Maps of Music

Love Symbol (1992)

Where the lyrics of Love Symbol take you, and where it was really made.

The official title is a symbol nobody can pronounce, and Prince used it as his own stage name from 1993 to 2000.

Key places

Paisley Park Studios (1992)

Recording site Paisley Park Studios — Listed as the place where this album was recorded. The mix was also done at the same studio complex. Google Maps · Apple Maps

How to get there: See the map for directions.

Album story

Overview

• Love Symbol: fourteenth studio album by American recording artist Prince
• Second of two albums featuring his backing band, the New Power Generation
• Released October 13, 1992 by Paisley Park Records and Warner Bros. Records
• Originally conceived as a 'fantasy rock soap opera' with various spoken segues throughout
• Mixes elements of R&B, funk, pop, rock, and soul
• Official title is an unpronounceable symbol depicted on the cover art

Background

• Prince copyrighted the symbol under the title 'Love Symbol #2'
• He adopted the symbol as his stage name from 1993 to 2000 to protest his treatment by Warner Bros. Records
• Warner Bros. had refused to steadily release his back catalog of unreleased music
• An early configuration contained as many as eight segues and an introduction setting the scene of his self-proclaimed 'rock opera'
• Storyline: an Egyptian princess falls in love with a rock star and entrusts him with the Three Chains of Turin
• Mayte Garcia played the Egyptian princess, in her debut on a Prince album
• 'I Wanna Melt with U' was added at the last minute, forcing Prince to cut many of the segues
• The remaining segues are somewhat confusing without the cut connective material
• Unreleased segues have long been available among fans
• In 1994 Prince released 3 Chains o' Gold, a direct-to-video film with songs from the album and a similar storyline

Recording

• Kirstie Alley voices reporter Vanessa Bartholomew in the segues
• In these segues she tries to interview the elusive rock star and fails when he hangs up after she tells him he is being recorded
• In a later segue Prince toys with her by answering with purposefully vague, nonsensical responses

Cover

• The cover art shows the unpronounceable symbol that serves as the official title

Sources: en.wikipedia.org

Tracklist

Sources: musicbrainz.org

Artist

Formation

• Prince Rogers Nelson, born June 7, 1958 in Minneapolis, Minnesota; died April 21, 2016 at Paisley Park in Chanhassen, Minnesota.
• Signed with Warner Bros. Records in 1977 at age 18; first album For You released April 7, 1978.
• Career spanned funk, rock, R&B and pop, with estimated sales over 100 million records.

Career

• Breakthrough with Dirty Mind (1980), Controversy (1981) and 1999 (1982).
• Purple Rain (1984) made him the first singer to hold the number-one film, album and single in the US at the same time.
• Sign o' the Times (1987) is widely considered his greatest work.
• Changed his name to an unpronounceable symbol in 1993, becoming known as the Artist Formerly Known as Prince; reverted to Prince in 2000.
• Won seven Grammy Awards and an Academy Award for Best Original Song Score.
• Inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2004.

Sources: en.wikipedia.org

Reception

At release

• Pazz & Jop: voted the 14th best record of 1992 in the annual poll of American critics published by The Village Voice
• Poll is an annual survey of American critics nationwide
• Critics' poll placed the album among the top records of the year

Reappraisal

• Robert Christgau, creator of the Pazz & Jop poll, later wrote about the album
• Christgau: designed to prove Prince's utter inexhaustibility after Diamonds and Pearls
• Christgau: his best-selling album since Purple Rain, by some stroke of commerce
• Christgau called the 'rock soap opera' label absurd and asked whether Prince was serious
• Christgau: the album mainly proves that he has the funk

Records

• 'Sexy MF' maxi-single: No. 66 US, No. 76 US R&B, No. 4 UK
• 'My Name Is Prince' maxi-single: No. 36 US, No. 25 US R&B, No. 7 UK
• The first two singles achieved modest success on the US pop chart, though both reached the UK top ten
• '7' maxi-single: No. 7 US, No. 3 US R&B, No. 27 UK
• '7' was less successful in the UK but a top ten hit in the United States
• 'Damn U': No. 105 US, No. 32 US R&B
• 'The Morning Papers' maxi-single: No. 44 US, No. 8 US R&B, No. 52 UK

Sources: en.wikipedia.org

Trivia

• Kirstie Alley voices reporter Vanessa Bartholomew, whose interview attempt fails when Prince hangs up after learning he is being recorded
• A few lines in which Vanessa asks about the Three Chains of Turin were edited from the final sequence provided for mastering and release
• Fans commonly transliterate the official symbol as 'Eye', since it stands for every use of the pronoun 'I' in the titles and liner notes
• Early pressings had an embossed gold love symbol on the jewel case, sometimes matte and sometimes glossy
• A Special Limited Edition Gold Box CD had a purple love symbol engraved in the golden box

Sources: en.wikipedia.org

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