In the tradition of the The Journey From Prince To and Prince Vs. Warner Brother... Fans Lost blogs which originated as Ultimate Come and Gold articles right here on prince.org, here’s a sequel covering the music /Prince released from 1998 to 2004 from his famous vault of hundreds of unreleased songs.

Crystal Ball, The Vault… Old Friends 4 Sale, The NPG Music Club, The Chocolate Invasion and The Slaughterhouse, including looks at abandoned projects like Roadhouse Garden and Crystal Ball II.

Read all about how The Vault Volume I, II and III became Crystal Ball and how the High album became The Chocolate Invasion - and so much more!

It's all right here: The Journey From Back To Prince

- it's a two-hour read. Please enjoy the experience.

[Edited 8/16/23 7:16am]

IIRC "Kiss (Xtended Version)" was once played at a Paisley Park party.

Thanks scfi.

Fascinating read!

Great to hear that you found time for another volume of your work! Looking forward to reading it!

On a side note: It's still bugging me why U were calling Ur original blog "... the fans lost". In my opionion as a fan it was the most fascinating part of my journey with Prince. I think we as fans gained a lot - not only spectacular music that wouldn't have been made had there not been the fight with WB, but spectacular concepts like the NPG store in London, the NPG magazine, the Goldnigga album, the home videos Undertaker + Sacrifice of Victor, tours with only new music played and of course the mystery and media exposure which lead to Prince opening up and giving lots of interviews for the first time in all these years.

Maybe U could give a short reply why U think the fans lost - and what? Thanx!

bizzie said:

IIRC "Kiss (Xtended Version)" was once played at a Paisley Park party.

Please describe it!!!

kindofblue said:

Great to hear that you found time for another volume of your work! Looking forward to reading it!

On a side note: It's still bugging me why U were calling Ur original blog "... the fans lost". In my opionion as a fan it was the most fascinating part of my journey with Prince. I think we as fans gained a lot - not only spectacular music that wouldn't have been made had there not been the fight with WB, but spectacular concepts like the NPG store in London, the NPG magazine, the Goldnigga album, the home videos Undertaker + Sacrifice of Victor, tours with only new music played and of course the mystery and media exposure which lead to Prince opening up and giving lots of interviews for the first time in all these years.

Maybe U could give a short reply why U think the fans lost - and what? Thanx!

Well, the fans didn't get the Come and Gold albums when Prince wanted to release them, and in my opinion, the albums that finally saw release weren't as good as they'd have been if they had been released when Prince originally wanted them released - Come in 1993 and Gold Exp. in 1994. That was the entire original point of writing Ultimate Come and Ultimate Gold - to get that point across. Many fans didn't even know about the history of those albums before I wrote about them. And then it all just developed from there. But granted, 1994 was an exciting time to be a fan because of the TV movie and all the bootlegging of new tracks. But imagine the worldwide tour Prince could've undertaken in 1994 if WB had released Gold then. Mayte & The ErotiCity dancers choreographed by Jamie King. The NPG Hornz. Instead there was a small scale tour of clubs in major American cities.

[Edited 8/16/23 13:32pm]

Fantastic article, so many things I didn`t know yet. Thank you!

Awesome, cant wait to read this.

Since publishing the blog, I've made a few updates.

1) It struck me that Why Should I Love You? by Kate Bush was the song by another eighties pop star H.M. Buff said Prince was asked to do a new backing for and that was considered for Crystal Ball, so I included a link to it on YouTube.

2) In the High chapter, I rewrote this part to include a bit more detailed information than previously: "Meanwhile, Prince kept busy recording new songs, like Sex Me Sex Me Not and Judas Kiss. The latter, which would get retitled Judas Smile in October 2001, was possibly intended for the NPG: Peace album with Prince sending “peace” to other artists, including Common and Erykah Badu who also appear on the Bamboozled soundtrack. The lyrics mention “bamboozled” a lot and the song might have been inspired by the movie. But Judas Kiss also mention “the chocolate invasion” in the lyrics and would end up credited to Prince on The Chocolate Invasion compilation that the High album morphed into."

3) Mr.Z pointed out that "the chocolate invasion" is not included in the lyrics for Sex Me Sex Me Not until the extended version in 2003. The text was changed to reflect this: "The Chocolate Invasion and The Slaughterhouse were assembled in the autumn of 2003 with The Chocolate Invasion being a new configuration of the High album. It derived its new title from the lyrics of the two newly added tracks, Judas Smile and an extended version of Sex Me? Sex Me Not which both mention “the chocolate invasion”, the latter in a rap added in the middle of the song."

4) I included a mention of the Strange Relationship (Live '87) download release in 2005 at the end of the High/NPG Music Club/Chocolate Invasion chapter.

He used to lie about how he didn't want to be called The Artist.

A couple of more updates were made, about Prince censoring past works after becoming a Jehova's Witness, during the NPG Music Club Era:

1) In connection with the live tracks played in NPG Ahdio Show #4, I added that “Shit” had escaped censorship in A Love Bizarre, Get Wild and Johnny, but “fucking movie” was garbled up in Strange Relationship and “shit” was garbled up in Deuce & A Quarter. And then I added that the 2005 Strange Relationship (Live '87) download was the same clean edit as in Ahdio Show #4.

2) I also noted for NPG Ahdio Show #10 that My Medallion was censored in it and then suggested for the 2004 configuration of The Chocolate Invasion that the censored word "bitch" might have something to do with My Medallion being replaced by The Dance.

Great read as always scifi.

.

Ultimately I'm glad we never got Roadhouse Garden, I think it would've been disappointing on several fronts and Prince wasn't in the right headspace at the time to approach a project like this (I'm not sure he ever was tbh). Crystal Ball II would've probably faired better with less tinkering, so I would've liked to see that get released.