Awesome Music / Prince

• His first album For You (1978) is more than the generic disco/soul record it seems at first glance:
  • The title track is an acapella consisting of a one-man choir.
  • Knowing that Prince played every single instrument on the album is difficult to believe when you hear songs like "Just As Long As We're Together". In fact, Prince cut a version of this song just to show executives at CBS Records his worth.
  • The almost liquid funk of "Soft And Wet", Prince's first single. Many critics point to this track as the biggest indicator on the album of the brilliance that was to come. To say the least, its sound lives up to its title.
• Dirty Mind (1980). In one fell swoop it set the tone for the rest of his 1980s output, in terms of lyrical content (it's one of the smuttiest albums ever recorded up to that time) and its musical styles (it mixes funk, rock, new wave, pop, and R&B into a fully cohesive record). What's extra impressive about Dirty Mind is that it manages to blend all of these styles in spite of its dry, spartan sound. The record is essentially a polished demo Prince recorded in his home studio, with occasional input from Dr. Fink and Lisa Coleman. He liked it so much he just decided to release it as is.
• The title track from his album Controversy (1981), particularly the full album version. Built on a rhythm section so solid that you could use it as the foundation for a skyscraper, Prince ruminates on the media speculation surrounding him, tongue firmly in cheek, and even throws in a recitation of the Lord's Prayer without missing a beat.
• The extended synthesizer jams from 1999 (1982) are highlights of the Synth-Pop heyday, and it's 70 minutes of colorful dance music that feels more like 30.
  • The title song, an energetic, up-tempo dance tune about the end of the world. Yes, we are gonna party like it's 1999...
  • "Little Red Corvette", his first real hit song, with incredibly direct lyrics about a one-night-stand with the singer working up the nerve to live up to the challenge:
    Believe it or not, I started 2 worry
    I wondered if I had enough class
    But it was Saturday night
    I guess that makes it all right
    And U say, "Baby, have U got enough gas?"
    Oh yeah!
  • "Little Red Corvette" inspired Stevie Nicks to write her hit song "Stand Back." When she told Prince about it while in the studio, he dropped everything he was doing to show up and play the synths for her.
• Purple Rain (1984), a rich, cohesive, concentrated blast of pop, funk, and rock & roll, is the consensus choice for Best Prince Album Ever, but there are a few runners-up, as this page proves.
  • The title song is hands-down one of the best ballads of the '80s. Till this song, Prince had never quite sounded this open-hearted or this sublime. To add to its awesomeness, the version of "Purple Rain" that appears on the album is a live recording of Prince & The Revolution performing the song at the First Avenue club in Minneapolis in August 1983. It was the first time the band had ever played the song. The only changes that were made to the live recording were a few studio overdubs, editing for length and the removal of crowd noise (although that's still audible in a few quiet places).
  • "When Doves Cry" is famous for having its bass taken out during mixing, leaving a drum machine, thin synthesizers, a longing vocal from Prince, and of course, some of his patented guitar work at the end. Even for Prince's catalog, it's a standout.
  • The swaggering glam rock sound of "Let's Go Crazy" is mind-blowingly awesome, from the faux-preacher act at the beginning to the biggest of Big Rock Endings.
  • "Computer Blue." A tight, menacing four-minute funk workout about a frustrated protagonist unable to understand women, Prince matches the brisk pace with a tense vocal, before after a single verse and chorus, the song goes down a rabbit hole of guitar solos and key changes before suddenly ending. And that's just the album version - not officially released until after Prince's death, the full, "Hallway Speech" version surpasses 12 minutes, allowing the Revolution to go completely nuts for the extended running time, and allowing Wendy and Lisa to bring the computer theme full circle.
    Poor lonely computer. It's time someone programmed you.
    It's time you learned love, and lust. They both have four letters, but they're entirely different words.
• 1987's ambitious Sign o' the Times was Prince changing course from his psychedelic experiments toward more earthbound R&B/funk jams while retaining some electronic elements. It will convince you that Prince can do anything.
  • Standouts include the bluesy, downbeat title track (created almost entirely with synth presets if you can believe it), the funk-world music fusion "Strange Relationship," the Lyrical Dissonance of "I Could Never Take The Place Of Your Man," and the beautiful ballad "Adore."
  • On its own, "If I Was Your Girlfriend" is a spacey little groove that almost sounds ominous. Then Prince goes full-Gender Bender in the lyrics and muses about whether his girl would open up to him more if he was a girl too. It's very disarming to listen to, and it'd be pretty romantic... if the coda didn't see Prince's, uh, male urges get the best of him. It's a fascinating, forward-thinking piece of art for 1987, and with its sped-up vocal, weirdly-processed production, and liberal take on gender and sexuality, one could say that in an odd way, it predicted late-2010s hyperpop.
• Batman (1989) is probably tied with AC/DC's Iron Man 2 for best comic book movie soundtrack ever.
  • "Partyman" is like concentrated funk, and it comes off like Awesome Ego in musical form. "All hail the new king in town!"
  • "Batdance" is the Ur-Example for the Voice Clip Song. Prince literally just cut and pasted various movie quotes through a multi-part funk suite, including a sudden tempo change and back again, and why does this work??
• The Gold Experience (1995), the troubled release of which was surrounded by label turmoil, actually became a major fan favorite over time. It's filled with all kinds of groovy pop and rock workouts, and it's one of his last major statements before he went independent.
  • "Endorphinmachine," is one of Prince's most underrated rock & roll numbers, notable not just for the Epic Riff but for Prince screaming his face off.
  • Prince referred to "Gold" as 'the new "Purple Rain."' Which isn't fair in hindsight; it's a smooth power ballad on its own terms, and has a fantastic climactic solo.
  • "👁 Hate U", one of Prince's best songs about having a broken heart, with his falsetto on top form, powerful lyrics, and a bridge where he lays out just how much she broke his heart, all topped with an outro made up of a blistering guitar solo and a final, poignant verse:
    👁 hate U, because 👁 love U, but 👁 can't love U, because 👁 hate U.
  • One of Prince's best rap songs, "P Control" (aka "Pussy Control"), opens the record. It sounds like he pimp slapped you six times listening to this song.
• His famed 2004 performance of George Harrison's "While My Guitar Gently Weeps" at the 2004 Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction ceremony (where both he and Harrison were inducted) in which he blew Tom Petty and Jeff Lynne off the stage with his outro guitar solo.
• 2006's 3121. Prince had craftily made something of a comeback with 2004's not-bad Musicology, but 3121 - a sparkling set of pop and R&B - is when everyone realized Prince was back on his game. "Black Sweat" is one of Prince's few concessions to modern R&B and dance sounds, yet at the same time, its minimal arrangement is classic Prince.
• And besides those albums, how about individual singles??
  • "I Wanna Be Your Lover", from his Self-Titled Album in 1979, is his first hit single proper. It's as poppy as funk gets... or maybe as funky as pop gets.
  • "Kiss", wherein Prince molds minimalist funk into a pop masterpiece. "You don't have 2 B beauuuutiful....."
  • "Controversy", especially the full seven-and-a-half minute version off the album of the same name, is a masterclass in rock solid machine-precise synth-funk. Even the sudden rendition of the Lord's Prayer sounds funky as all get-out.
  • "Raspberry Beret". A psychedelic pop song telling Prince's story of his first sexual experience is easily one of the breeziest numbers in his catalog. Even the B-side, "She's Always In My Hair", is awesome, if a bit more of a rock number. Most of his B Sides, especially "How Come U Don't Call Me Anymore" and "Erotic City" are really worth exploring.
  • Prince has been hit or miss with his flirtations with Hip-Hop, but the deep groove of "Gett Off" is definitely one time he got it right.
  • "Diamonds And Pearls", one of the smoothest, prettiest ballads you'll ever hear.
  • "Cream," reportedly written by Prince while looking in the mirror (yes, really) is one of those songs that just oozes sex in every nook and cranny of its arrangement.
  • "My Name Is Prince." This song has a hundred things going on at once, between its huge beat, samples, and background vocals, and it's not so much overwhelming as it is exhilarating.
  • The (frankly underrated) love ballad "Damn U" is Prince at his most tender, and it's a major highlight of the often cluttered The Love Symbol Album.
  • "The Holy River" is one of his more spiritual singles, but its slow build into its climactic guitar solo is the best thing to come out of Emancipation.
• While becoming a Jehovah's Witness made him tone down the sexually explicit stuff, his later slow jams like "Incense and Candles" and "Mr. Goodnight" prooved that he could still be sexy like it was nobody's business even if he wasn't being sexual.