Prince - Originals (2019) [Official Digital Download 24/96]

This June, The Prince Estate, in partnership with Warner Bros. Records will release Originals, a 15-track album featuring 14 previously unreleased recordings that illuminate the vital role Prince played in other artists’ careers.

Prince will forever be remembered as a commanding live performer, chart-topping recording artist, and music business revolutionary. Yet for all the time he spent in the spotlight over his four-decade-long career, Prince also worked tirelessly behind the scenes to nurture talent and pen songs for the rising artists he respected.

By the mid-1980s, Prince was dominating the charts even as a writer/producer with songs he’d composed and recorded for others. In addition to releasing nine of his most commercially successful full-length albums, he also wrote and recorded endless reels of material for protégés The Time, Vanity 6, Sheila E., Apollonia 6, Jill Jones, the Family, and Mazarati. Occasionally, Prince’s original demo recordings would be used as master takes on their albums, with only minor alterations to the instrumentation and a replacement of the vocal tracks. Other times, artists would rely on his demos to guide them through their own recording process, with Prince’s initial take informing their final version of his song. The aggregate effect was a complete saturation and transformation of the pop music landscape, with Prince both leading and subverting mainstream culture.

Originals pulls back the curtain to reveal the origins of familiar hits, in addition to deeper album cuts such as Vanity 6’s “Make-Up,” Jill Jones’s “Baby, You’re a Trip,” and Kenny Rogers’ “You’re My Love.” The album also features Prince’s majestic original 1984 version of “Nothing Compares 2 U,” released in 2018 as a standalone single.

Tracklist:
1. Sex Shooter
2. Jungle Love
3. Manic Monday
4. Noon Rendezvous
5. Make-Up
6. 100 Mph
7. You're My Love
8. Holly Rock
9. Baby, You're a Trip
10. The Glamorous Life
11. Gigolos Get Lonely Too
12. Love… Thy Will Be Done
13. Dear Michaelangelo
14. Wouldn't You Love to Love Me?
15. Nothing Compares 2 U

Digitally remastered