Prince
HITnRUN Phase Two

We are in 2015, the year before Prince tried to "return" to Warner Bros. Records after years of recording isolation, releasing an album, Art Official Age, rich in ideas but somewhat unfocused; regretful, he once again goes "solo," slamming the door in the face of "his" record executives for good.

Thus, he plans two completely different albums, with the same title - HITnRun - distinguished as Phase One and Phase Two, released three months apart and serving as the artistic farewell of a man I consider to be one of the best musicians and composers of the past fifty years. Visionary, eccentric, and futuristic, the first "classic," elegant and complete, the second. This Phase Two isn’t an album of all new songs; some pieces had already been released as singles, others were known because they were performed live and ended up on bootlegs.

However, Prince enjoys himself, literally, by reuniting his THE NEW POWER GENERATION with an expanded horn section (NPG Hornz) in the home studio at Paisley Park, re-performing these pieces with the skill of a conductor, turning the record into a compendium of music, embracing every possible genre—pop-rock-rhythm n blues-Jazz—making it a Fusion work, where I feel, more than elsewhere in Prince's vast discography, the groove of another great, Jaco Pastorius.

Yes, Prince and Pastorius, same initial, same immense and innovative talent.

I start from the last track on the list, Big City, a pure Funky enriched with Jazz passages with a great horn work giving it an RnB touch: putting so much together is only feasible if you are a "genius" of music. More Fusion, immense class, in Black Muse: just the bass intro would be enough to give this piece the highest marks, pumping funky of great class with Latin-Jazz enrichments that, at least to me, bring the emotions and atmospheres of Jaco's great music to the heart. The same funky Jazz elements in Groovy Potential which, compared to the other two, has some urban-soul hints that make it innovative and never predictable or already heard: splendid the finale with bass and horns perfectly assembled. When She Comes is a Blues, old style, made unique and precious with touches of accordion: I don't remember many other blues pieces with the accordion, an instrument suited for other genres. Rocknroll Loveaffair and Screwdriver are two rock tracks, the first more RnB oriented, almost Hard Rock the second, with Prince's great guitar rising to the occasion, at the center of his "orchestra," because in this record, more than a band, Mr. Nelson seems surrounded by an orchestra. Stare is pure funky, with Prince's bass at the center of the melody: genius and perfect overall, the "self-citation" of the guitar riff from Kiss. Finally, the pop, classy, in Baltimore, enriched with a masterful and clear guitar solo: the lyrics speak of love against war and violence, love is brought by the music, especially by the guitar... "it's time 2 hear the guitar play."

I recommend this album to anyone who loves music, perhaps without having a "preferred" genre; here the musical genre is one, very simple: beauty!