' thunder, Bruno Twix®, Justin Lumberjack™, stuff like that ("Look At Me, Look At U", "Groovy Potential").

And as for the shitty Trump-coming-of-age Reagania phony money eighties, since he dominated them from start to finish, why not cover himself while giving the high five to the Fam ("Extraloveable")? Long gone are the days when the Sheriff was giving us fans the finger, it was just a bad dream after all.

I think you're unfair about cohesiveness. There's this predominance of acoustic/real instruments from start to finish (that is why SCREWDRIVER, all electric yet not as good and loud as the punkish video version, could have been better left a part of a possible next 3rdEyeGirl project).

OK, it's not all acoustic, there are electronic artefacts here and there, but by now we've learned to accept them as part of his sonic palette, and they're more mastered than, say, the sound effects on "The Truth". Even "2.Y.2.D." has grown on me: I thought the only thing "ruining" it was this reverse effect on the background vocals, but no, it's part of the shuffle, he plays with the effects, like he used to. The Fender Rhodes is like the glue that holds electronica and old school together.

What baffles me is Prince turning off most of the effects on his voice on this album (very little chorus, almost no compression, using the natural reverb of the studio). There's an old school approach so genuine that it makes the one tried on Musicology forced, even if that album has its own merits. Pay attention to his humming at the beginning of "Baltimore". You think it's a synth pad doubling the guitar line? Nope, that's him. Sampled and replayed as a synth pad.

Ah! You read us when we were bitching about preset sounds, confess now Jamie!

What a drummer, what simplicity, so much groove with so little ("Revelation"), or so much ("Black Muse"), but it's never "too much".

Ahh, "Groovy Potential": that fantastic bridge with the nod to MPLS, and the slow burn until the end. These horns!
This one is the most hybrid of the batch, with this perfect and joyful blur between electronic and acoustic.
The ad lib, Prince out of his lungs reaching cloud nine.
The whole album deserves a high end audio system and high resolution.
Leave the basses alone, just push the high ends to get sprlnkling pianos ("Big City") and ride cymbals like rain drops ("Revelation").

Who was (were?) the sound engineer on these songs?

Enough of this critic shit.
This album on 11 is a rope to climb, that ultimately leads to heaven.
"When U go, U will know" and all that jazz.


"Baltimore" alone grabs you by the eardrums and never lets go,
and finishes you with flashes of the Kilimandjaro at dawn. Knock-out on the 1st round. By cowbell!
The few still standing will be on the floor before Round 2 ends.


High five, Christopher.
Shit, your hand's too high.
Comeback here.

I'm in the office on my feet applauding.

In the words of Sonny T; 'Yes MF Yes'

bonny kills with words.