Dearly beloved

August 18, 2018 7:17 PM

23 Prince Albums, New Anthology Come to Streaming Services [Rolling Stone] [Pepsi Blue Purple] “Until now, a limited slice of Prince’s catalog was available on most streaming services. Luckily, that slice included his indispensable Eighties LPs like Dirty Mind, Purple Rain and Sign o’ the Times. But on streaming services, the latter half of Prince’s career effectively disappeared. That started to change in June, when Prince’s estate reached a deal with Sony to acquire the distribution rights to 35 of the singer’s albums. 23 of those titles are now available on services like Apple Music and Spotify, including several LPs stocked with late-period Prince gems like Crystal Ball (“So Dark”), Rave Un2 the Joy Fantastic (“Man o’ War”), Musicology (“Call My Name”), Planet Earth (“Chelsea Rodgers”), 20Ten (“Sticky Like Glue”) and more.”
posted by Fizz (19 comments total)

Remember that time where Prince just randomly showed up on stage and busted out one of the greatest solos ever recorded?
posted by Definitely Not Sean Spicer at 7:40 PM on August 18, 2018 [14 favorites]

I've had a smile on my face since I caught word of this! So many wonderful unsung Prince songs from this period, and so many albums I've never been able to hear before now. The accompanying "anthology" compilation release does a decent job of introducing the albums (although the tracklist is slightly jarring).
posted by kryptondog at 7:53 PM on August 18, 2018 [1 favorite]

We listened to this last night, there's Prince songs I've never heard of on that playlist. It's really awesome.
posted by Sphinx at 7:54 PM on August 18, 2018 [1 favorite]

Go listen to "White Mansion" from "Emancipation", a wickedly under-appreciated album.
posted by davebush at 8:14 PM on August 18, 2018

I'm having the time of my life this year after joining a band with a bunch of Prince fanatics, but tracking down the songs we're covering has occasionally been more interesting than you'd expect in this day and age. Great to see all this come online, thanks for the heads up!
posted by bfields at 8:25 PM on August 18, 2018 [1 favorite]

Remember that time where Prince just randomly showed up

It wasn't all that random. NY Times:

I wrote basically a personal letter to Prince, care of his lawyer. [snip] I got a call from one of Prince’s guys, a week or two later, saying that Prince was in L.A. and he wanted to have a meeting with me. [snip] A couple weeks later his security guy called me again, and said, “Prince would like to meet with you again.” He said he definitely wants to do the song, he’s definitely going to do it.

etc. The rehearsal with the rest of the guys was pretty haphazard, but there was a rehearsal, so they did know he was going to be there and playing the final solo, and Prince possibly had been working on that solo for weeks. On the night, he just needed to wait patiently and then step into rock history.
posted by pracowity at 12:46 AM on August 19, 2018 [8 favorites]

Prince was a hyper-pro, and that he could make something that had had so much work put into it seem fluid and natural and done-for-the-first-time is a testimony to his extraordinary abilities. In the same way that a great classical pianist can be playing notes that have been on paper for centuries in such a way that it seems like they're just now coming from the composer via their fingertips.

(tl/dr - Prince was really, really good at what he did. Not that anyone was suggesting otherwise, I just wanted to say it too.)

On the other hand, my knowledge of these later albums is sketchy at best, and I really look forward to diving into them in the next few weeks. I suspect they're due a major critical reappraisal.
posted by Grangousier at 7:03 AM on August 19, 2018

1. The “disappearing guitar” solo is one of my favorite things, and I kind of think 90% of guitar solos are unecessary (but I’m a rhythm player so there you go). No disrespect - guitar solos that make sense and aren’t boring are super hard to do is all I’m saying.

2. These albums are on amazon unlimited too, if you have that.
posted by hilberseimer at 7:28 AM on August 19, 2018 [3 favorites]

"Crystal Ball" certainly has its moments.
posted by NedKoppel at 7:34 AM on August 19, 2018

I listen to the title track of "Crystal Ball" and I swear the rhythm mimics Janet Jackson's "Rhythm Nation." Anyone else?
posted by NedKoppel at 7:38 AM on August 19, 2018

I used to joke that the reason for OK GO's popularity is that people wanted to be able to listen to something that sounds like Prince on the internet.
posted by roll truck roll at 9:00 AM on August 19, 2018

I’m always glad when a holdout’s catalog finally makes it to the streaming services — although it’s unfortunate when it takes the artist’s death to make that happen.

I mean yeah, it’s the artist’s catalog and they can do what they want with it, but I really do think they’re shooting themselves in the foot when they spurn the streaming services. Like, there’s a whole generation who’ll probably never know about King Crimson because their catalog is mostly absent from Spotify. What will the poor college nerds listen to when they get high and do their calculus homework? Why won’t somebody think of the nerds???

But alas, I digress. This is great! I know what I’ll be listening to this afternoon.
posted by panama joe at 9:15 AM on August 19, 2018 [2 favorites]

At some point, Prince started playing "Let's Go Crazy" much slower than the original recording, and it drives me crazy I love it so much.

https://www.billboard.com/video/prince-lets-go-crazy-live-at-the-billboard-music-awards-2013-1562993
posted by 4ster at 9:49 AM on August 19, 2018 [1 favorite]

His catalog showed up on Google Play at the same time this year: woohoo! Does no-one else use Play? I thought it a strange omission.
posted by not_that_epiphanius at 10:38 AM on August 19, 2018

"At some point, Prince started playing "Let's Go Crazy" much slower than the original recording, and it drives me crazy I love it so much."

We're covering a version of that 3rdeyegirl arrangement this weekend! I'll confess my first reaction was "but I wanted to do the Purple Rain Version with the organ intro and all", but it's grown on me.
posted by floppyroofing at 11:48 AM on August 19, 2018 [2 favorites]

At some point, Prince started playing "Let's Go Crazy" much slower than the original recording, and it drives me crazy I love it so much.

I love the interpolation of Frankenstein as a bass solo.
posted by fedward at 12:14 PM on August 19, 2018 [2 favorites]

It's been a funky weekend; my boyfriend and I have binge-listened to latter-day Prince throughout. Random impressions:

• Revisiting The Rainbow Children, Rave Un2 The Joy Fantastic, and 3121 in particular has been great. Those were some of the few contemporary Prince albums I've listened to as a whole, but I haven't played them all the way through in years.
• I've never heard Musicology outside of the title track, and I enjoyed it more than I thought I would. Dear Mr. Man is a highlight for me.
• The live version of Joy in Repetition (on the One Nite Alone after-show album) is life-changing.
• Face Down is fantastic, and the music video is worth tracking down.
• Chaos & Disorder hasn't grown on me much, bar a couple tracks.
• The compilation album did its job, for me at least - it was fun hop-scotching years between tracks, and some of the works I may have liked less in a different context all sounded greet together. Many fans don't seem to care for the ordering, though, and I can understand why.
• How have I gone my entire life without hearing Eye Hate U? Or for that matter, the rest of The Gold Experience?Or Emancipation? Or One Nite Alone? And so on. What an embarrassment of riches!

posted by kryptondog at 4:24 PM on August 19, 2018 [1 favorite]

I'm 65. I bought vinyl for 30 years. I bought CDs for 20 years. I am having an existential crisis about How to Listen to Music now. Everything is available. (Except for some of the LPs I still have, like James Cleveland gospel records, transcendentally unavailable elsewhere.)

I am overjoyed that I can listen to more Prince. OK, maybe too much, but that's my problem anyway.
posted by kozad at 10:48 PM on August 19, 2018 [2 favorites]

But could you do a raspberry bourrée?
posted by pracowity at 8:22 AM on August 20, 2018