Maps of Music

The Black Album (1989)

Where the lyrics of The Black Album take you, and where it was really made.

The album was withdrawn a week before its release, yet a small number of the roughly 500,000 copies already on loading docks escaped destruction and reached the bootleg market.

Key places

Recording at Paisley Park (1989)

Recording site Paisley Park Studios — The album's studio is listed as Paisley Park in Chanhassen, Minnesota. The point marks the studio at the building's own coordinates. Google Maps · Apple Maps

How to get there: See the map for directions.

Album story

Overview

• The Black Album: untitled sixteenth studio album by Prince
• Scheduled for release in December 1987, then withdrawn at Prince's request after promotional copies had been issued
• Officially released 22 November 1994 by Warner Bros. Records
• Follow-up to Sign o' the Times
• Dubbed The Funk Bible by earlier press releases and in the opening track
• Seen as a reaction to criticism that Prince had become too pop-oriented; an attempt to regain his black audience

Background

• Prince invoked Camille, the alter-ego behind his unreleased 1986 album Camille, as the guiding force behind the record
• Prince became convinced the album was 'evil' and ordered it withdrawn a week before its release date
• Replaced by Lovesexy, a brighter pop-oriented album with elements of religious affirmation
• Prince contacted Warner Bros. chairman Mo Ostin to request the withdrawal
• The record company had to destroy about 500,000 copies already on loading docks

Cover

• Entirely black sleeve with no title and no credit to Prince, hence the name The Black Album
• Promo copies printed only a song listing and catalog number 9 25677-1 on the disc
• Commercial version had the catalog number printed in pink on the spine only
• Original CD pressing made by Sony DADC rather than WEA Manufacturing

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

• Reactions to the 1987 promo release were largely positive
• Several celebrities, including U2's The Edge and Bono, named it one of their favorite albums of 1988 in a Rolling Stone magazine poll
• Robert Christgau in The Village Voice compared Prince's approach to George Clinton's 'sonic wallop and communal craziness'
• Christgau found the bassy murk never let up and recommended fans of heavy funk pressure local dealers over the scarce advance copies
• Jon Pareles of The New York Times wrote that the album answers the Beatles' White Album with Prince's own tour of black music styles

Reappraisal

• Retrospective reviews since the limited official release have been more mixed
• Select's Matt Hall panned it as 'the sound of someone losing step with the times' and criticized 'Dead on It' as an embarrassing rant against hip hop
• David Browne of Entertainment Weekly felt it had not aged well by 1994, though he praised 'Bob George' as spooky, scary and funny
• Stephen Thomas Erlewine of AllMusic judged it fun but not a lost masterwork, called 'When 2 R in Love' nondescript and praised the rest as pure funk

Records

• An original 1987 promo copy sold on Discogs' marketplace in April 2016 for a then-record US$15,000
• Five copies were discovered in the United States in 2017, one of which sold for US$42,298
• Another original copy found in Canada in June 2018 later sold on Discogs for US$25,000
• The official release was limited and deleted on January 27, 1995

Sources: en.wikipedia.org

Trivia

• Prince's withdrawal request came days before the planned December 1987 release, sent to Warner Bros. chairman Mo Ostin.
• A small number of the about 500,000 copies destroyed on loading docks escaped and became available on the bootleg market.
• Prince later referenced the withdrawal in the video for the Lovesexy lead single 'Alphabet St.', where a message scrolls down the screen.
• Samples of 'Bob George' later appeared on the 'Dub Beats' official promo mix of Madonna's 1989 single 'Like a Prayer'.
• A Billboard advertisement by Warner offered a free legal copy to the first 1,000 people who mailed in their bootleg copies.

Sources: en.wikipedia.org

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