Prince's Best Work As An Artist Compositionally But Too Bad About the MLPS!

Prince seems to have decided to move up the ladder of Maslow's hierachy of needs pyramid to tackle issues other than just the primal baser instincts and as a result shows himself an artist to be taken seriously. Although some siliness is still evident on tracks like "Housequake" and "If I Was Your Girlfriend" other tracks like the title track, "U Got the Look" and "The Cross" show an artist with depth to go along with his undoubted musical and compositional talent. The tracks do not flow as well as say on "Purple Rain" but like another very good double album the Beatles' "White Album" the disjointedness seems to work in an ironic and unexpected way and similar to other classic albums, you feel you can only truly appreciate the album if you sit through and listen to all the tracks at one go. I get the feeling that I'm listening to one entire track and not the 16 individual tracks that make up this album.

Too bad this mini-lp replica sleeve (mlps) version couldn't equal the content in terms of quality though as the SHM-CD treatment of using a allegedly better reflective plastic material does little to improve the sound quality over previous releases. The mlps design too is a disappointment coming in thin, poor quality cardboard that is flimsily assembled looking like it will come apart easily once the glue gets old. There is a small heart-shaped sticker included though which is nice, 2 inner sleeves that replicate the original vinyl release and a 28-page booklet containing all the lyrics in both English and Japanese.

No noticeable improvement in sound quality and a mediocre mlps design and assembly makes this certainly not good value for money and hence not recommended.