Let's Rank All Of Prince's Albums
It occurred to me that the best piece I could ever write on Prince was one I wrote before I had this blog. It was the day he died, April 21st, 2016 and I was reeling. His passing hit me really hard and I just started writing. Had to get my thoughts down - you can read it HERE.
Meanwhile there is no post solely dedicated to the Great Purple One here on Doug’s Music Snobbery so I figured a good ol’ fashioned album ranking would be a good entry. As with most opinions on this blog if you disagree with the order you’re wrong. Okay not really, but….kinda yeah. Hehe…
I’m pretty much sticking to actual albums - like the 4 track N.E.W.S. album doesn’t quite count as a “Prince album” - more of just an instrumental jam and it probably wouldn’t be fair to try to rank it here - same with live releases or collections. By the way there are no “awful” Prince albums. Even the ones at the bottom of the list have good and even great songs so I’ll highlight those.
So without further adieu, eye give 2 u all of Prince’s albums, ranked.
37. Planet Earth (2007) Not so great… Not sure what happened here since the album before it 3121 was a masterpiece. Planet Earth just isn’t very consistently interesting. Best tracks here are Future Baby Mama which is a nice slow jam, Mr. Goodnight is pleasant enough and Chelsea Rodgers is a fun bass popping disco-influenced jam.
36. The Rainbow Children (2001) A little heavy handed with the spiritual messaging for my tastes overall. Jazzy in spots and still containing a few nice cuts. The Work Pt. 1 is a standard funk workout that I remember him performing on late night TV. Not groundbreaking but not bad. 1+1+1 Is 3 has a smooth groove a la Erotic City. She Loves Me 4 Me is an adorable little ditty, and the album finishes stronger down the stretch with a couple of pretty good extended jams Family Name and The Everlasting Now. The album closes with the religious singalong of Last December...
35. Graffiti Bridge (1990) Kind of a mess in my opinion, and not really an album but a hodgepodge of tracks recorded over a couple years leading up to the Purple Rain film sequel, which is surprising to me - surprising that he didn’t put more effort into new tracks for the project. Other artists are featured on this album like The Time for example, but Prince wrote almost the whole thing and played most of the instruments. Thieves In The Temple is a great single but much of this album doesn’t quite hold up. Elephants & Flowers, Tick, Tick Bang, The Question Of U - all decent tracks but not particularly memorable.
34. LOtUSFLOW3R (2009) Every once in a while I’ll pull this one out thinking it will get better and it never does lol… another one that isn’t awful, just not great. It’s telling that maybe the most interesting track is a cover (Crimson & Clover) which is rare for Prince. 4ever is a nice love song and Dreamer is a pretty good jam.
33. For You (1978) Notable for being his first at the age of 19 and writing and playing everything on the album, Soft and Wet is a classic and the whole album is interesting enough. I don’t listen to this often but it’s cool to hear him as a teen working out his style before he had made it big.
32. MPLSound (2009) Slightly better than the companion album LOtUSFLOW3R but still not totally up to snuff. Chocolate Box and Ol’ Skool Company are really good.
31. Chaos And Disorder (1996) One of those contract obligation albums that Prince himself wouldn’t promote as an F You to the record company but still with a few really good jams. The title track is killer, I Like It There, Dinner With Delores, Zannalee and Dig U Better Dead are all great.
30. One Nite Alone… (2002) I have to admit I just discovered this one… just Prince and a piano for much of it and wasn’t released as a proper Prince album but it’s still really good. We’ll just stick it here but I’m not exactly sure where it should actually be ranked frankly.
29. Musicology (2004) This one was a giveaway on his tour that year, and it’s pretty good. The title track is a cool funky jam, Cinnamon Girl is fun, Call My Name is an awesome Prince slow jam and the rest of the album is decent. Not his best but not his worst.
28. Rave Un2 The Joy Fantastic (1999) An album that had a lot of promise and it’s very good. It just falls short of classic. The duets with Sheryl Crow (as well as the Crow cover Everyday Is A Winding Road) and Gwen Stefani are interesting enough and I like The Sun The Moon The Stars and Tangerine a lot, but the album really catches fire down the stretch with Strange But True which is just plain NASTY, Wherever You Go Whatever You Do is really nice and Mr. Pretty Man is a great funk workout with Maceo Parker.
27. Crystal Ball / The Truth (1997) I put this one here even though Crystal Ball is a collection because it has the acoustic album The Truth tacked on to the end as the 4th CD. Some amazing stuff from the vault at the time like Calhoun Square, Interactive, Cloreen Bacon Skin (from the same sessions that yielded the amazing Time B-side Tricky - if you know you know), the epic title track and plenty more. A treasure trove. The Truth is cool too - Don’t Play Me is great.
26. 20Ten (2010) I was frustrated trying to get my hands on this one for a while. He gave this album away as a CD in a British magazine and it wasn’t available online at all. Not for download, not for physical purchase - nothing. A really strange move when you think about it from the standpoint that from 2007-2014 he only gave us 3 subpar LPs for purchase - all of which I have in the bottom 6 on this list. It’s the roughest spell of his career. But as it turns out in addition to all the stuff that’s still likely in the vault he did indeed record two really good albums in 2010 - we just didn’t get to hear them until years later. 20Ten is finally available now and it’s really good right from the fun Let’s Pretend We’re Married-ish rhythm of lead track Compassion straight through to the end. Not sure there are many “classics” here, but it’s a very solid listen and he sounds more inspired than the previous three albums.
25. PLECTRUMELECTRUM (2014) Prince released 4 albums in the last couple years of his life after being quiet for a couple years, and this is the one with his girl band he assembled called 3RDEYEGIRL and it rocks. All the albums from here on out are great… This one isn’t a rock album completely but there is plenty of guitar and it kicks ass from the first track Wow. The title track is a banging instrumental, Whitecaps is a gorgeous slow jam with vocals by drummer Hannah Ford, and Fixurlifeup, Boy Trouble, Tictactoe, and Marz are all fantastic. It would have been nice to hear a few more albums with this backing band in the tradition of other great Prince bands like the Revolution and the NPG.
24. Lovesexy (1988) I’m not sure I’d have this one this high if not for the nostalgia value. It’s a good album and even great in parts, but some of it doesn’t totally hold up. Some of it is just a little messy with the made up word “Hundillasillia”, some evil character named “Spooky Electric” and referring to random things as “glam” without much explanation. Lots of spirituality mixed in but Prince’s reach might have exceeded his grasp just a slight bit here. I bought it hook, line and sinker upon its release when I was in high school but I don’t know... Alphabet Street is an amazing guilty pleasure of a single, Dance On is a very cool herky jerky funk jam, and I Wish U Heaven is beautiful. Also notable for the nude photo of Prince on the cover and the annoying sequencing of the songs as one long track on the CD.
23. The Black Album (1987) Prince famously recorded this one around the same time he recorded the tracks for Lovesexy, even lifting When 2 R In Love from it to include on Lovesexy after he decided to shelve this one. If I had to choose between the two I’d stick with The Black Album by a hair. But this one was another that was unavailable for several years unless you could get your hands on a bootleg copy which I eventually did before the official release in 1994. The album is dark and strange and he disavowed it at the time feeling it was a mistake and apologizing for it. Not all of it works, but I love Le Grind, the bizarre altered voice monologue of Bob George, the steamy ballad When 2 R In Love, and the funk workout of Superfunkycalifragisexy.
22. Welcome 2 America (2010) The other 2010 album referenced before and the first posthumous release of a full and completed Prince studio album just sitting in the vault. I mentioned in my 2021 year in review that a buddy of mine said he doesn’t like to listen to albums the artist didn’t intend for us to hear which I get, but Prince also just threw caution to the wind by not leaving a will, and I can’t help it - I want to hear it all…okay well most of it anyway. This one is worth it - the opening title track still sounds pretty relevant with Prince’s assessment of the state of the union (right down to the role of the iPhone) and it’s a fine groove. Hot Summer could have been a great summer single and Check The Record is a JAM. Okay so maybe Stand Up And B Strong is just a little too cheesy, but there are plenty of other great tracks like Born 2 Die & Same Page, Different Book.
21. The Chocolate Invasion (2004) One of two albums he only released to members of his NPG Music Club (which I completely missed the boat on at the time) in 2004, this is the lesser of the two but it’s still fantastic. Prince fires shots with the awesome lyrics “You been bamboozled, hoodwinked, took - If you thought that you could put me down and not get a page in my book!” on the extremely funky Judas Smile. Supercute and Underneath The Cream are nice and groovy and then the nasty funk hooks kick back in with Sex Me? Sex Me Not, Vavoom and High. A version of The Dance is here as well which would resurface with another version on 3121 a couple years later. This LP is worth it if you missed out.
20. Art Official Age (2014) The next three (and the last three) LPs all land right in the middle of the list. They’re all great and this one was released on the same day as PLECTRUMELECTRUM. Prince doesn’t sound like he’s pressing - he sounds revitalized and having fun after a couple years off. It’s nice to hear him at another creative peak in the years just before he tragically passed. Funknroll just feels like a Prince classic - the first since Black Sweat 8 years earlier in my opinion. Sometimes you just know it when you hear it - a nasty groove that doesn’t sound like anything you’ve heard before. He actually put another more rock version of it on the PLECTRUMELECTRUM album but this is the superior version. The full medley performance on SNL (his 4th and final performance on the show) with his 3RDEYEGIRL band of Clouds, Marz, and Anotherlove was a great return with songs from both albums. The Gold Standard and U Know are two highlights from the album that really bring it - he’s pushing ahead here creating new sounds instead of recycling. Granted even recycled Prince grooves are great, but a song like U Know expands your mind a little - that’s when he’s at his best.
19. HITnRUN Phase 2 (2015) The following year Prince released two more albums a few months apart and this is obviously the second one. A few of these songs were released over the previous couple years but the whole thing plays as a coherent album with standout tracks like Stare which gives a couple of nods to classics Kiss and Sexy Dancer which is fun. After the protest opener Baltimore and a few pleasant grooves the album kicks into gear with Stare, Xtralovable (which I just learned was originally written and then scrapped for Vanity 6 in 1982), and Groovy Potential - lots of big horns throughout too which work really well. Not a bad song in the batch and Big City is a fantastic closer - an uplifting jam with plenty more horns. While poking around the web I found a great review of this album that I wholeheartedly agree with in Vanity Fair.
18. HITnRUN Phase 1 (2015) The penultimate Prince release during his lifetime, this is my favorite of the final four albums. This is where it starts to get tough because the next 10 are hard to rank. They are all amazing and relatively interchangeable. The final song on this album could be one of my favorite Prince songs ever - June. The Vanity Fair review actually highlights this one as well which I thought was spot on. Incredible. I wish it was 10 minutes long just so I could just drift to it a little longer…like a dream. I think every song on this album is great, and my faves are X’s Face - only 2 1/2 minutes long but it’s Prince at the height of his quirky funky powers, the party jam Shut This Down, and Like A Mack with a slinky female rap by Charli from Curly Fryz kinda like Cat Glover used to do. So good…
17. Batman (1989) The soundtrack to the Tim Burton movie of the same name with Michael Keaton as Batman, Jack Nicholson playing the Joker, and Prince’s flame at the time Kim Basinger as Vicki Vale, this still stands alone as a fine Prince album. A solid set of songs - plenty of funk (The Future, Electric Chair, Lemon Crush), a couple classic Prince ballads (The Arms Of Orion, Scandalous) and the classic and bizarre mashup Batdance with sound clips from the movie actually being used to the track’s advantage.
16. Diamonds And Pearls (1991) The holographic cover was so hype!!! This is Prince showing off all the styles he can cram into an album with his new band at the time the New Power Generation. Most of it works really well. The excessive rapping by Tony M. is my only overall complaint, but I love Rosie Gaines on vocals. Gett Off is a bona fide Prince classic - nasty as all get out with the flute hook and some of Prince’s most direct lyrics in existence… The title track is gorgeous, Money Don’t Matter 2 Night is a great mellow groove, Willing And Able a really cool jazzy number, Insatiable a classic Prince ballad and Live 4 Love a confident strut to close it out. Cream was also a big hit from this one even if it’s not my favorite. Great album overall.
15. The Gold Experience (1995) Oh yes. Has the man ever flat out served notice like he did with P Control to kick this one off? Okay maybe he has (“Don’t worry…” & “Dearly beloved…” come to mind) but damn he meant business here didn’t he? This is your captain with NO NAME speaking and he’s here to rock your world alright. The Most Beautiful Girl In The World is another gorgeous ballad as is the epic Shhh which finds Prince at the height of his seductive powers with his voice, his delivery, his lyrics, his arrangements and especially his guitar (one of the best guitar tracks of his you’ll find) - it almost comes off as the sequel to Do Me Baby and it’s an overlooked gem in my opinion. Meanwhile 319 and Now are just monster slabs - awesome. A big bold album that delivers throughout and closes with the uplifting and shimmering Gold.
14. Love Symbol Album (1992) The first appearance of the “symbol” which you can kinda type like this O(+> Lol… He would adopt the symbol as his name the following year in his fight against the record company. Another album with the NPG and like Diamonds & Pearls this one hits a bunch of different styles with fantastic results starting with the double shot of My Name Is Prince and Sexy M.F. - the latter especially is a classic. The only flaw here is the ballads Sweet Baby and Damn U aren’t quite up to Prince slow jam standards, but the jams abound and they make up for it (I Wanna Melt With You, The Max, The Continental), not to mention a few mid tempo jams like the reggae-flavored Blue Light, The Morning Papers, And God Created Woman, the jazzy Love 2 The 9’s and the fantastic single 7 that are all really solid.
13. Come (1994) Not sure most would rank this one so high but I love it. No nonsense grooves - not a ton of elaborate arrangements - just a lot of funk. Another contractual obligation record and the last release for Warner Brothers. I was living in Cleveland when this one came out and I played the crap out of it. I think part of what I liked about it is it felt like a throwback after the grandiose statements of Diamonds & Pearls and the Love Symbol Albums - no NPG, no rapping, no wild swings in styles (or at least mood) from track to track. It also had the black and white cover which he only did with Dirty Mind and Parade before that, and the fact that he credited it to Prince when he was no longer going by Prince (even listing Prince’s lifespan as 1958-1993) all gave it a throwback vibe to me. Will this album sound so great without that context? I say yes. The title track is an epic - an 11 minute opener. The only throwaway is Solo - just a solo vocal performance that doesn’t really warrant much attention in my opinion, but everything else here is fantastic. Pheremone, Loose! & Race are the jams while Space, Dark and Letitgo are the grooves.
12. Prince (1979) The best two ballads on a single Prince album? They’re in the discussion for my money. When We’re Dancing Close and Slow and It’s Gonna Be Lonely are incredible (With You ain’t too shabby either). Prince’s second album is his first masterpiece containing his first true hit in the opener in I Wanna Be Your Lover - so good. But it doesn’t end there. Sexy Dancer is a fantastic funk jam, Bambi a great rocker and I Feel For You a pop gem made famous years later by Chaka Khan and Melle Mel. I still love this album.
11. The Slaughterhouse (2004) I know this might also be a controversial pick, but man if I don’t return to this album A LOT. The other straight-to-the-fan-club release of 2004, this thing is just so damn funky. Like he was doing this on purpose…releasing what HE wanted straight to HIS fans. It’s just such a vibe… The Daisy Chain, Welcome To The Slaughterhouse (along with the reprise closer of Silicon), Northside, and S&M Groove are ridiculous. All this nastiness doesn’t start until the 5th track. Some of the flat out funkiest stuff ever laid down by anyone and yet they don’t necessarily sound like “hits” which in the case works as part of the beauty. The first 4 tracks are all fantastic in their own right - Prince sounds unfettered by any record company expectations - he’s not swinging for the fences and the proceedings are funky but relaxed. You just don’t know what’s coming and when it hits, whoa. Could be ranked higher but I mean…..look at what’s ahead.
10. New Power Soul (1998) Okay well maybe you’re looking at “what’s ahead” and here you’re like wait, huh? This album isn’t even credited to Prince - he credits it to the New Power Generation but then again he wasn’t going by “Prince” at this time anyway… Meanwhile this is a criminally overlooked gem just like The Slaughterhouse but maybe even more so since this one was indeed commercially released…..and flopped. Mad Sex sounds like one of those Prince classics - another unique stuttering funky groove that hits right away. Not a dud in this set - When U Love Somebody has that I Wanna Be Your Lover vibe - a great pop gem with a little surprise jam segment at the end. Then the vibe a la Slaughterhouse comes with Push It Up - oh yeah… this joint just builds and builds and just gets SO hype with Larry Graham & Chaka Khan adding vocals and Doug E. Fresh providing the rap! Then it slides into the next two grooves Freaks On This Side and Come On. Oh man… The last three tracks are all amazing as well - The One is an epic slow burn, (I Like) Funky Music is as funky as anything Prince ever laid down - sometimes that just happens with his alter ego Camille shows up, and then there’s the seductive hidden track Wasted Kisses to close it out. Yes - this is absolutely a top 10 Prince album for me. Don’t @ me. Odds are if you know, you know.
9. Controversy (1981) The opening title track is legendary with the propulsive “Ooh” throughout the track. Prince pushing the envelope back in 1981 with lyrics like “Am I black or white, am I straight or gay?” and then right into Sexuality with the diatribe at the end “We live in a world overrun by tourists…” - this was seriously groundbreaking stuff and it still sounds as exciting as it did then. Do Me, Baby is the blueprint for the Prince slow jam seduction and Private Joy and Let’s Work are both towering classics. As much as I do love the remaining three tracks (and I do trust me) they are all more or less curiosities and the only thing standing between this album and one of the top spots on this list.
8. 3121 (2006) This album should have been way bigger than it was. It’s the best latter day Prince album and he promoted it with his third SNL appearance with a kick ass performance of Fury and the duet track Beautiful Loved and Blessed with Tamar Davis (Prince never stopped promoting female protegés like he did with Vanity, Apollonia, Cat, & Mayte but his magic touch started to wane when it came to their success by the time he featured Tamar and Bria Valente). The album actually debuted at #1 in the U.S. but while I remember hearing Black Sweat here and there it’s not like I remember it being a massive hit…. is it me? Anyway, 3121 was the address of a rental property in L.A. Prince was using but he frames it as an idea/ideal - a place where “U can come if U want 2 but U can never leave…” borrowing from Hotel California perhaps? The aforementioned Black Sweat is another of those Prince classics - a defining track sung in his unmistakeable falsetto. The Word is just so silky smooth, Love is funky as can be, Get On The Boat a great call to action closer that gets you out of your seat… another album with no filler, no missteps.
7. Around The World In A Day (1985) Surely not the obvious follow up to the blockbuster Purple Rain, and that’s part of the charm here. We’re even instructed to open our hearts and our minds right off the bat and for those of us who did this album was a psychedelic revelation right down to the incredible painting on the cover (is Prince on the cover or not?). Prince was growing by leaps and bounds with a loose vision of a Utopian place called Paisley Park - which eventually became a reality in Minneapolis. Songs about politics, religion, temptation and life in general that still rocked (America) and funked (Tamborine). Raspberry Beret is obviously the saccharine sweet mega hit with the psychedelic video that everyone knows, Pop Life is a pop gem with the perfect lyrics and Temptation is a rousing two act opera of sorts with Prince acting out the conflict in his head baring his soul with an outlandish and exciting vocal performance to close it out. The real highlight though just might be the gorgeous epic ballad Condition Of The Heart - Prince painting a poignant and unforgettable picture. Actually here’s an article about the song that says it perfectly.
6. Parade (1986) The Soundtrack to Prince’s second feature length film Under The Cherry Moon, Parade contains plenty of classics starting with the obvious Kiss that had the famous video of Prince and Wendy Melvoin from the Revolution, made even more famous (as if that was possible) with Julia Roberts’ famous solo version in the hot tub in the film Pretty Woman. Parade is jammed with classics from the raucous jam Girls & Boys, the steel drum funk of New Position, the beautifully grandiose Mountains, the gorgeous instrumental of Venus De Milo or the matter-of-fact missive Anotherloverholenyohead - all fantastic. But once again the highlight like on the album before it might be another gorgeous story told in the ballad Sometimes It Snows In April. Wow…
5. Dirty Mind (1980) Prince at his raunchiest in the days when he would take the stage in a long trench coat, black high heeled boots, leggings and black bikini underwear… Songs about sex, sex, incest, and more sex. And it’s amazing. The title track has always been a top 10 Prince song for me and leads off the album. Side 1 is kind of the pop side and side 2 is the dirty funk side really although not much of the album is exactly “clean”. When You Were Mine is a classic (I remember when Mitch Ryder’s cover used to be on the radio in Detroit all the time). Side 2 is a party - Uptown, Head, Sister & Party Up - just a tour de force. This album is where Prince REALLY started to bring it.
4. Emancipation (1996) Prince finally gaining control of his destiny. Getting away from Warner Brothers and being able to release as much material as he wanted when he wanted, and boy did he unleash here. A full three hours of new originals (save for 4 covers) in a three CD set, Emancipation is incredible. You can sort of breakdown the first 12 songs (CD1) as a great variety of tunes with multiple styles, the second 12 songs (CD2) as the mellow middle and the third 12 (CD3) as the JAMS. Almost ALL 36 songs are fantastic. I don’t even know where to begin with this one… I will say the 4 jams (Slave, New World, The Human Body, Face Down) that lead the 3rd disc are incredible… but don’t skip to them. Just listen to the whole thing if you haven’t. You don’t have to do it in one three hour sitting obviously but take the whole thing in from beginning to end, rinse, repeat. You can easily process it in thirds - that’s probably best. Jam Of The Year, In This Bed I Scream, Joint 2 Joint, One Kiss At A Time - just so many strong songs. No real hits and not a HUGE seller, this was another Prince album that deserved better.
3. 1999 (1982) “Don’t worry, I won’t hurt you….” Prince’s first magnum opus - a sprawling double album that really made him a star with multiple hits like the title track, Little Red Corvette and Delirious. I saw this tour in the 5th row on the main floor at Crisler Arena in Ann Arbor with The Time and Vanity 6. I’ll never forget it. An album with plenty of funk and a bit of mystery, you could easily make a case for this being in the top spot as well along with either of the two I have above it. The title track is a perfect single, funky and with the catchiest chorus (about the apocalypse) you’ll ever hear in your life. Little Red Corvette - with that percussive & unmistakeable ch-ch-chhhh and the swing of Delirious which is a style Prince always kicks ass with - this is the standard for those… What a start! But then things really get epic with the 7+, 8+, & 9+ minute workouts D.M.S.R. (the ultimate party jam), the deliciously dirty Let’s Pretend We’re Married, and Automatic with that hypnotically mesmerizing A-U-T-O-MATIC refrain. Prince is totally inside your head at this point…and there’s still 30 minutes of genius to go. You could kinda say Something In The Water (Does Not Compute) & All The Critics Love U In New York (with the mysteriously missing lyrics on the lyric sleeve) are slighter tracks - maybe even filler (?) and yet I still LOVE both of those tracks. The other three remaining tracks are massive - Free an incredible ballad, Lady Cab Driver an epic funky groove, and International Lover the perfectly seductive lounge closer with your pilot Prince guiding you in for the perfect landing. Oh - and can we give a shout out to the fantastic B-Side Irresistible Bitch which the Electrifying Mojo here in Detroit turned over and played on WJLB making that a bona fide local hit as well? Was that on the radio in your town too? 1999 was given the official podcast treatment by the estate along with a posthumous super deluxe reissue - all worth listening to.
2. Sign O The Times (1987) Prince breaks away from the Revolution as his backing band here and crafts a masterpiece for the ages. So many classics here and the appearance of Prince’s alter ego Camille on a handful of tracks. So much has been said and written about this album it’s hard to add anything here, but it’s just such a marvel with such advanced lyrical themes and musical styles it still blows my mind. Prince said things that just seemed to never have been said before such as in If I Was Your Girlfriend - he wants to have the type of relationship where she can tell him anything - the types of things she would tell her girlfriends…genius the way he lays it out and he does it as the androgynous Camille. The opener is an all timer with that bouncy bass line that kicks things off with a reference to the AIDS crisis and proceeds to ruminate on the apocalypse, gangs, drugs, and anything else on his mind, in the end saying oh well let’s get married and have a baby anyway and “we’ll call him Nate if it’s a boy”. I usually shy away from the occasional Prince overt religious song like The Ladder or Last December, but The Cross is just too good to deny. One of the few gospel songs I love. I Could Never Take The Place Of Your Man is a towering achievement - Prince in the role of the gentleman telling a girl he knows a one night stand isn’t the right move for her with a perfect hook and an awesome extended guitar midsection. Forever In My Life is such a simple structure - stripped down and no frills - just a focus on a pouring out of the heart to tell someone in no uncertain terms that he wants them forever in his life. You just have to drop what you’re doing and sing the whole thing with all the emotion you’ve got when you hear it. Hot Thing, It, It’s Gonna Be A Beautiful Night, Housequake - all bangers, and then there’s ADORE (caps added by me). Adore….considered by some to be the best Prince slow jam of all time and it’s hard to argue. I’m realizing I’m all over the place on this one but that’s appropriate - mind racing covering all the things I love about this album. Strange Relationship and The Ballad Of Dorothy Parker just make you feel sophisticated when you listen to them. Strange Relationship for the brilliant lyrics and the complicated nature of the relationship he (Camille though) is singing about, and Dorothy Parker for how incredibly vivid the storytelling is. What a seduction! He says cool I’ll take a bath but I’m leaving my pants on cuz I’m kinda going with someone - she says “sounds like a real man to me” and at some point his phone rings and she says “whoever’s calling can’t be as cute as you” and right then and there he knew he was through… all of this over the coolest jazzy jam with those percussion fills - I mean, it’s just brilliant man. You can’t overlook the wonderful and slightly trippy nursery rhyme of Starfish and Coffee - Cynthia Rose who stood at the back of the line with a smile beneath her nose? Love it. I could go on and on about this album - I started off saying it’s hard to add anything about it, but once I get going it’s hard to stop. Check out the Super Deluxe version which includes a ton of extras including the sensational B-sides Shockadelica, La, La La, He, He, Hee and the estate gave this one the official podcast treatment as well. Oh - I almost forgot about U Got The Look too…
1. Purple Rain (1984) If 1999 made Prince a star, Purple Rain made him a king. The most famous Prince album with the most famous Prince songs (and the best B-sides) as the soundtrack to the most famous Prince movie and it still holds up all the way through. For my money it’s the best album of the 80’s. The end. Rolling Stone has it #2 behind London Calling but I (dis)respectfully disagree. Not to mention the best two B-sides ever released in music history from one album’s singles in Erotic City and 17 Days and it’s not even close. The man was just churning out the greatest songs at an otherworldly clip. When Prince first addresses us all as “Dearly Beloved…” we know he means business. Is there a simpler call to action than Let’s Go Crazy? Let’s get NUTS? Hell yes - let’s do it. What an opener. Take Me With U evokes those images of Prince riding his fancy bike with Apollonia on the back as the leaves scatter… and then comes The Beautiful Ones… OMG. What a vocal. H.E.R. performed this at the Grammy tribute to Prince with Misty Copeland dancing which I thought was very cool. Wendy and Lisa lead us into the rocker Computer Blue which kicks ass followed by the amazing raunch of Darling Nikki. I think it took balls even for Prince to put Darling Nikki on an album with so much at stake, and while I don’t think he looked at it that way, to have one of the best selling albums of all time with those lyrics on it back then? Whoa - and sure enough it ruffled some feathers helping to lead to “Parental Advisory” tags on albums. Next is the masterstroke of When Doves Cry - with no bass and that industrial sounding snare that was such a staple of Prince’s sound in the early days - SO COOL. One the best songs of all time period. Dig (if you will) the picture of you and I engaged in a kiss… Wow. Not to mention that video! And then the party starts - I Would Die 4 U and Baby I’m A Star - you can’t really have one without the other. These two along with the towering Purple Rain title track were all recorded live in Minneapolis and the footage exists of Purple Rain. Not the best quality but it’s still incredible to watch with subtitles explaining where the edits are including the third scrapped verse (I’m pretty sure it’s real - not an official release). Then there’s the Super Bowl halftime in 2007 when Prince performed Purple Rain in the POURING rain. One of the most memorable moments to be sure. Purple Rain was the last song Prince ever played live a week before he died. …and now I’m getting choked up. One of the greatest songs ever written on one of the greatest albums of all time.
The writing of this list was a joy. Spending all this time going through his entire catalogue like this has been a labor of love and I hope you enjoyed it! Please share it, comment with your favorites below and keep listening to Prince! As he would say, May U Live 2 See the Dawn!
M10 Social is owned by Doug Cohen in West Bloomfield, MI and provides social media training and digital marketing services from the Frameable Faces Photography studio Doug owns with his wife Ally. He can be reached there at tel:248-790-7317, by mobile at tel:248-346-4121 or via email at mailto:doug@frameablefaces.com.
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