Publication: The San Diego Union-Tribune [US]
Date: March 30, 1987
Section: Lifestyle; Ed. 1,2,3,4,5,6
Page Number(S): C-1
Length: 1074 Words
Title: "Prince's New Lp A Big Deal"
Written By: Divina Infusino

Prince is a musical card shark who has been been dealt an especially largby fate. invented.

During his nine-year recording career, Prince has revealed these influences the way a gambler plucks cards from a deck, ever-ready with a draw that ups the ante. He has played stark funk on "Dirty Mind," and "Controversy," rock guitar and gospel on "Purple Rain," psychedelia on "Around the World in a Day," jazz fusion on "Parade" and '60s soul and blues balladry on individual songs such as "Why Don't U Call Me Anymore?" and "International Lover."

His top card, however, has always been his song craftsmanship coupled with his often-copied synthesized pop-funk, a la "Little Red Corvette," "When You Were Mine," "When Doves Cry" and "Kiss." He has conjured some witty, imaginative arrangements and a persona mysterious and controversial enough to challenge Greta Garbo. But his ability to hang it all on a catchy pop hook and a dance imperative has always been his ace.

On his new album, "Sign O' the Times," Prince lays all his cards on the table, shuffles them brilliantly and comes up with a winner.

In many ways, this 16-cut double album is a culimination of all Prince has done before. But, as with each Prince album, "Sign O' the Times" shows new growth for him as a musician and human being.

After the guardedly received 1985 psychedelic fantasy of sin and redemption, "Around the World in a Day," and last year's sound track to his film bomb, "Under the Cherry Moon," Prince's challenge was clear: Experiment as always, but without lapsing into the self-indulgence that rendered his two previous LPs generally incomprehensible to his younger audience. Prince also faces more competitors this year than in the past, including his arch rival, Michael Jackson, whose new album is due later this year.

To regain his commercial footing, Prince returned to familiar ground, recording mostly alone and anchoring the album with hip-swaying anthems, ready-made for the disco floor. creatively twisted and sprinkled with odd juxtapositions that not only surprise but unify the album's stylistic and thematic diversity. In an era of singles, each cut on "Sign O' the Times" resonates off the other to form a whole.

Let's take it blow by blow.

"Sign O' the Times," the album's first cut and single, is a moody, bleak account of drug-related crime, poverty and even the Challenger space disaster. Prince unfolds his disjointed narrative to pingponging rhythms and edgy guitar jolts. The song has the harsh, sparse atmosphere.

With "Play in the Sunshine," the album swings to an enjoy-yourself-before-it's-too-late dance frenzy. This disco-ready cut comes compete with instructions for the light man to "turn the lights up 2 10." It's driven by equal parts funk and rockabilly, peaking with rock guitar bursts and call and response vocal chants. The ending -- a wistful fade out of dreamy voices -- prepares the listener for the down 'n' dirty James Brown funk of "Housequake," which maintains the dance pace.

Next comes the calm after the storm, "The Ballad of Dorothy Parker." A blues-jazz midtempo number blatantly derived from Sly Stone's "There's a Riot Goin' On" phase, the song chronicles a brief romantic encounter with a waitress of mystery. It's Prince's version of "Norwegian Wood," and sets a lyrically ambiguous tone for the LP's later explorations of relationships.

It" is more funk, but this time Prince hammers on one of his favorite topics -- sex. The song builds with weird, almost otherwordly effects, with several voices simultaneously singing the same lyrics in different melodies.

This sex obsession doesn't last long. With an alarm clock ring, Prince jumps to "Starfish and Coffee," the charming tale of young Cynthia Rose, who claimed to start each day with "starfish and coffee, maple syrup and jam, butterscotch clouds, a tangerine, and a side order of ham." marriage proposal, "Forever in Life."

Emotional commitment is new territory for Prince as are most of the emotional questions he poses on side three, probably the best of the album. It begins with the hot "U Got The Look." Prince teams with Sheena Easton on this hit-bound, hummable toe-tapper. It ends however, with chords from "The Wedding March," bracing the listener for one of the LP's most provocative and probably controversial songs, "If I Was Your Girlfriend."

Prince has toyed with gender-bending in the past. But on this song, he begs to break not so much sexual, but emotional rules: "If I was your girlfriend would u remember 2 tell me all the things u forgot when I was your man?"

The song snakes alone relatively unadorned, except for well-placed off-key notes, and reaches a crescendo with a spoken plea that could rile parents groups. Still, the song is less about sex than about breaking down barriers in a love relationship. And it's one of the album's best.

From exploring social roles in an haunting musical setting, Prince goes on to muse about a love-hate relationship to the bouncy pop of "Strange Relationship." The album's relationship theme peaks, however, with "I Could Never Take the Place of Your Man." With its Ringo Star-like drums, wonderfully infectious song structure, loving lyrical honesty and inviting but innovative jazzy arrangement at the end, this song is a gem, an example of how Prince has grown in musical and lyrical insight.

"I Could Never Take the Place of Your Man" is musically bright like '60s pop, but lyrically sad and worldwise as only the '80s can be. This juxtaposition readies us for "The Cross," a psychedelic hymn of spiritual salvation, complete with sitarlike sounds and playful acoustic guitars. This sudden stylistic turn makes unusual but stunning musical sense given its position within the album. It's the kind of move that was once routine in the experimental late '60s. But for today, "The Cross" is a shock, drawing the album to a moving climax.

For the finale, Prince turns around the mood with the dance ode, "It's Gonna be a Beautiful Night," the only live cut, recorded at Le Zenith in Paris. He ends with "Adore," an Earth, Wind and Fire-like love song. romantic, so in love, so vulnerable. But it becomes him.

True, "Sign O' the Times," won't push pop music onto a new plateau, as "1999" and "Purple Rain" did. But Prince is still one of today's most accomplished musical gamblers, playing his cards with renewed mastery.