Review: Prince's 3-CD set is wildly uneven

Review: Prince's 3-CD set is wildly uneven

By JOSH L. DICKEY, AP Entertainment Writer Josh L. Dickey, Ap Entertainment Writer

Prince, "LOtUSFLOW3R"

Of the 31 tracks on Prince's new three-CD fire sale, only a handful will glint in the eyes of loyal fans who still sift his newer material for rare gems. To those awaiting a free sample on the radio, sorry you aren't going to get one this time around, either.

It's been 15 years since a Prince single cracked the Top 10 ("The Most Beautiful Girl in the World" charted No. 3 in 1994), and nothing from these three discs sounds in danger of breaking that streak.

The rare die-hard who understood "The Rainbow Children," Prince's wildly conceptual Jehova's Witnesses manifesto from 2001, may be able to translate the shifting language of "LOtUSFLOW3R," the central record in this effort. It's heavy and esoteric at times, jaunty and jammy at times, and highly indulgent all the time.

Thing is, if you're going to listen to someone indulge themselves in genre-bending psychedelia, it may as well be this guy.

The best track is "Boom," with its melody that descends like a dazzling meteor shower, ponderous slabs of wet bass crashing all around and light saber-buzz guitar to slice through it all. The song embodies the dark yet delicate surrealism of the new fan site that Prince helped design, lotusflow3r.com, from which "members" can download all three albums as part of a $77 annual subscription fee beginning Tuesday.

The deal includes a T-shirt, dibs on concert tickets, access to a vast archive of concert video footage and other digital geek-out goodies. (The three-CD set is being sold in its physical form exclusively at Target for a much more earthly $11.98.)

On another guitar-heavy highlight, "Dreamer," Prince unabashedly echoes Jimi Hendrix's "Voodoo Child" in fact, the better part of "LOtUSFLOW3R" careens around the edges of the bluesy, spacey trail that Jimi blazed. But its unevenness is its undoing; weird mumbling, random atmospherics, dissonant touches and an unnecessary cover of "Crimson and Clover" punch gaping holes in the cosmic seriousness with which the record takes itself.

Thank goodness, then, for "MPLSoUND," much of which may be the artist's greatest gift to fans in many years.

The disc starts out as an old-school romp that sounds as if Prince rolled up the rusted door of a warehouse behind Paisley Park, surveyed the dusty, vintage synth gear, and said to the posse behind him: "Fellas, let's make a funky record today."

The first few tracks could almost be mistaken for "Controversy" outtakes: You'll recognize the dry, flat pop of primitive electronic drums, campy whirl of analog keyboards and wild-eyed vocal stylings that ground an edge on Prince's early stuff. But sure enough, even "MPLSoUND" gets bogged down in throwaway slow-jams and shuffles that suck nearly all the fun energy from a promisingly rowdy start.

A third CD, entirely sung by new protege Bria Valente, is so lifeless and irrelevant as to hardly merit mention here. "Elixer" is a wholly forgettable trudge through generic R&B plodders that would drag down the most dynamic of singers; and Valente is not one. Her breathy whispers and naughty good looks, for that matter are more reminiscent of Ashley Alexandra Dupre than Apollonia.

The good news is that at $11.98 for all three, you can afford to rip the good tracks from "LOtUSFLOW3R" and "MPLSoUND" to your iPod, then use "Elixer" as a mirror to work on your air-guitar face. Because you're going to need it.