FEATURE:
Prince: Five Years Gone
My Favourite Album from the Master: 1991’s Diamonds and Pearls
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IT is a sad day tomorrow (21st April)…
because we mark five years since we lost the amazing Prince. I have written a few features about him already that covered a number of themes – from his essential albums through to his undeniable guitar genius. To round off, ahead of the anniversary on Wednesday, I want to spend a bit of time with an album that is my favourite of his. Many people would not agree with my choice because, when we think of the ‘ultimate’ Prince album, naturally, we think of 1999 (1982), Purple Rain (1984), Sign o’ the Times (1987) - or maybe Parade (1986). I think truly great artists have a purple patch. Bowie’s way very much through the 1970s, whereas The Rolling Stones’ was from the late-1960s to the early/mid-1970s. For Prince, this was between 1980’s Dirty Mind and 1988’s Lovesexy. He created brilliant music right through his career, though there was this golden spell where The Purple One was truly inspired and unstoppable! Debatably, Diamond and Pearls was near the start of a patchy period. The 1989 Batman soundtrack was not great. 1990’s Graffiti Bridge had its moments, as did 1994’s The Black Album. The same cannot be said of 1994’s Come. It seemed like, for every solid album, there followed one that was a little light on genius. Diamonds and Pearls is my favourite because it is an underdog. It has moments of sensuality and tenderness together with absolute monster tracks that recall Prince at his greatest.
Songs like Diamonds and Pearls, Thunder, Gett Off, Money Don't Matter 2 Night and Cream are among his greatest cuts. There is a nice balance so that we open with the thrill and rush of Thunder. Whilst Diamonds and Pearls fades a little in the final few tracks, there is a nice mix of tracks so that one is invested for the majority of the album. I will bring in a couple of positive reviews towards the end. The first album with his backing band, The New Power Generation, I think that Diamonds and Pearls is a lot stronger than its hit singles – though others will disagree with that assertion. The thirteenth studio album from the Minnesota-born maestro, there are so many terrific songs across Diamonds and Pearls. Whilst many will celebrate other Prince albums over the next few days (as we mark his sad loss), I wanted to spend some time extolling the virtues of one of his more overlooked albums. In their review, despite some muted acclaim, Pitchfork found some positives:
“Thunder” stitches evangelic lyrics to sub-continental sitars, slashing guitars, and chord progressions that Max Martin has swiped for the last two decades. It’s basically a proto-Backstreet Boys anthem for born-agains. There are the classic Prince deep cuts usually only cited by the apostles (“Willing and Able”) and sunny day guitar benedictions to individualism (“Walk Don’t Walk”). “Strollin” pairs George Benson jazz guitars to New Edition adolescent pop, and a story about two teens roller skating, eating ice cream, and buying porn. It’s weird. It’s Prince.
If you’ve heard OutKast’s “2 Dope Boyz (In a Cadillac),” you’ll recognize the extraterrestrial intro of “Live 4 Love (Last Words From the Cockpit”—an anti-gang space-rap exploration about what happened after he got kicked out of his house at 17. Even the afterthoughts betray a brilliant guitar riff, organ lick, or drum coda.
There is, of course, the title song—the twinkling locket-pop ballad that both Cam’ron and Lil Wayne eventually rapped over. One of those songs they’ll play at weddings until we stop using diamond engagement rings and the ocean runs out of pearls. It’s Prince at his best, blending dizzying romance with an undercurrent of danger. He opens up: “This will be the day/That you will hear me say/That I will never run away.” It’s a utopian promise he knows he can’t keep, an incantation he hopes will become true if he utters it out loud. “Love must be the master plan,” he says, echoing a clichéd sentiment that so many before him have uttered. But Prince had the gift of making you believe whatever he said.
As with all the greatest pop stars, Prince was a master at simplifying life’s most complicated emotions into catchphrases. He encompassed lust, jealousy, fear, spirituality, avarice, the impulse to run away, and the need to strip everything to its core—sometimes literally, sometimes figuratively. The man who believed in everlasting love died alone and childless, adored by almost the entire world. A song like “Diamonds and Pearls” illustrates why. For all the flamboyance and idiosyncrasy, Prince just wanted the same things as everyone else”.
In another review, the BBC noted how Diamonds and Pearls was a turning point that had more than its share of gems and jewels:
“Thankfully, Diamonds and Pearls reversed this decline. While it’s the first Prince LP to officially feature The New Power Generation, this has the feel of a solo record – the singer’s fantastic band would impress more significantly on 1992’s Love Symbol album. But if assessed as a solo affair, it’s absolutely Prince’s best since 1987’s double-LP masterpiece Sign O’ the Times (albeit not close to being in the same league). Diamonds and Pearls is equally scattershot of style, moving from bombastic rap to sultry funk via slick RnB and low-slung grooves. It’s probably best taken as a collection of standalone tracks rather than a conceived-as-a-whole experience, immediately distancing it from Lovesexy’s suite-style sequencing. And some of these standalones are double-thumbs-up winners.
Although it’s not the most immediate of those standouts, there’s no doubting Money Don’t Matter 2 Night is the heart and soul of this album. A slow-paced strut, the track’s a celebration of realising that hard cash isn’t the be all and end all of one’s existence – which might seem rich coming from a millionaire, but it’s delivered with such sincerity, the vocals imperfect but pure, that one can imagine Prince himself as the man one card away from 22, about to blow everything with a smile. At the other end of the spectrum, far away from real-world concerns, is Cream: quite simply a song about getting it on, and a brilliant one at that (apparently written by Prince while admiring himself in the mirror). More explicit is Gett Off, which borrows a line or two from James Brown but is undeniably Prince through and through, the aural equivalent of a sex pest you can’t help but take home.
Elsewhere, Daddy Pop updates the boisterous Partyman from the Batman soundtrack to fine effect; the title-track is a brilliant ballad recently sampled by Lil Wayne; and anthemic opener Thunder apparently refers, in its lyrics, to withdrawn 1987 LP The Black Album, a funk-fuelled disc eventually released to critical approval in 1994. The by-numbers rap efforts, Push and Jughead, are unmemorable (to be kind), but cut the fashion-following rather than trend-setting filler from Diamonds and Pearls and you’re left with a still-satisfying set of songs that stand up well to Prince’s very best. It’s no classic, but this album marked the vital revival of an artist who continues to fascinate”.
It is amazing to think it has been five years already since we received the shock news that Prince died. I think everyone in the music world was rocked. Whether you were a casual fan or considered yourself a diehard, it was a bolt from the blue that is still being felt! Among the many tribute articles and shows that we will read and hear this week, so many people will talk about a once-in-a-lifetime talent. From his staggering work-rate to his guitar brilliance to his amazingly varied voice, there is so much to love about Prince. He left us with so many terrific albums. Thanks to his famous Vault, we will get ‘new’ recordings from him for years. I wanted to talk about my favourite Prince album, as it really doesn’t get the love it deserves! We all have our choice Prince album, and I have reasons for loving Diamonds and Pearls. It may have some flaws, but I can spend a lot of time listening to the album over and over. Whilst some of his albums were not up to his classics, like Diamonds and Pearls, Prince’s albums were…
VERY rarely ordinary.