Definitely Sign "O" The Times. Personally I'd say to get Dirty Mind, Lovesexy, Parade, and Controversy before The Gold Experience, but the The Gold Experience is pretty awesome, and very easy to get into.

I said The Gold Experience because it might be one of the easiest Prince Albums to get into. Goddamn is good too.

Lament have you heard anything from his new album? When is that coming out?

The girls in the band said that everything on the album is brand new, so if that's true I've heard none of it. I know the single is up on itunes, but I haven't grabbed it yet. There's no official release date, but the word on the street is it'll be before summer.

Alright, so in another thread stip asked me to make him a Prince mix of stuff that doesn't appear on Purple Rain or the Hits I & II collections. I obliged. It started out as one disc, ballooned to two, then to three, then back to two again before I finally sucked it up and made it a single disc. I'm sure a lot of my choices will be unpopular, but...I don't care. I'm posting it here in case anyone else wants it, and so we can all make angry posts when stip writes up his thoughts.

Seriously though, it was REALLY fucking hard to make this a single disc. I had to cut out so much stuff I love. And I also had to cut out a lot of stuff I love because I knew it'd contrast greatly with stip's tastes. But yeah, in case anyone wants the mix, here is the link...

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B6VItzi_8iZrR2tzUzE3LUVyNTA/edit?usp=sharing

and here is the tracklisting...

Spoiler: show

P Control (The Gold Experience)
Thunder (Diamonds & Pearls)
Anotherloverholenyohead (Parade)
17 Days (B-side, When Doves Cry)
Anna Stesia (Lovesexy)
Erotic City (B-side, Let's Go Crazy)
Girls & Boys (Parade)
Let's Work (Controversy)
Partyup (Dirty Mind)
Automatic (1999)
The Ballad of Dorothy Parker (Sign "O" the Times)
Dinner With Delores (Chaos & Disorder)
She's Always In My Hair (B-side, Raspberry Beret)
I Wish U Heaven (Lovesexy)
The Cross (Sign "O" the Times)
Last December (The Rainbow Children)

Just in case it's needed, I have a sequel to this mix ready to go.

Is Erotic City the full version or the edit? I don't have a good copy of the full version.

I thought I was pretty fair to stevie wonder.

Thanks Lament. Gonna listen today while I convalesce.

Nice mix, Lament. I'm probably the second biggest Prince fan on here next to you. Some of these would have made my list, but I'd have a hard time leaving something from the Black Album on the cutting room floor. Two songs from Lovesexy and no Eye No? Not a single song about incest or blow jobs!!! What kind of Prince mix is this?

But seriously, it would have been tough to narrow this down to a single disc. She's Always in My Hair, Dorothy Parker, and (the highly underrated) Automatic are three of my favs. Erotic City is easily top ten, but I just assume even casual fans know that one. Kind of the same for Anotherlover and Girls and Boys. I'm surprised these aren't on the greatest hits album for that matter.

I really love the Time stuff he recorded. People forget (or don't realize) that Prince wrote and performed everything on the first couple of Time albums, except for the vocals. Even the backup vocals are clearly him. The demo of Chocolate is one of the best, with Prince doing all the Morris Day mannerisms. Or maybe it's really the other way around. It's a shame people can't listen to this stuff on YouTube the way you can everything else under the sun. A few of my lesser known favs:

Chocolate
Cool
777-9311
Another Lonely Christmas
Bambi
When You Were Mine
Sister
Head
Do It All Night
Jack U Off
Lady Cab Driver
Something in the Water (Does Not Compute)
Mutiny
Tambourine
The Question of U
Elephants and Flowers
We Can Funk
Joy In Repetition
Cindy C
Le Grind
Superfunkycalifragisexy
The Future
Electric Chair
Lemon Crush
Strollin
Horny Pony
The Morning Papers
Basically anything from Sign o the Times esp Starfish and Coffee, Strange Relationship, Never Take the Place, Girlfriend
Gold
Billy Jack Bitch
Good Love

I've found his post Gold Experience material largely impenetrable or just sort of bad. Would love to hear the good stuff you think he's released in the last ten years or so. That hasn't changed his stature as a live artist -- he's still amazing in concert. I saw a couple of shows in Holland two years ago and he killed it. There was one pretty good new song -- When Eye Lay My Hands on U.

The edit. I will try to upload the full version later. I needed to save all of the space I could on the mix.

I think you were too.

PryTo, I had to leave When You Were Mine, Head, I Could Never Take the Place of Your Mine, & If I Was Your Girlfriend off because they're on the Hits I & II collections. When I had the mix at mulitple discs, Another Lonely Christmas, Bambi, Do it all Night, Jack U Off, Joy in Repetition, Le Grind, Strange Relationship, Gold, and Good Love were all on it. Off the top of my head, so were I'm Yours, Let's Pretend We're Married, Around the World in a Day, Paisley Park, Christopher Tracy's Parade, Sometimes it Snows in April, Play in the Sunshine, Forever in My Life, Glam Slam When 2 R in Love, Insatiable, My Name is Prince, Space, Endorphimachine, Wherever U Go, Whatever U Do, Valentina, How Come U Don't Call Me, Gotta Stop Messin' About, and Crucial at various points.

You're right about the lack of great post-TGE material. Last December amd Wherever U Go, Whatever U Do are probably the only two songs he's released since then that I'd put on the top shelf. Valentina is close. Maybe I'll try to put together a post-TGE mix. It'd be a nice, short listen.

I'd listen to that for sure.

I posted this in the videos thread, but it probably belongs here. The first half is just amazing, and clearly aiming for that Purple Rain (the movie) vibe. Can you say swing and a miss?

Wow. That's something else.

I always wished someone would write a good, in depth book about the Prince-Rick James rivalry from back in the day. There's probably an awesome story to be told there.

That would be an interesting book. People forget that Prince made a name for himself as an opening act for Rick James. By most accounts, big chunks of Dirty Mind were a direct influence + you have the Mary Jane Girls vs. Vanity Six, etc. Interesting that Rick then spent some career time clearly following in Prince's footsteps.

Oh, this looks worth a read!

http://www.popmatters.com/feature/156002-dirty-minds-think-alike-the-forgotten-rivalry-of-prince-and-rick-jam/

By all accounts, they both legitimately disliked each other. Apparently when Super Freak crossed over and Street Songs was a huge smash, James thought he'd won the battle and relinquished Prince to the dustbins of history. Man, would I like to have the expression on his face the next year when Prince dropped 1999.

But you're right, if Prince doesn't spend the first half of 1980 opening for Rick James, we probably don't get Dirty Mind. The shift in his craft/image between the self-titled album and Dirty Mind is a huge one, and James probably had a lot to do with that.

Oh nice!

I only own Purple Rain as well. My Aunt is a huge Prince fan so I have heard quite a bit of his catalog but I need to dive into it no doubt.

My buddy saw him a few years ago in LA. Said he was blown away.

He's pretty amazing. He'd be on my Mount Rushmore of singular music talents for sure.

Rick James caught lightning in a bottle... Prince, on the other hand, is a volume shooter... He has hit some big 3's, but overall I think his percentage is pretty low. A badass on guitar live, though, and I can respect the fuck out of that!

I've said this on here before, but Prince is the single best concert I've ever seen. And I've seen just about everyone.

That would be a fun list to make.