Ready for His New Evolution
After a decade spent tending almost only to his faithful, Prince has had a revelation. He's supposed to be a rock-'n'-roll star
By JOSH TYRANGIEL

Monday, Apr. 12, 2004
Shortly after he signed a $60 million contract with Warner Bros. in 1992, Prince scrawled the word slave on his face, changed his name to a symbol and announced that he was retiring from recorded music. The problem was that he had a backlog of 450 songs he felt the world wanted to hear, and Warner Bros. simply refused to flood the market with that much product. Commercial suicide, the company said. In one of his last public acts before locking himself away in Paisley Park, his hermitage just west of Minneapolis, Minn., Prince stood before an awards-show audience and prophesied in his little whisper, "Perhaps one day, all the powers that are will realize that it is better to let a man be all that he can be than to try to limit his output to just what they can handle."

A decade later, Warner Bros. and the other record-industry giants are flat-lining, and Prince is doing a happy dance that would make Snoopy look like a depressive. In the past two months, he has opened the Grammy Awards with Beyonce Knowles, been inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, launched a sold-out arena tour, opened an iTunes-ish music-download store to go along with his successful, subscription-based NPG Music Club and released Musicology, his best album in an age.

It's tempting to call this resurgence a victory lap for free-spirited artists over the big, bad corporations, but that would be giving Prince too much — and too little — credit. He may have briefly adopted the language of artistic brotherhood in his fight with Warner, but Prince didn't pick up the face pencil to fight for the Hoobastanks and Josh Grobans of the world. The principle at stake was never creative Utopianism: it was narcissism. Prince believed that he was a genius and that his tiniest musical doodle merited commercial attention. (He even declined to do phone interviews, saying he didn't want his voice recorded by anyone else.)

He has spent most of his time in seclusion proving his point. Since 2000, the NPG Music Club has signed up around 400,000 members, who pay a $25 initiation fee for access to countless Prince songs (and many less enjoyable Prince songlike things) as well as unreleased videos, specially reserved concert tickets and after-parties. It is a highly profitable model of music distribution utterly dependent on the fact that many people will pay to listen to even Prince's worst ideas.

But it's clearly not enough, at least not for Prince. Why else would he have launched his Musicology download store, an iTunes rip-off that makes his music available to the agnostic, non-NPG fan for 99¢ a song? Why would he be touring with the come-on — aimed at all those slow-dancing Purple Rain thirtysomethings — that this may be the last time he will play the hits? Why would he have released Musicology both on his website and in record stores (on April 20) through a distribution deal with megacorp Sony?

Perhaps because having established that he is a genius, Prince has decided he would rather be a rock star. And Musicology reminds you he is still capable of being the world's greatest. As a Jehovah's Witness, Prince has said he will try to abstain from getting too dirty, and give the man credit: he manages to hold out for an entire song. But by the time the second track, Illusion, Coma, Pimp & Circumstance, comes on, he's pushing the throttle with some funk four-four and singing about a gigolo and his old bag of a client. "Ugly! So ugly, the bitch beyond compare/Dropped a couple hundred thousand dollars on a silver whip just to match the color of her hair."

The best and sexiest song on the album, On the Couch, is a slow jam that has Prince begging from the living room. It starts with a "Come on, baaaaaby," proceeds to a line about how "it's undignified to sleep alone" and reaches its climax — yeah, yeah — with a grand moment when the backup singers go "bip-bip-a-bip-a-dee-dip," the horns wail away and Prince slides down the begging scale from falsetto to a great big rumbling roar. It's the best James Brown song in years.

There are wit and sex all over Musicology, but Prince at 45 is not trying to imitate Prince at 25. A surprising number of songs (A Million Days, Call My Name, The Marrying Kind) are about monogamy, and it's a testament to his confidence that none of them feel corny. He falters a bit when he tries to address the war in Iraq on Cinnamon Girl and inner-city woes on the Marvin Gaye-ish Dear Mr. Man, but then he never was at his best discussing public policy. No, with that voice and one of the best backing bands he has ever assembled, Prince's place is in the bedroom. Everybody's bedroom.

From the Apr. 12, 2004 issue of TIME magazine

Well said.

Well said.

well said

well said.

I hated this article. So many flaws, but the one that stuck out the most:

Ugly! So ugly, the bitch beyond compare/Dropped a couple hundred thousand dollars on a silver whip just to match the color of her hair."

He doesn't say "bitch become compare"; he says "rich beyond compare..."

laylow03 said:

Yeah, I was surprised by that too. Dude used to complain about getting misquoted in early interviews. Now the press is butchering his lyrics!

OdysseyMiles said:

And then they wonder why he's so guarded and reclusive. I don't blame him for not wanting his voice recorded or doing interviews. It's this kind of shit that might run him away yet again! Saddest thing is that people will start calling him a hypocrite because he used the word "bitch," when that's not what he really said...

Gotta love that imagery.

laylow03 said:

nahhh... People will be excited! This article will sell records. Rock On!

And


Well Said!

I'll say it's true he falters musically on Cinnamon Girl, but on Dear Mr. Man? It's a clear homage to Marvin Gaye and it's well-done.

It's funny how this album elicits so wildly divergent reactions. Sure, it has often happened with Prince records -- he's had several where critics couldn't seem to agree about the weak songs, so much in fact that by the time you had read 20 reviews of Emancipation, pretty much all the songs were "gems" according to at least 1 critic.

My own theory is that Prince songs often take a few listening session to appreciate. Of course, he does write bad songs and they are simply not great no matter how much you listen to them. But in some cases, they just get better. Among the songs I did not like after one or two spins : WDC, Pop Life, Kiss, Housequake, U got the Look, etc. It's hard to believe today. Now I wouldn't compare Musicology to any of these songs, but the album has grown in a strong way. TRC did grow on me, but that was normal considering it was unappealing lyrically. Before that I have to go back to TGE... and before that Lovesexy ... to find an album that has grown on me this way. The middle of the record still has a major quality hole for me at this point, but the guy above didn't note it. Maybe in one month, I'll like the middle and hate the end? Not bloody likely with LOTP.

A b1tch beyond compare? I thought the lyric was "Rich Beyond Compare"??
I do agree with the author's point though. It does matter if you say "Sh@T" or if you say "fecal matter", it's really the same thing.
Prince can abstain from cursing all he wants, but the point is he's still a sexual being and the subject matter hasn't changed too much, though the presentation of it has been subdued. I see these things as necessary facets of his personality (or anyones). One can't sing about Jehova all the time and expected to convey the complete picture of who he is.
As such, cursing or no curing, Prince is probably still pretty FREEEEEKAAAAAY.

AsianBomb777 said:

I think this guy did a Google search and found the lyrics here on the threadabout Musicology lyrics. On that thread, it says "Bitch"... at least the last time I had a look.

manonearth said:

THAT MAKE POOK LAUGH!

Aerogram said:

PLEASE DONT USE ACRONYM ON NEW SONG

ICNTTPOYM IS ONE THING

BUT IT HURT POOK BRAIN TO THINK LIKE THAT

Why do so many people dis Cinnamon Girl? Am I the only one that likes it? I think it's a good pop/rock song. Yes, it is simple but so what?

The greatest sin is dissing Dear Mr Man though. It is the best song on the album imho.

The article is nice and positive though. Just about all the early independant reviews of the album have been pretty good.

bkw said:

I've been a little surprised by the negative sentiment towards this song too. It seems like it has one of the strongest hooks on the album, or strongest choruses anyway. I thought that's what people were complaining about when they first heard the track Musicology?

But anyway, I respect everyone's opinions, even when they're wrong

p could've avoided the misundestanding of lyrics if he posted them online or in the sampler. i know putting them in the promo opy that was goven for free would be a bit much but he could have had them in one of those many wasted rooms of his music club.

to be fair, though, the article was kind of cheesy. the bit about prince belonging in the bedroom...puh-lease. if all that journalist thinks about prince is bedroom related,well, he is missing so much!

bkw said:

i dig this song a lot. i would even say it is one of my favorites so far. that may change in time but so far my favorites are cinnamon girl, what do u want me 2 do, illusion coma pimp and circumstance, reflection and on the couch. other than musicology, which i think is the weakest track, i am really loving the whole cd!

SassierBritches said:

I think this is princes best album since TGE. Even though TRC was very good musically, I see a top ten hit ,possibly 2 with the help of the tour. Yes i know prince is not about making hits , but it would be nice to see for us prince fans. And i wish prince didnt release TGE around the time that he changed his name, i think it would do so much better had he released it at a time like this...that was a truly great album, very underrated. Cant wait for 2nd dallas show! and san antonio!!

OdysseyMiles said:

Well, I hope they don't screw up so much that he clams up again....

pluvv2002 said:

there's a few possible hits here, on a few different programs. what do u want me 2 do and reflection could both be big adult contemporary hits. cinnamon girl or a million days or the marrying kind or if eye was the man in ur life could be pop rock hits. musicology, on the couch and call my name could be successful R&B hits. there's a lot going on for this record. i guess its all in how sony markets it. since so many people got the record for free, they should just saturate the market and release a different single for each format.

laylow03 said:

I don't think Prince is going to be too bothered about a tiny error in a very glowing article. And if he does then he deserved to be ridiculed for being so timid. I'm sure he's above that.

Universaluv said:

Where do I find the countless Prince songs and Prince songlike things on the NPGMC? Seriously. Anyone?