TryWhistlingThis said:

If the album does receive the Super Deluxe reissue treatment (ala PR, 1999 and SOTT), would there actually be any unreleased material from the vault from this album? Surely he released everything that he had recorded in that year or two for the album?

There's a bootleg of outtakes called, Emancipation

The Secret Chapter. Tracks are Slave 2 The System, New World, Slave, 2020, Feel Good, Right Back Here In My Arms, Journey 2 The Center of Your Heart, I am the DJ, Goodbye, Emancipation. There are other known outtakes and alternate cuts too.

TrivialPursuit said:

dodger said:

I’m with you on those, especially the title track, except "Joint 2 Joint." Surprised to see that on your bad list.

I've gone thru it with this song. Sometimes I love the weirdness of it, other times it's so fucking annoying. The sampled rapping, the tap dancing by Glover. It's nutz. I don't know that I'll ever resolve how I feel about it. In fairness, I don't always skip past it on the CD.

Nutz is the word. With a touch of genius.

.

When he says 'come upstairs to my room' and you hear a door open it conjures up all kinds of images... burlesque dancers, jugglers, dwarfs in a big room with chandeliers and polished wooden floors.

At one point you can hear a whip (most likely a dwarf on the receiving end from a burlesque dancer).

The tap dancers (also dwarfs) are on a big long wooden table and P is over-looking from a balcony whilst playing guitar.

.

funkbabyandthebabysitters said:

I give up actually. This album has to be taken in its entirety more or less, flaws included lol

That's always been my take on the album.

It's not my favourite Prince album but I do like it.

Self-indulgent? Insert sky + blue question here.

Overly long? Sure.

Messy and inconsistent? Much like my mornings.

But that's why I like the album and why I refuse to listen to the album in an abridged or partial session. It's either the full three hours or nothing at all. It's always been about the journey for me.

TheEnglishGent said:

TryWhistlingThis said:

If the album does receive the Super Deluxe reissue treatment (ala PR, 1999 and SOTT), would there actually be any unreleased material from the vault from this album? Surely he released everything that he had recorded in that year or two for the album?

There's a bootleg of outtakes called, Emancipation

The Secret Chapter. Tracks are Slave 2 The System, New World, Slave, 2020, Feel Good, Right Back Here In My Arms, Journey 2 The Center of Your Heart, I am the DJ, Goodbye, Emancipation. There are other known outtakes and alternate cuts too.

I believe that sometime before, P said at a PP party that he was going to release a 50 track album. So that would suggest a bunch outtakes.

Every single song that ended up as outtakes, should've replaced some of the songs in the albums. They were ALL strong songs, I don't understand why they haven't made the cut.

I would like to hear a earlier version of the album (if it exists) like with the Diamonds and Pearls Beginnings bootleg, without the overproduction and just plain weird loud sound of it.

it is an album that has been produced to death.

funkbabyandthebabysitters said:

as next year will be the 25th anniversary of this album

Where did the time go?!

.

.

I think the Emancipation 1CD version wishlists have been done to death so I won't add mine, but just to say I think the album is aging well. The songwriting on Emancipation was never the problem, it was the production that leveled off all the rough edges and interesting nooks and crannies to give a very cohesive, but flat, homogeneous sound that stuck around until The Rainbow Children.

.

As I return to the album in recent years, I realise more than ever that the positives outweigh the negatives and there's at least a double album's worth of really good songs here.

Emancipation's LP cover is one of Prince's best

dodger said:

TrivialPursuit said:

I've gone thru it with this song. Sometimes I love the weirdness of it, other times it's so fucking annoying. The sampled rapping, the tap dancing by Glover. It's nutz. I don't know that I'll ever resolve how I feel about it. In fairness, I don't always skip past it on the CD.

Nutz is the word. With a touch of genius.

.

When he says 'come upstairs to my room' and you hear a door open it conjures up all kinds of images... burlesque dancers, jugglers, dwarfs in a big room with chandeliers and polished wooden floors.

At one point you can hear a whip (most likely a dwarf on the receiving end from a burlesque dancer).

The tap dancers (also dwarfs) are on a big long wooden table and P is over-looking from a balcony whilst playing guitar.

.

best song on the opus!

3 jams "come 2gether" as one to make a fourth jam

dodger said:

Nutz is the word. With a touch of genius.

.

When he says 'come upstairs to my room' and you hear a door open it conjures up all kinds of images... burlesque dancers, jugglers, dwarfs in a big room with chandeliers and polished wooden floors.

At one point you can hear a whip (most likely a dwarf on the receiving end from a burlesque dancer).

The tap dancers (also dwarfs) are on a big long wooden table and P is over-looking from a balcony whilst playing guitar.

.

TrivialPursuit said:

dodger said:

Six dwarfs carry a burlesque dancer, played by Carmen Electra, up the marble stairs to P’s balcony. Just as they begin their embrace in sweet gypsy moans he sees Mayte’s face in the huge heart-shaped mirror above the bed.. . He shrugs Carmen off, runs down the fire escape at the back of the building and jumps into a waiting yellow cab. He tells the driver, who is HM (Half Man) Buff and obviously a dwarf, to drive while he writes the lyrics to Friend, Lover, Sister, Mother/Wife...

The project is fine as is.

There was a master plan 2 market that album.......and EMI closed its doors out of the blue.

Yes. This is the definitive, inarguable, perfect version of a single-disc Emancipation.

1. Slave Jam of the Year

2. Right Back Here in my Arms

3. Somebody's Somebody

4. The Love We Make

5. Style

6. In This Bed I Scream

7. Sex in the Summer

8. White Mansion

9. One Kiss at a Time

10. Sleep Around

11. Damned if Eye Do

12. The Holy River

13. Emancipation

[Edited 8/25/20 21:52pm]

[Edited 9/3/20 18:19pm]

I'd leave out the cover songs. Makes condensing down tracks easer.

funkycat00 said:

I'd leave out the cover songs. Makes condensing down tracks easer.

Although part of Prince's 'emancipation' was to be able to include covers on an album for the first time.

leecaldon said:

funkycat00 said:

I'd leave out the cover songs. Makes condensing down tracks easer.

Although part of Prince's 'emancipation' was to be able to include covers on an album for the first time.

There was nothing stopping him from doing cover songs with Warners.

NouveauDance said:

leecaldon said:

Although part of Prince's 'emancipation' was to be able to include covers on an album for the first time.

There was nothing stopping him from doing cover songs with Warners.

I remember him saying something in an interview. More likely it was the publishers who would care about that.

Shockedelicus said:

Yes. This is the definitive, inarguable, perfect version of a single-disc Emancipation.

1. Jam of the Year

2. Right Back Here in my Arms

3. Somebody's Somebody

4. The Love We Make

5. Style

6. In This Bed I Scream

7. Sex in the Summer

8. White Mansion

9. One Kiss at a Time

10. Sleep Around

11. Damned if Eye Do

12. The Holy River

13. Emancipation

[Edited 8/25/20 21:52pm]

I agree with much of this, but ... any version that includes Jam of the Year has a problem. That is one of the worst openers of his career.

right back here in my arms

new world

in this bed eye scream

somebody's somebody

white mansion

one kiss at a time

soul sanctuary

curious child

dreamin about u

the holy river

da, da, da
emale

lets have a baby
style

my computer

one of us

the love we make

emancipation

controversy99 said:

Shockedelicus said:

Yes. This is the definitive, inarguable, perfect version of a single-disc Emancipation.

1. Jam of the Year

2. Right Back Here in my Arms

3. Somebody's Somebody

4. The Love We Make

5. Style

6. In This Bed I Scream

7. Sex in the Summer

8. White Mansion

9. One Kiss at a Time

10. Sleep Around

11. Damned if Eye Do

12. The Holy River

13. Emancipation

[Edited 8/25/20 21:52pm]

I agree with much of this, but ... any version that includes Jam of the Year has a problem. That is one of the worst openers of his career.

right back here in my arms

new world

in this bed eye scream

somebody's somebody

white mansion

one kiss at a time

soul sanctuary

curious child

dreamin about u

the holy river

da, da, da
emale

lets have a baby
style

my computer

one of us

the love we make

emancipation

Yeah I don't get the appeal of that song, I t's kind of awful.

TrivialPursuit said:

dodger said:

Six dwarfs carry a burlesque dancer, played by Carmen Electra, up the marble stairs to P’s balcony. Just as they begin their embrace in sweet gypsy moans he sees Mayte’s face in the huge heart-shaped mirror above the bed.. . He shrugs Carmen off, runs down the fire escape at the back of the building and jumps into a waiting yellow cab. He tells the driver, who is HM (Half Man) Buff and obviously a dwarf, to drive while he writes the lyrics to Friend, Lover, Sister, Mother/Wife...

slyjackson said:

controversy99 said:

any version that includes Jam of the Year has a problem. That is one of the worst openers of his career.

Yeah I don't get the appeal of that song, I t's kind of awful.

I edited it down and took out all that stupid talking and extra shit. It feels more cohesive. "Damned If I Do" would've been a better opener for disk 1.

And frankly, the title track is just as weak as JOTY if you think about it.

TrivialPursuit said:

dodger said:

I’ve tried to get into Damned If I Do several times over the years but it just grates me. . The shitty drums sound so un-Michael B, his vocal delivery reminds me of Avril Lavigne and the guitar bits could’ve been used for a Friends interlude

This sort of supports the ongoing notion that sometimes Prince songs sound better live. It was obvious when a song like "Get Yo Groove On" was pretty good on record, but during the Emancipation concert, it was great. It was funky, kinetic. The falsetto on the record thinned it out, but his regular voice live made it a whole different song. I really wish I'd heard "Damned If I Do" live. I think it would've rocked.

Emancipation was also the beginnings of his overly compressed, flat, acrylic production that permeated many of his records in the aughts and beyond. The Rainbow Children sorta stands out like a sore thumb because it doesn't have that flat plastic sound that other albums did, which is weird that he bounced between totally different types of productions like that. TRC is almost an anomoly in that way.

I really believe if he had brought in a band way more often, as he did in the mid 90s with TGE, Come, Exodus, Chaos, that Emancipation would've been a whole different ballgame. I don't hate the record. I just feel like it could've given more if he had nurtured it a bit.

There's a thread on this every week.

So this week I'll say "Prince in domestic bliss" is the least interesting Prince.