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- Summary: The collection of nine songs recorded before 1984's Purple Rain includes covers, songs that would later see release and three unreleased tracks.
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- Record Label: Warner Bros.
- Genre(s): Pop/Rock
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Top Track
| Purple Rain | |
|---|---|
| I never meant to cause you any sorrow I never meant to cause you any pain I only wanted one time to see you laughing I only wanted to see you... | See the rest of the song lyrics |
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Score distribution:
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Positive: 17 out of 17
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Mixed: 0 out of 17
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Negative: 0 out of 17
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Sep 21, 2018These wonderful recordings provide yet more evidence of his colossal talent, and, tantalisingly, it appears that there are still more to come.
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Sep 20, 2018While the session is informal--he sniffles now and then, and at times something rattles in the piano--the performance is not sloppy for a moment. The one-take, real-time vocals are exquisite. .. He shifts musical styles and vocal personae at whim--melancholy, playful, devout, flirtatious--yet it’s all Prince. ... It’s a glimpse of a notoriously private artist doing his mysterious work.
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Sep 27, 2018Despite its intimacy, Piano & A Microphone doesn’t feel like trespassing on Prince because it doesn’t truly expose him. This recording doesn’t reveal the nuts-and-bolts inner workings of one of the greatest artists of all time. How could it? We get to listen as a visionary works with simple tools--and in the end, Prince’s genius remains as mysterious as ever.
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MojoSep 20, 2018His piano-playing is a joy, his vocals a dramatis personae of lively characters. ... The whole thing feels--thrillingly, poignantly--like you're in the room with him. [Oct 2018, p.84]
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Sep 21, 2018A fitting subtitle could be “Everything You Know About Funk is Wrong,” thanks to a couple of flat-out stunning solo performances on this session. This is not the Holy Grail of lost or shelved Prince albums.
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Classic Rock MagazineSep 20, 2018For serious fans--and them only--this album is a revelation. [Oct 2018, p.83]
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The WireNov 15, 2018This collection, and its atmosphere of sharing a bench with the 20th century’s Mozart as he explores still nascent songs, is an appropriately seductive tease to what will doubtless be a decades-long unearthing of the vault’s untold treasures. The songs themselves, as they’re presented here, really are secondary to this feeling, something like finding a just unearthed message from a departed loved one. [Dec 2018, p.69]
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