The world is, and I am, sick of these second rate albums, and if respect for his work in the 80s and to a lesser extend the 90s, keeps me listening, it doesn’t keep me obsessing by any stretch of the language.
The worst time I ever saw Prince was also the last time I ever saw Prince and while time changes our memories, I guess it did a real job on mind. I coulda sworn he really sucked, but apparently he only kinda sucked. I’ve seen him so often and loved him so much and this wasn’t bad, apparently it was great, it just doesn’t remember that way. Now back to 2010….
, Prince is a fool comparing recording recording contracts to slavery. Indentured servants, maybe, it is a little extreme in 2015 but OK, but SLAVES??? This is offensive to me and my ancestors weren’t slaves. The comment doesn’t stand up to any scrutiny whatsoever and if it was taken seriously by people who think more than ‘oh, it’s just Prince being Prince’, I think the world would listen to him more seriously if he managed a “Baltimore” more than once every 20 years.
I just checked on Itunes Store… they aren’t there either. Does Prince want to protect his copyright so much he doesn’t want to sell the albums at all? It is so very strange, These can’t be albums he isn’t proud of, Crystal Ball alone is better than anything he released this decade. The man is a nutcase, he should put all his music anyway but at least he should sell them.
There is nothing I don’t like about this song,Eryn sounds great, Prince is spectacular, he plays everything here but it is voice that pulls you short, he doesn’t use his falsetto often, but “at least a little better” is so slight, but it is very lovely. This is an anthem without the browbeating. Well done, Prince, a good song does more for peace than words or gestures, or even money, ever will.
In 2015, when, if Prince chose to, he could write, record and release a song in an hour, we are still wauiting for his response to the civil unrest in Baltimore. And when we get it, he is releasing the song via Tidal to absolutely insure that 99.9% of the people who hear his great moment of protest HAS TO STEAL IT.
it is 2015, if you’ve recorded a song, what earthly good is a press release? Release the damn song. Also, check out the art work above. Who but Prince would release a song in solidarity with Freddie Gray and the protesters (though, one assumes, not the looters) in Baltimore, and stick a picture of themselves on the record cover. The mind truly boggles at this half wit.
When Doves Cry – Prince – This is where Prince mixed his blackness and his whiteness in equal measure and evolved his persona into a rock star manque with too much pain on his bands, if not indeed, too many women on his hand – A
The Guardian reviewer gave the show 5 stars: “The tight line-up – female trio 3rdeyegirl, a keyboardist and dynamic backing singer Liv Warfield — makes for a lean, hard show with thrilling new funk-rock arrangements.”
On the day after Marvin Gaye was murdered I was inconsolable, and LIVE AID did nothing at all to change it till prince presented the video of a new song, this song, and stopped the show -a masterpiece of beat and tempo, a herky jerk bass throbbing work the likes of which he never came close to again: this did what it should have, it matched his funk and pop sensibilities – A+
Behind the keyboards and trading vocals with Lianne La Havas before switching to guitars and effortlessly seguing into “Spectrumelectrum” and “Marz” before performing a blistering show stopping “Anotherlove” with howling Hendrix guitar and Prince tearing his voice into a searing falsetto
So I inspected further and instead of the disaster I thought I’d been listening to, I noticed that if you edited down for him, it would’ve have made a pretty good single album. Not a great one, not even Emancipation or Crystal Ball, but still, vastly better than Lotusflower or Planet Earth It would have made to a fair to middling effort
U Know – Prince – I haven’t been overwhelmed by Prince’s recordings for a couple of years (and the last time I saw him live he wasn’t on his game) but this is one of his better hot sizzle slow r&b jams – B+
So, Helen Bach, our editor cum PR maven, sent me a link from Warner Brothers announcing the release of two new albums. I thought about writing about it, but it hardly seemed worth interrupting the days flow to rush it out. I mean, so what? Nothing personal but it is hardly the most exciting story I’ve ever heard
Story Of The Rockers – Gene Vincent – Lennon called the Beatles four Gene Vincents and here is one reason why, an ode to the progenitors of rock and roll and Gene snarls and roughens up all the way from Bill Hailey to the Beach Boys and ending with… Otis Redding! – B
Prince doesn’t use his falsetto but he does manage to go higher and lower and the same time (up for “Keep breaking me” and down for “down”), the band sound fabulous and sure it is better than the execrable Zooey duet. But I hope to never hear it again.
Franklin’s Tower – Grateful Dead – Less a Dave Mason soundalike on this version, and less a dance marathon than the Allman Brother’s superb version of Friday, but not bad at all – B+
The episode of “New Girl” featuring Prince was like Pixie and Dixie as they outshone each other in whimsy and twerk and the song itself is one of the worst Prince has put his name to. It is so cutesy you wanna scream and, surely Prince’s calling card, the beat is flat – D+
When you attempt to funk her up it sounds like a nun sucking helium with a tone deaf ear. Then there is Prince with a new mixing board, what happens next is a tune that we should never have found.
In this video he has never been more Jimi Hendrix inspired–right down to the almost Richard Simmons ‘fro. This is no way deflects from the magic of this guy. At 5’ 2”, he is larger than life and with a thumping predictable thrust beat.. he’s still a dirty boy with a bad attitude.
J just another reworking of “Iron Man” with a bass taking overfor the guitar riff, and a full on hard funking all girl band behind it, plus a wicked guitar solo. But it is derivative and pointless, it also a lameneness to its core being; halfway through you are wondering how we reached this place, why is Prince and a back up band copping a feel off Ozzy? And will Ozzy sue?
Vivir Vi Vida – Marc Anthony – A “My Way” for the Latin American superstar stands as an anthem to living your life in the way you choose, for Anthony that means horns handling the melody – A
Ah, the 1980s…foremost was the effect that the economic policies of Margaret Thatcher had on British bands, epitomised most obviously by the Specials’ “Ghost Town” and less obviously by a slew of other songs
