Prince
Lotusflow3r - Mplsound - Elixer

Having that beautiful urgency to speak, to communicate, at twenty is right, sacred. Perhaps even mandatory.

Having it still at fifty is a vice. A sin that I would dare to call mortal.

Prince, alas, has accustomed us to hyper-production. Paradoxically, in the early eighties (his golden period) he calibrated his music releases, though very frequent, with projects heterogeneous among them but each of them was amiably "concept": "Purple Rain", "Around The World In A Day", and "Parade" had very little in common, for instance, despite being consecutive and all three, for very different reasons, splendid.

Then came the nineties, the famous and furious disputes with record labels, the rebellions, the pseudonyms, and too many, too many, too many albums.

After having released, in the past, even a couple of quadruples (?!), now the Minneapolis genius has come out with three simultaneous albums, mainly available online but also in some big (and surviving, alas) record store. For instance, I found a copy, as a triple, and thus as a single music release, at FNAC.

So, let’s start by saying that the inspiration, the best inspiration, seems to have died long ago.

Quantity could therefore be said to be inversely proportional to quality. Probably, if these records had been merged into just one, selecting the best tracks, it wouldn’t have been among the best, but it would have been abundantly listenable, like, for example - among the works from the dark period - "Gold" or "Chaos & Disorder", or even the almost recent "3121"..........

Here instead it was totally overblown. One could say it went decidedly out of the pot.

We could define them as three "concept albums", in the sense that the first has a minimalist structure, mainly voice, guitar, drums, and bass, with some minor interventions of pianos and keyboards, and it is the best of the three. Heartfelt, excellently played. Written moderately poorly, but ultimately listenable.

The second one, full of self-references especially in the electronic rhythm sections, is danceable, quite banal but at times rather fun. Nothing special for Prince, mind you.

The third is a solo album and essentially nonsensical by his protégé of the moment, Bria Valente, a predictable starlet, with whom it is very easy to become friends on Facebook (however...). Glossy stuff. Great for cozy moments with a semi-mature woman, but nothing more.

In conclusion, besides the obvious advice for the non-devoted to abstain without any problem, we permit ourselves, in our small way, to give some advice directly to the Prince (obviously advice that he will never read and thus can never consider...): let's start with the parable of the talents.

God or whoever gave him really a lot: he was an excellent songwriter, with an enviable "sense of song". He wrote unforgettable pages (even today, on the radios, "Purple Rain", "Kiss", to name two, are aired daily as great classics). He has a very unique voice and a falsetto that could even make a berghibb envious. In addition, he plays any instrument, but above all guitar and piano, in a phenomenal way.

But talents, like everything, age, wither, and sometimes die.

Today the Prince can no longer write. Inspiration, the "Gong-ho", as Conte would put it, is no longer there. And so, the really best thing would be to put to use the tools that still work.

A nice funk-jazz album, or an equally nice cover album. And then lots of concerts. And few records.

Obviously, he’ll do the opposite. And we, passively, will love him anyway.