 |  | Prince is an under-rated concept artist |  |
Although segues between songs is nothing new in the world of CD's, I have never heard such an idea pulled off so well. The almost futuristic SFX and female voice-overs offer much to the atmosphere of this brilliant album. I could go on and on about the music, but I think everyone else has already done so. This is Prince at his artistic best.
September 15, 2008 | | Prince is one of the greatest | |
The Gold Experience is a cool album that I had a long time ago, but it broke. I tried to find it in stores but no one had it for sell and I heard it was out of print, so the years past and than I started ordering stuff on the internet and found it on amazon.com. I ordered it and now I am happy.
July 10, 2008"The Gold Experience" (1995) is an essential Prince recording that ranks favorably with "1999" and "Sign 'O' the Times." For 65 glorious minutes, His Royal Badness delivers one classic after another: "Endorphinmachine," "Shhh," "We March," "Shy," "Billy Jack B---h" and the transcendently brilliant "Dolphin." Though criminally out of print, this treasure trove of rock and soul belongs in every Prince collection.
May 23, 2008| | | (4.5 stars) Do yourself a favor and buy it | |
Despite earning lots of praise, this flopped badly, and is now quite out-of-print - I finally found it used, for nineteen dollars, which is more than I would normally pay for a new double-album, let alone a used single. But I gotta tell you, it was more than worth it. Oh, sure, it's nothing Prince hasn't done before, and I could've definitely done without the segues. But the songs are so freaking fantastic that those two complaints are insignificant. All Prince's usual trademarks are in attendance: hard-driving funk ("P. Control", with lyrics so explicit they're not in the lyrics booklet, "We March", "Now", "319"), ballads (the sweetly romantic single "Most Beautiful Girl in the World", which easily lives up to other ballads like "Adore" and "International Lover", the horny slow grind "Shhh", "I Hate U", with an admittedly pretentious monolog, the Messianic but brilliant "Gold", which would probably fit in my top 10-15 Prince songs), and wild rockers (the reincarnation-themed "Dolphin", "Endorphinmachine", Prince at his most intense since "The Beautiful Ones"). And I don't know where to place "Shy" (country-jazz, I guess), but I like it. Every song has something about it that really makes it wonderful: the screaming and driving beat of "Endorphinmachine", dazzling guitar soloing on "Shhh", "I Hate U", "Gold", and "Dolphin", genre-blending psychosis on "Shy", moving falsetto on "Most Beautiful Girl", a surprisingly engaging rap on "Now"... I could go on for ages. Hell, even the trivial "Billy Jack B*tch" has some pleasant horn playing, even though I find myself rapidly losing patience with whoever decided to shout "B*tch!" once a measure (because hearing any word repeated once every four beats for six minutes would probably drive you up the wall too). The lyrics are perhaps negligible, covering Prince's usual themes of individuality, spirituality, and (what else?) sex, but strictly judging by tune quality it's debatably Prince's best ever. Other than the segues. Does ANYONE like the segues?
February 25, 2008When I first heard all the chaos surrounding the Warner thing, I was worried it would affect him and the music. What was I thinking?! The man can't be stopped! Gold is one of his most original albums. I love the NPG Operator, he is so innovative and does not hesitate to try something outlandish and new. He has no fear when it comes to the creativity of his music. I was lucky enough to get a copy of a rare live version of Endorphine Machine, it was even more funky than the CD version! Eye Hate U is my favorite on this album and is currently pumping in my CD player right now. He always knows the right things to say. Everything he touches turns to GOLD! "Right now I hate you so much I wanna make love until you see..."
May 9, 2007More reviews at Amazon.com ...
(66 reviews)