Got me crawlin' out the woodwork for this one.... Happy New Year, everyone.

Found this on Reddit:


"Circa 1990, a set called "The Jewel Box" first hit the black market, filled with never before heard Prince. The sound quality, while not great, did not take away from the feeling of having an exclusive inside look at the genius that goes on in the studio. Next was The Work, a comprehensive collection of all circulating studio cuts. The Work evolved into Work It, an even bigger set with upgraded sound and more tracks... But that was over 20 years ago and since then various major upgraded sets such as "Box O Chocolates", "Perfect Unreleased Prince", and "30 Years of Unreleased Funk" have come out alongside exciting new leaks. The call for a new (bold) generation of complete studio boots has been ignored for far too long. Here is the first of many volumes of a new set simply titled The Vault. Chronological, complete, the best sound, no tweaks, and FLAC when possible. We do not do this for the fame or the name, but for THE MUSIC! Happy holidays from Purple Advisory and enjoy. Stay tuned this April for part one of the 80s Vault..."

Time for another of my classic "KEEP/DUMP" reviews... Let's go...

Disc 1 - Home Demos + Early Studio Work ('76-77)

01 Sweet Thing

02 Wouldn't You Love To Love Me? #1

03 I Spend My Time Loving You

04 Rock Me, Lover #1

05 Improvisation

06 Don't You Wanna Ride?

07 Nightingale

These earliest tracks have never sounded ''great''. Old cassette dubs, you know. Here, they're on par with the ''best'' copies I have heard. KEEP.

08 Humming A Tune

09 Humming A Tune Pt 2

10 Instrumental

11 Instrumental

12 Telephone Conversation

These are new to me! Inconsequential, but cool to have. KEEP.

13 Leaving for New York #1

14 Instrumental

15 For You #1

16 Acapella

17 Hey, Lover

18 Instrumental

19 For You #2

20 Piano Intro
Again considering these are 40+ year old cassettes, they're never going to sound ''good''.

21 Soft and Wet #1

22 Instrumental

23 For You #3

24 For You #4

25 Untitled
Sound quality should be better on Disc 2, is all I can say. If you can look past the quality here, this is primo stuff. It's not going to sound any better than it does here. KEEP.


Disc 2 - Sound 80 Sessions (’76-'77)

01 Baby #2 (Instrumental)

02 Baby #3

03 Jelly Jam #2

04 Just As Long As We're Together #1

05 Instrumental

06 My Love Is Forever #2

07 We'll Make It Through the Storm #2

08 Soft and Wet #2

09 Just As Long As We're Together #2

10 Just As Long As We're Together #3

Now we're in the studio and everything is sounding much better. KEEP.

11 Instrumental #1

12 Instrumental #2

13 Instrumental #3

14 Instrumental #4

15 Instrumental #5

16 Instrumental #6

17 Instrumental #7

18 Instrumental #8

All sounding as good as can be. KEEP.

19 We Can Work It Out
KEEP.

20 Neurotic Lover's Bedroom
This appears to be the original leak. It was quickly ''remastered'' by somebody, with poor results. KEEP.

Disc 3 - Home Demos ('78-’79)
01 K-FUNK Interview (featuring Nadeara)
Pretty damn clean. KEEP.

02 Baby, Baby, Baby
03 Nadeara
04 Miss You
Original length, not the fan-edit. KEEP.


05 Donna
06 Down a Long Lonely Road
This one has always sounded bad. Nothing we can do about it though.

07 Wouldn't You Love to Love Me #2
Considering this is another home tape, KEEP.

08 Instrumental #1
09 Instrumental #2
10 Instrumental #3
11 Instrumental #4
12 Instrumental #5
13 Instrumental #6
These sound mad clean. KEEP.

Disc 4 - The Rebels ('79)

01 Kiss Me Quick

What's this doing here? Interesting, as it's generally considered a 1981 track, but I've always thought it was older than that. It's definitely not a Rebels track, but I guess you had to fit it somewhere chronologically. KEEP.

02 Instrumental #1

03 Hard to Get #1

04 Disco Away

05 You #1

06 The Loser

07 If I Love You Tonight #1

08 Too Long

09 Instrumental #2

10 Thrill You or Kill You #2

Personally I've never heard these as clean as they are here. KEEP.

Ok, obviously, there's nothing here that wasn't already circulating. However, I think this is a great beginning for a set that will serve the old and newer collector alike, especially if they continue it. If your collection is disorganized, if you've missed some of the leaks of the last several years, if your collection is plagued with fan-remasters, Do Yourself A Favor and get this set. I can't wait for the 80s part.

i have it on good athority that humming a tune pt. 2 is actually bloody mouth

lustmealways said:

i have it on good athority that humming a tune pt. 2 is actually bloody mouth

You crack me up, lustmealways. Please never change.

Pardon my ignorance, but isn't this just the Studio Nights set with Neurotic Lover's Bedroom tacked onto it?

VaultCurator said:

Pardon my ignorance, but isn't this just the Studio Nights set with Neurotic Lover's Bedroom tacked onto it?

I think so, based on comparisons I've made. But if they want the best cleanest sources for these early cuts, that's where you go. This being only the first part of a big set, I think it's to be expected that they would mine Studio Nights for these tracks. I've talked to a lot of people who say this fits the bill for beginning to re-organize their collection.

smokeverbs2023 said:

VaultCurator said:

Pardon my ignorance, but isn't this just the Studio Nights set with Neurotic Lover's Bedroom tacked onto it?

I think so, based on comparisons I've made. But if they want the best cleanest sources for these early cuts, that's where you go. This being only the first part of a big set, I think it's to be expected that they would mine Studio Nights for these tracks. I've talked to a lot of people who say this fits the bill for beginning to re-organize their collection.

Yes, this will be a great way to re-organize my collection and make sure I have the best quality for each song. Thanks for bringing it to our attention.

lurker316 said:

smokeverbs2023 said:

I think so, based on comparisons I've made. But if they want the best cleanest sources for these early cuts, that's where you go. This being only the first part of a big set, I think it's to be expected that they would mine Studio Nights for these tracks. I've talked to a lot of people who say this fits the bill for beginning to re-organize their collection.

Yes, this will be a great way to re-organize my collection and make sure I have the best quality for each song. Thanks for bringing it to our attention.

Definitely. Comes with a nice pdf booklet too!

You're right about that. But not everyone's got those tracks, or the good copies of them. I think this is more for the "babies of the new power generation", not us old-timers. It's nothing to shit on though.

love2thenines2003 said:

This compilation is just rehash from what is circulating for decades... nothing new!

Yes, as multiple posts have mentioned, the point of this set isn't necessarily to provide anything new. It's to provide a comprehensive, organized, definitive collection of the best quality of each song.

So rather than have ten different copies of varying quality of a song from multiple boots that were released over the years, you can have one nicely organzied set with just the best quality copies of each song.

Maybe that's not a selling point for everyone, but for someone like me (with serious OCD), I think it's great.

lurker316 said:

love2thenines2003 said:

This compilation is just rehash from what is circulating for decades... nothing new!

Yes, as multiple posts have mentioned, the point of this set isn't necessarily to provide anything new. It's to provide a comprehensive, organized, definitive collection of the best quality of each song.

So rather than have ten different copies of varying quality of a song from multiple boots that were released over the years, you can have one nicely organzied set with just the best quality copies of each song.

Maybe that's not a selling point for everyone, but for someone like me (with serious OCD), I think it's great.

That's exactly how I see it. Now bring on the 80s!!

FragileUndertow said:

Trying to sort out tracks is a bitch. I mean you have different sound quality, source, some have different pitch. Some tracks are incomplete. Quick example, I have a mp3 copy of Strage Way of Saying I Love you. It has a count off in the beginning (1,2,3,4) but its omitted on most, if not all the lossless copies I have. (as I recall) I tried sorting out the "Work It" set into sessions, years etc. Broke up other sets (bootlegs) and added, deleted tracks. But there is way too much to sort. The time and effort. I gave up. BIG Thanks to all, whomever is involved. This sounds great. Something to look k forward too

Figuring out which copy is the best quality is often difficult for me. I may have a lossless (flac) copy of a song that sounds like crap, and a 128 kbps copy of the same song that sounds great. I assume that's because the flac had an inferior source. Consquently, I listen to each copy and judge based on my own, addmittedly flawed, ear.

It would be like creating a blu-ray from a VHS tape. Yes, the format is superior, but it's not going to add missing date. The blu-ray will look just as terrible as the VHS. Meanwhile if you have a DVD of the same movie that was copied from another DVD, it will look better than that blu-ray because of its superior source.

lurker316 said:

FragileUndertow said:

I tried sorting out the "Work It" set into sessions, years etc.

Hi. The "Work It" set was/is in chronological order. Are you sure it wasn't "The Work" set, which iirc was a mess as far as that was concerned.

FragileUndertow said:

lurker316 said:

Consquently, I listen to each copy and judge based on my own, addmittedly flawed, ear

Yeah. I did/do the same. Then I found myself keeping 2 copies of some tracks I hate to break up cd sets. But I figured this is my personal collection. I can find outtakes by year, session, etc. So it works for me. Plus most files have metadata A side note ; Years ago people were sharing intire catalogs of bootlegs by label in lossless. Some of those sets I broke up now reappear if full. Another reason I stopped trying to sort stuff out

I may have a lossless (flac) copy of a song that sounds like crap, and a 128 kbps copy of the same song that sounds great

I noticed that on some tracks too. I deleted a ton of mp3 files. But I kept some

I broke up nearly all of my bootlegs. It made no sense to me to have five different copies of Witness, and I could never remeber which was the best quality. I went through my collection, chose the best quality of each version, and sorted them into folders that make sense to me. I also edited all of the metadata.

mb71 said:

lurker316 said:

FragileUndertow said:

lurker316 said:

I broke up nearly all of my bootlegs. It made no sense to me to have five different copies of Witness, and I could never remeber which was the best quality. I went through my collection, chose the best quality of each version, and sorted them into folders that make sense to me. I also edited all of the metadata

That be the best way to do it. I tried the same. But I got tons if more that could be sorted. As I said I gave up. And with Eye records blast from the past series. Ugh.. they are know for doing their own tweaks to tracks, I left those as sets

My project literally took me a month. I spent all of my spare time not at work organizing my collection. My wife was not happy because I was basically absent that month.

lurker316 said:

My Prince ''vault'' folders, are both organized and disorganized. i have them by year, with the tracks just alphabetical, and some are mp3s, some are Flac, some are even Wav. And like all of us, I have multiple copies of many tracks in those year folders, plus various boots that i've kept intact copies of as well, such as Parade Demos, to name just one. It would be nice after 30+ years of collecting these studio tracks, to have one definitive set. I think i'd still keep certain boots, but I haven't tried to put this all in order in many years.

The Vault book is still a great reference, but another excellent resource for putting things in order is sthe Chronological page created by VaultCurator.

smokeverbs2023 said:

My Prince ''vault'' folders, are both organized and disorganized. i have them by year, with the tracks just alphabetical, and some are mp3s, some are Flac, some are even Wav. And like all of us, I have multiple copies of many tracks in those year folders, plus various boots that i've kept intact copies of as well, such as Parade Demos, to name just one. It would be nice after 30+ years of collecting these studio tracks, to have one definitive set. I think i'd still keep certain boots, but I haven't tried to put this all in order in many years.

The Vault book is still a great reference, but another excellent resource for putting things in order is sthe Chronological page created by VaultCurator.

I have a very similar structure. There were some bootleg collections I kept intact, like Parade Demos, Come Original Test Pressing, Dream Factor, etc. Basically collections that represent an early configuration of an album, as opposed to a random assortment of tracks.

For those bootleg collections that I did split up, I sorted them into 3 general categories:

1.) completely unreleased songs (such as "Dance with the Devil" and "I'm a DJ")

2.) unreleased versions of songs that have had official releases (such as the long version of "17 Days" and the studio version of "Days of Wild")

3.) unreleased Prince versions of songs released by other artists (such as "All Day, All Night" and "High Fashion"... basically the same typ of stuff that was on The Originals posthumous release)

[Edited 1/5/23 8:36am]