4/5
The Signs 'O' The Times They Are A-Changin'.
It's times like this you wish Prince lived again. 2020. Kobe. Chadwick. Corona. Police brutality. Black Lives are supposed to Matter but we still don't have justice for Breonna Taylor like we will keep saying her name until we one day do. We said, "arrest the cops". Not slap them on the wrist. Slap some cuffs on those wrists. What is with this virus and disease of a year? A century ago this decade roared in decadence like a Gatsby. Today looks like the end of days. But by royal appointment of purple reign. From the Lakers King James, to a Prince in resurrection he once cosplayed. It looks like the beautiful ones will save us, instead of smash the picture in reflection. Eye no ur gonna luv dis 2. We need something to jam the funk out to. Especially in a time where we should have been celebrating the 2020 Olympics here in Tokyo, Japan with the neon fireworks of a closing ceremony. It was four years ago we lost a man who could show stop Superbowl's with doves too. Prince passed in 2016 which somehow seems yesterday and a lifetime away. In what was until now the calender formerly know as the worst year when we lost Bowie and Ali and gained nothing but Trump and Brexit. And what a time to lose music's throne just years after another King of Pop. Prince was live from Lianne La Havas' (what a self-titled album he'd love this year) living room like quarantine, 'Hit N Run' guerilla touring like he had not tomorrow and releasing the freshest, future albums in similar volume. But the moment he played his last key his Paisley Park Castle was raise and his vault broken into. And from the stripped down and essential, 'Piano and a Microphone 1983' album that played like many of his last also private shows, released two years back and last years 'The Beautiful Ones' autobiography excerpt and outtakes, it just hasn't felt the same, but still we feel joy between the pain with his words and work. And sometimes like the 'Hollyrock' banger and animated Hollywood video of similar tribute sometimes we just find something that shines special amongst all that buried treasure. Just like the 'Sign 'O' The Times'. Those being from 1987 classic that many Prince heads crown as his best album. Even more than the king 'Purple Rain'. The latest of Prince's epic reissues and super deluxe edition from the Paisley Park vault may just be his biggest and best at a world wonder of 8 hours long for your Netflix kids binge age. All hail the times.
"In France a skinny man died of a big disease with a little name/By chance his girlfriend came across a needle and soon she did the same/At home there are seventeen-year-old boys and their idea of fun/Is being in a gang called The Disciples, high on crack, totin' a machine gun/Time, times." That's how the greatest lyric off the greatest song off the greatest album of the same name began to end a decade that was rife with Reganomics and the crack and AIDS epidemic. And in this year where we have two more in COVID-19 and rampant racism (although racism was alive in its unwell world then. As Will Smith says, "racism isn't getting worse. It's just getting filmed"), rereleasing this album seems more than fitting. It seems necessary in the good fight against all this evil. As soon as you feel like you can 'Play In The Sunshine' again, moving to these rocking beats like a 'Housequake' you will be nostalgia reminded of a time that seemed better again. With 'Little Red Corvette' and 'Raspberry Beret' essential classic track names like the beautiful 'The Ballad Of Dorothy Parker' and classics amongst classics you forget until they fondly come brewing back into play like 'Starfish and Coffee'. But it's when you, "I think about it all the time baby, all right" hear the classic Prince kick beat of 'It' remastered in all its glory like a Stephen King Pennywise adaptation when you just feel how great it is to have this back, like we only wish we could have the man too. "Tonight is the night for making", 'Slow Love'. Drop the needle on this one you love as you drop your hand on the shoulder of the one your heart belongs to in a two step in the name of body and soul. But 'Hot Thing' its when you hear that beat off one of the standout singles on this double disc of definitive hits that you'll really lose your mind like the heat of Summer season. All before the cutting room floor opens up a new crop of old talent in the 'Love and Sex' 'Emotional Pump' and 'Colors' of the man with 'A Place In Heaven' like the God that he is. 'And That Says What?' Look 'Above The Wall' (Donald) and into a 'Crystal Ball' 'In A Large Room With No Light'. And then you will see 'It Ain't Over 'Til The Fat Lady Sings'. Time to catch the 'Train' with 'Adonis and Bathsheba' to 'Soul Psychodelicide' because you shall go to 'The Ball' too. With essential tracks like 'Eggplant' and 'Blanche' and worthy singles like 'I Need A Man' and 'Jealous Girl'. This is 'Crucial' like the 'Rebirth Of The Flesh' in this 'Cosmic Day'. This is the album you want 'Forever In Your Life' like that things best follow or the peace sign the 'O' often represents from the love symbol in these times.
Side two and all the other discs. This is even bigger than the 'Sign 'O' The Times' movie. 'U Got The Look' (and how about the 'Long Look'?) and now the sound too in iconic record after inspired remaster for all the senses. "Boy versus girl in the World Series of love" and now all the bases are reloaded whilst you try to make it to home plate, swinging big like Babe with this record on. But 'If I Was Your Girlfriend' get the wedding organ march ready for this gender reversal in falsetto for a track that TLC covered classically like Beyonce "sometimes I trip on how happy we could be" ab-libbed on her '03 Bonnie and Clyde' with Jay-Z like 'The Beautiful Ones' of Mariah Carey's 'Butterfly' with Dru Hill and Ginuwine's 'When Doves Cry' with Timbaland (we still can't get over on some Chappelle Show pancake hoops story that Prince approached G in a club and said he doesn't normally like people covering his record's, but Gin's was cool, before disappearing into the dust and club smoke as 'The Bachelor' double raked) like the time Prince gave his songs to others like 'Manic Monday' for The Bangles, Alicia Keys 'How Come You Don't Call Me' and of course 'Nothing Compares To' Sinead O'Connor. The sound of a 'Strange Relationship' and then the signature 'I Could Never Take The Place Of Your Man' whose guitar solo could never take the place of the time he by surprise made the late, great Tom Petty and everyone's guitar gently weep in tribute to George Harrison (remember he threw the guitar up and just left. You know who caught it and probably handed it back at the pearly gates, My Sweet Lord). Just like this remaster could never take the place of the original recording out the booth. But just put it on 'The Cross' and realize how important this album was for a man with the sexual vogue of Madonna, bringing those Springsteen statements with his Dylan record, a child of Marvin and Sly and the Family Stone like a rolling one, or black Beatle. "Ghettos to the left of us/Flowers to the right/There'll be bread for all of us/If we can just bear the cross", he sings on a powerful project he changed like the lyrics to 'The Christ' when he converted to becoming a Jehova's Witness. Sanctified from sexual to secular. Saturday night to Sunday morning. 'It's Gonna Be A Beautiful Night' when you listen to this live and the unique Utrecht, Netherlands live show in beautiful, bountiful bonus here featuring all the hits on the versions and B-sides of this spirited reflection of a super album. Segmented in orange and a ghostly image of the artist playing that iconic artwork background for a time when The Artist Formerly Known As dressed in a Jubilee of yellow leather like a Marvel X-Men character from the same decade, classic animated series. Complete in tribute with box set linear notes and musings from the likes of Lenny Kravitz (we're still waiting for that, "this is just for us" duet album) and Dave Chappelle talking about hoops with the late, comedic great Charlie Murphy like breakfast can wait. "Eye" was wrong. You're going to 'Adore' this like that jazzy sax. As you sing this chorus in I it concert to the fade out a whole working day later. Because it 'aint over yet. N.S.F.W. If you're in work tomorrow. You're going to be partying all night long like the 'La, La, La, He, He, Hee' to the dogs bark in beat to the street. "You've got none lives. I've only got one" Prince signature screams before lamenting the 'Shockadelica"of the Cosby's Camille. Or how about 1985's 'Teacher, Teacher' sensei like a Sting from The Police's 'Don't Stand So Close To Me'. All these outstanding outtakes and more like the atmospheric 'All My Dreams', a 'Wonderful Day' we all want to see again and 'Can I Play With U' featuring MILES F###### DAVIS like INXS rocking with Ray Charles on 'Full Moon, Dirty Hearts' could make a whole new lost album of their own. And they kind of do with 'Visions' of 'Power Fantastic' for the 'Witness 4 The Prosecution'. Because the 'Signs 'O' The Times' have changed in 2020. If we could only make peace with the rest. TIM DAVID HARVEY.
Playlist Picks: 'Sign O' The Times', 'It', 'If I Was Your Girlfriend.'
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