Sometimes represented as Sign ☮︎ The Times, which I guess makes a play on the word “sign”. This feels like the most “Prince” of the Prince albums so far, although I’m not quite sure why.
It’s largely some very solid funk/pop of which Prince himself does the lion’s share of all of the instrumentation (and although the dreaded Fairlight CMI and Linn M-1 are here, they’re largely not obvious, the album sounds a lot more analogue). The stalwarts Lisa (Coleman) and Wendy (Melvoin) are here too, as well as a host of other musicians that provide horns, strings, and backing vocals (including Sheena Easton). Most notable is the live track It’s Gonna Be A Beautiful Night which features jamming with keyboardist Dr Fink and blends in the Winkies' chant from Wizard of Oz in a bit of audience participation. Some of the tracks use a pitch-shifted vocal for Prince’s alter-ego Camille. Which, it has to be said sounds a little bit hokey and artificial; he’d have been better singing in his higher range, which can be pretty high and doesn’t sound like a cartoon chipmunk.
This is a double album, the second this year already, after a lull of them since the early Seventies. There’s not, as far as I could tell, an especially thematic link between the songs. The title track has some political comment, but other tracks are typical Prince about how much he loves the ladies. Adore is probably the most “Prince” track on the album, all falsetto vocals and a slow soul feel. The Cross is another slow track that goes more psychedelic. The sense I got was not that Prince had a particular message to convey, or a particular musical genre to explore, but more he just had a whole load of songs he wanted to release (I recall that when he died he left folders of hundreds of unrecorded songs and song ideas).
I have to admit, this was one I listened to while working and didn’t give it my full attention, so my impressions of it was that it was nice, but no tracks really stood out to me that I could point to. On the other hand, I didn’t get Side Three Slump with it either. Like Stevie Wonder’s Songs In The Key Of Life, there’s enough range and variety, and quality, to sustain a double album.
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