Jan 86 Early 1986 : !
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Apr 8601-04-1986 : Washington Post Prince Of All Trades ; Craft and Clutter on His 'Parade' By Richard Harrington The pretty good news : "Parade," the new album by Prince and the Revolution, hit the stores yesterday. The not-quite-bad news : It's at best a mixed bag, with only a few truly memorable moments. After the badly received neo-psychedelic expansions of last year's "Around the World in a Day," many old-line Prince fans must have been hoping that his hot new single, "Kiss," presaged a return to the funky dance floor esthetic of albums like "Dirty Mind" and "1999." So must his label, which sold only 3 million copies of "World" after moving more than 10 million copies of the sound track to "Purple Rain." Both fans and label will undoubtedly get some satisfaction from the Minneapolis wunderkind's new effort (Warner Bros. 1-25395). But, despite the rekindling of Prince's seductive falsetto on a number of tunes, the album is neither the all-out return to R&B roots that some were predicting nor a steaming rock and funk express like "Purple Rain." There's nary a guitar solo to be heard on "Parade," but there is much to delve into. Slowly. The album is the sound track to Prince's new film, the self-directed "Under the Cherry Moon" (due in July), so there's a good chance these songs will start making sense once we have an explication de texte. But where the material on "Purple Rain" stood quite effectively alone (though several songs gained immensely in affective power with context), the 12 cuts here seem not simply diverse but curiously unrelated, as if they were more the proof of Prince's continually expanding palette than of his singular vision. There are '70s funk, '60s psychedelic collage, '50s cinema music, confessional ballads and maudlin cabaret tunes appropriate to the film's French setting. But outside of "Kiss," there's nothing on "Parade" that instantly grabs the listener's attention. There are a number of unsettling moments, mostly musical moods. Lyrically, there is none of the tension between spiritual and sexual compulsions that has marked so much of Prince's previous work. There is some minor erotica, some pulsating sensuality, but it's as if Prince is following up the idea that closed his last album : "Love is more important than sex." The new album kicks off with "Christopher Tracy's Parade" (named after the character Prince plays in the film, it is one of two songs cowritten with his father John L. Nelson). A Beatlesque collage that falls between the brilliance of "Sgt. Pepper" and the indulgence of "Magical Mystery Tour, " it's one of several cuts that are just too busy, too cluttered musically. Over the course of eight albums, Prince has restlessly explored any and all musics ; his is very much a multifaceted musical sensibility. But his assimilations and expansions used to be clearer; increasingly, on record at least, they seem muddled. It's as if George Martin, Gil Evans and Phil Spector all had a shot at producing parts of "Parade," and no one gave anybody else the last word. A similar clutter affects "I Wonder U" ; its disquieting muffled bass lines, muted trumpets, flute accents and edgy melody don't seem to lead anywhere. In terms of lyrics, there seems to be no middle ground on the album between the cryptic ("Christopher Tracy's Parade") and the explicit ("New Position"). The latter song is an obvious sex ditty that builds on 30 years of rock innuendo yet still seems curiously tame compared with ye olde Prince repertoire. In terms of craft and production, "Kiss" is the most compelling cut on "Parade." Like "When Doves Cry," it is sparse, stripped down to basics with nothing but sharp percussion and brittle guitar behind Prince's celebration of his own raging libido. At least when divorced from its fairly lewd video, "Kiss" is exciting and funny ("Act your age, not your shoe size"), a sexy, sly funk workout that dares you to resist it. There are several other cuts with falsetto vocals and dance floor appeal. "Anotherloverholenyohead" is sassy and clever in a Stevie Wonder manner, with a killer hook and irresistible rhythms. But despite their steady grooves, "Life Can Be So Nice" and "Mountains" are plodding, rhythmically busy throwaways that suffer from Prince's major weakness, a tendency to resort to naive, cliche'd lyrics ("love will conquer if you just believe"). On the other hand, "Girls and Boys" is sly and supple in the manner of "I Wanna Be Your Lover," a song with a wink, a honking baritone sax and a hilarious "French seduction" passage that will remind no one of Jane Birkin's "Je t'Aime (Moi Non Plus)." There are other continental flavors on "Parade." The languid "Under the Cherry Moon" suggests Jacques Brel melancholy and Brecht/Weill irony in a decadent cabaret setting, with Prince actually crooning, melodramatically, "If nobody kills me or thrills me soon/I'll die in your arms under the cherry moon." And with its accordion washes and relatively clever lyrics, "Do U Lie ?" is part chanson, part vaudeville, positing Prince as the new Maurice Chevalier. Can't wait to see the video. "Venus de Milo" is pretty (and pretty slight), half New Age, half neo-romantic incidental music. It anticipates the most intriguing song on "Parade," the elegiac, introspective "Sometimes It Snows in April." This song, which closes the album, is a remembrance of Christopher Tracy with mystic/religious implications that may or may not be explained by the movie. Unlike in the rest of the album, Prince's voice here is mixed right on top of very simple acoustic piano and guitar. That yearning voice is immensely vulnerable, the melody haunting and the lyrics bittersweet ; one suspects that "April" is the kind of ballad Prince is only now beginning to master. "How can I stand to stay where I am," he sings on "Under the Cherry Moon." It's a line that applies to much of this album. 02-04-1986 : San Diego Union-Tribune Intriguing New Album May Not Boost Prince's Career By Davina Infusino Prince is a musical genius. Even his detractors admit that. But every hero must fall, it seems. The question is : What will it take to get Prince on his feet again ? The musical ingeniousness of his new album "Parade" may not be enough. Not enough for the Minneapolis loner who defied music-business conventions and set up an outpost musical empire away from the industry centers of Los Angeles and New York.... For the black man who ventured into white rock territory, shuffling gender roles along the way, mixing musical styles, and ignoring the boundaries between black and white social mores, sex and spiritualism, artistic risk and commercial appeal. For the singer who reached dizzying popularity with his 1984 album and film, "Purple Rain," then froze in fright at the height, becoming paranoid and withdrawn. For the star whose overzealous bodyguards beaned photographers on the same night that he didn't show up for the "We Are The World" recording sessions. Never mind that Prince performed a string of unpublicized concerts for handicapped kids or donated $500,000 to an inner-city teacher-training program in Chicago. Prince was branded as a cold-hearted, egomaniac misogynist, (despite being an artistic mentor to Sheila E.). In 1985, he released the LP "Around the World in a Day," a sometimes self-indulgent, psychedelic pastiche tracing a loss of innocence, repentance and redemption. The clash between his arrogant image and fanciful album rubbed the public the wrong way. Then came word about his film in France, "Under the Cherry Moon," where he fired the director and took over the production. Now the music from the film arrives on "Parade." Beatles-esque psychedelia once again plays a part in the music here, particularly on the opening Sgt. Pepper-like montage of "Christopher Tracy's Parade" and in the Indian intonations that dot several cuts. But the album's greatest source of inspiration is jazz — from contrapunctal melody lines to contrasting instrumental textures, to interspersed jazz chord progressions. Prince always has dabbled with jazz-related techniques in a pop context, even on his big pop hit, "Little Red Corvette." But this time, perhaps due to the influence of his father, John L. Nelson, a jazz performer who collaborated with his son on parts of the album, the jazz influence is overt. Songs like "Sometimes it Snows in April" and "I Wonder U" have the loose floating melodies of jazz rather than tight structures of his pop and funk material. The album contains plenty of the latter, however, like the hip-swinging "Girls and Boys." It also has what might best be described as movie music like "Do U Lie," complete with French dialogue, violins and an old-fashioned, fanciful Broadway musical sound that Prince twists with odd harmonies and instrumental surprises. The album also boasts the wonderful homage to the power of musical minimalism, that catchy, compelling single "Kiss." Except for "New Position," the lyrics, by the way, have few of the sexual references that got Prince in so much trouble with the Washington-based censors last summer (unless there's some untranslated suggestiveness in the French dialogue). Even if "Parade" makes more sense after the film's release July 2, the album alone at least is unlikely to redeem him completely in the public's eyes. It lacks the mass appeal of "Purple Rain," and no doubt some of the music will fly above portions of his teen audience. Others may mistake the experimentation for artistic narcissism. But "Parade" is one of the most intriguing albums in a long time, revealing new subtleties with every listening and still new dimensions of this pop enigma named Prince. 04-1986 : ♫ Parade Tour Rehearsal (Boston 03-04 ?) (1:24) (A : The Parade Era Rehearsal Sessions – 7/10) Around The World In A Day / Christopher Tracy’s Parade / New Position / I Wonder U / Raspberry Beret / Alexa De Paris / Controversy Mutiny / Dream Factory / Anotherloverholenyohead / How Much Is That Doggy In The Window / Automatic / DMSR / The Dance Electric Under The Cherry Moon / Pop Life / Girls & Boys / Life Can Be So Nice / Purple Rain / A Love Bizarre / Kiss / Mountains
Manic Monday (Extended California) (4:59) The Australian 12” vinyl release contains a remix extended version of Manic Monday, dubbed Extended California version. 
Unknown newspaper Sue’s a surefire hit with Prince ! Sultry singer Susanna Hoffs is the new pop princess in the life of rock king Prince. She is one of The Bangles, the four-girl group he has taken to the top by writing their hit Manic Monday, now Number Three in the charts. Prince is trailing behind them in the hit parade – he is at six with Kiss – and he has been trailing backstage after Bangles concerts, to take Susanna out on the town. 03-04-1986 : ♫ Boston Metro (2:13) * Attendance : 1.250 / Sold Out / Tick. Price : $12.50 (A : Boston People Know How To Rock – 7/10)
New Position / I Wonder U / Raspberry Beret / Alexa De Paris Controversy / Mutiny (Incl. Dream Factory) How Much Is That Doggie In The Window ? / Lady Cab Driver Automatic / DMSR / The Dance Electric / Under The Cherry Moon Anotherloverholenyohead / Soft & Wet / I Wanna Be Your Lover / Head Pop Life / Girls & Boys / Life Can Be So Nice / Purple Rain Whole Lotta Shakin’ Goin’ On / A Love Bizarre (Incl. Holly Rock) America / Kiss (Extended) / Love Or $ (Incl. Ain’t It Funky Now) Local radio station WBCN announced the Metro concert at 11 a.m. on the day of the show, and the 1.200 tickets were sold out 20 minutes later. Outside the club, people were offered $300 or more for their tickets. Plans for the show were set in motion when Boston concert promoter Don Law received a call from Steve Fargnoli asking if Prince could play the Metro two days later. The venue was chosen because of Prince's fondness for the club, having played there in 1981 (when it was called The Channel). The Metro show was pretty tame compared to Minneapolis and the later San Francisco show. Containing less improvisation and joking around, it was a tight, disciplined show. The concert saw the debut of the "Lady Cab Driver" / "Automatic" / "D.M.S.R” medley, (preceded by “How Much ls That Doggie In The Window ?”) while “Paisley Park" and "Mountains," played during the First Avenue concert, were left out. Jim Sullivan, reporting for Rolling Stone felt the show “emphasizes music, not spectacle,” while The Phoenix’s Milo Miles thought the show “recalled a propulsive revue much more than the psychedelic soundscape Prince offered at the Worcester Centrum last year." Returning to the stage after "I Wonder U,“ Prince said, “That was Wendy. Do you like Wendy ? Do you Iike me? I like you too. That's why we're gonna play everything we know tonight, all of it. I'm feeling awfully good. You know why ? It's because of you. Here's a song you might know..." As usual, the audience took part in "Raspberry Beret.” Towards the end of the song, Prince asked Jerome if he could tell her about "this girl I met. Can I talk to you ? Let me tell you some good lies. She’s about this tall, about your complexion. She's a little heavy, though, a little heavy, but I like her. You know her name, don't ya ? Your mama." "Can I just say something right here ?" Prince asked during the backing singers chant of "St. Paul, punk of the month” during “Mutiny.” “Can I just say something ? Man I hate to brag, but we’re the funkiest hand of all time !“ "Mutiny" turned into an extended jam, with a repeated chant of "Ain't nobody fuck with us”. Prince changed the intro to "The Dance Electric.“ “Good morning, Jerome, look out your window. The world is falling.“ The song contained few lyrics, turning into a lengthy guitar solo instead. "I hate rock and roll," Prince said emphatically after “I Wanna Be Your Lover." He joked with Jerome during "Head,” asking if he was from The Time. “No, I'm from The Family,” Jerome replied. Prince then asked if Morris was in the audience “ls Morris out there ? No, that's a girl." He proceeded to teach Jerome how to make a wooden leg out of the oak tree. "Sometimes It Snows In April, y'all," Prince said over the intro of “Purple Rain.” "I'm glad to back. This time I'm gonna stay.” A playful version of "A Love Bizarre” left plenty of room for Eric Leeds' saxophone improvisations. A chant of "Boston people know how to holly rock" was repealed during the song. “Alright, Boni, let's see how funky you are.” Prince said before leading the crowd in a chant of "Let's dance, let's shout, getting funky is what it’s all about“ during "America." Previously circulating on the fan release 'Boston', this is the first Hit & Run show following on from the First Avenue showcase of new "Parade" material the previous month. The previous recording was woeful and was plagued by sound problems, wavering and drop-outs making it really rather unappealing. This is the exact same audience recording, however it appears to be a better generation copy and whilst some of the previous problems also affect this release, they are not as severe or detrimental. In saying that, anyone looking for a clean, stellar quality recording should look elsewhere as this certainly is not that. Whilst nowhere near as subdued, dull or heavy as the previous release, this is still a distinctly average recording for 1986, but in its favour the show itself is vastly more audible and there are no problems with actually hearing the show - again, a major problem previously. The drop-outs throughout the previous release also feature here and are most noticeable on 'Head', 'Purple Rain' and 'America', however they are far smoother here. Perhaps one too many problems for this release to appeal to the majority, however anyone with the previous release should hear a noticeable improvement. The frustrations of the recording lie with the fact the show is so loose and fun. The material is new to the crowd ("Parade" only being released a few days prior to this show), but they are enthusiastic and appear to participate throughout. As the Hit & Run shows are still in their infancy, the show contains many portions which were dropped as the shows moved along, and eventually morphed into the Parade tour. The opening 'Around The World In A Day' is far lengthier, as is the version of 'Raspberry Beret', which is almost full length. 'Alexa De Paris' and 'The Dance Electric' are still in the set-list, however guitar problems appear to affect both performances, with Atlanta Bliss getting some extended solo-time on the latter. Prince makes a few comments during the show regarding Sheila E being in attendance and dedicates 'A Love Bizarre' to her, which as usual contains the additional chant of 'Holly Rock'. 'America' begins with a guitar solo reminiscent of 'Let's Go Crazy', is a lengthy 13 minutes and includes a ferocious extended drum solo (Prince ?) towards the end, and is followed by the extended 12" version of 'Kiss'. The show is brought to an end with a very rare, although straightforward performance of 'Love Or $'. I like this release because I like this show, however it's perfectly understandable that it won't be to everyone's taste due to the sound issues throughout. It is an improvement over a previously circulating release, and even with the problems it suffers from, it's still much better than before.  
There was much discussion between Prince and his managers about whether or not they went on tour in the United States. His managers state that an extensive tour might overexpose him due to the short time since the Purple Rain tour. On the other hand, Prince wanted a simple tour, a sort of anti-tour, and he wanted to prove his credit in funk and R&B with his new music and band. 03-04-1986 : Cashbox 05-04-1986 : Billboard Chart beat By Paul Grein Prince & The Revolution are headed for another three-way N°1 hit, as Kiss jumps to N°1 on the black chart and to N°3 on the pop and dance/disco club play charts. Prince topped all three surveys with two 1984 smashes, When Doves Cry and Let’s Go Crazy. Kiss is Prince’s fourth N°1 black hit. The single and his two triple-crown winners from Purple Rain were preceded by 1979’s I Wanna Be Your Lover. Kiss also moves up to N°1 on the pop, black, and club play charts. As a writer, Prince has a second hit in the top 10 on this week’s pop chart. The Bangles’ Manic Monday, which he wrote under the pseudonym Christopher, jumps four notches to N°7.
Prince had his fans scrambling in Boston earlier this week with another of his semi-surprise concerts. The 1,250 tickets for the show sold out in 30 minutes. People were paying up to $300 for the tickets (face value: $12.50) to the Metro dance club, which was informed that Prince wanted to play there 48 hours earlier. Hundreds of people milled outside the club, and things became so congested that police were forced to close Lansdowne Street. 07 to 16-04-1986 : Mountains promo shooting (Nice) 
Prince heads back to Nice, France, to film a promo video for "Mountains" (shot on April 13). A few transitional scenes for Under The Cherry Moon were also filmed. The band flight back to MPLS on April 12, but Prince stays for one more week. 08-04-1986 : Sheila E – Countdown shooting (aired 03-05) Bussum, The Netherlands – Concordia Studios [TV] Countdown : “Holly Rock” & “A Love Bizarre” (TV air date : May 3 '86, Veronica, Nederland 2) 09-04-1986 : ! Sheila E @ 1,2,3 Show (NL – KRO) A Love Bizarre ??-??-1986 : Unknown newspaper Purple panic Chaos was created recently when Prince showed up to play an unannounced concert at the Metro Club in Boston. It seems a local radio station heard about the impromptu show several hours before it was to begin and gave the info over the air. The club’s box office was mobbed and the crowds went crazy. Some scalpers were even getting $300 for $12.50 tickets. When Prince did step onto the stage before the wild audience, he was not only with the regular members of The Revolution but he also had six new musicians with him. One of the new additions, Jerome Benton, was in Purple Rain and co-stars in Prince’s latest movie, Under The Cherry Moon. The Revolution barrelled through a two-and-a-half hour set, with The Purple One jumping into the audience from time to time. And who was sitting in the middle of all those fans ? Sheila E. 10-04-1986 : Scene
(aired 12-04) Saarbrücken, Germany – Saarlandhalle [TV] Wetten Daß..ZDF : “A Love Bizarre" (TV air date : Apr. 12 '86) 11-04-1986 : Chicago Tribune Prince Back In Groove, For the Most Part By Daniel Brogan Relax. "Around the World in a Day" was a fluke. Not that "Parade" is on a par with "1999" or "Controversy." "Parade" opens with three bombs and closes with the unbelievably lame "Sometimes It Snows in April." But beginning with "Under the Cherry Moon," Prince kicks into a lean, cool groove. "Kiss" will surely be every bit as big a monster as "When Doves Cry," and tracks like "Girls and Boys" and "Anotherloverholenyohead" will be party tape staples for years to come. And judging from the unprecedented amount of credit he gives to collaborators (especially band members Lisa Coleman and Wendy Melvoin), Prince's ego may slowly be coming back to Earth. As on 1980's "Dirty Mind," though, the incessant falsetto gets real old real fast. 12-04-1986 : NME Sometimes it pisses down in April I took 'Kiss' as a signal that we were being ushered back into the compressed, airtight funkworld of 'Dirty Mind'. Didn't flip over the song itself - slick metronome sexgospel - but what a relief to hear that funky, flecked, flicking guitar again. It turns out we're not going back to that springy, spunky sound after all - 'Kiss' is on its own as a throwback to 'Head' and 'Party Up' and 'Do It All Night'. Not that Prince doesn't still have a filthy little mind, of course, just that these days he doesn't speak it quite so economically. It's all mixed he doesn't really know how to express, and that's become a drag. A few things have changed since 'Around The World In A Day', it's true. For starters, there are no printed lyrics, so i don't have to pretend to have given his twee and icky poems my most careful consideration. Then for seconds there's no purple or paisley stuff on the sleeve - just plain ol' black and white narcissism (another throwback to 'Dirty Mind'). Most important, Prince isn't being such a sourpuss primadonna anymore. There I was thinking the little mulatto Amadeus was on the edge of a breakdown and suddenly he's all happy and relaxed and flirty in the 'Kiss' video. Trouble is, i actually think 'Around The World In A Day' was the better record. For all its neo-psychedelic silliness it had three great songs, which is about three more than 'Parade' has - nothing here as witty as 'Pop Life', as mournful as 'America', or as anguished as 'Condition Of The Heart'. The worst thing about Prince's "maturity', if we can call it that, is that he has given up writing great songs - songs like 'When You Were Mine' - as a matter of course. I mean, if he can find time to bestow a morsel like 'Manic Monday' on four desperate California chicks who will probably never have another hit record in their lives, surely he could craft the odd decent tune for himself. Prince, instead of writing simple, succinct, sexy songs, is always trying to save the world, which means that he is never content with anything but grandiose 'Sgt Pepper' albums where all the songs run into each other and vast orchestras make a lot of superfluous noise. He is a master architect of sound but he will show off and spoil it all. His Rundgren-esque technosoup of Sly and Stevie Wonder is beginning to get very predictable. The LP opens with 'Christopher Tracy's Parade', a typical fanfare for his highness 'Disneyland soundscape and pretty much a follow-through from the ambience of 'Paisley Park'. Who this Tracy fellow is I don't know, though going by the closing elegy of 'Sometimes It Snows In April', I would guess that he is a deceased pal of the Minneapolitan midget's. 'New Position' follows with steel drums, a hard pop-funk beat, and yet basic lewd double entendre. Guitarist Wendy picks up for the strange, brief interlude of 'I Wonder U' (performances seem more democratically delegated this time around: P. isn't being such a spoilt-brat autocrat in his studio playpen) which slides swiftly into 'Under The Cherry Moon', title track of the unpromising-sounding flick for which this LP purports to be a soundtrack. I have seen many moons in my time, but never a cherry moon - how about you ? The song is a kind of Kurt Weill lullaby co-authored by (Prince Sr ?) John L. Nelson. Next up, 'Girls And Boys' is an adolescent 'Lady Marmalade' replete with "sauce" French bits and set to the beat of 'Take Me With U'. 'Life Can Be So Nice' bypasses me completely - a highspirited mess - before 'Venus De Milo' trails away at Side One's end as a slight sliver of mood-muzak, grand piano plus sweeping strings and reeds. Flip the disc and we're straight back into Prince's booming sytnh beat on 'Mountains', which is a pounding Stevie Wonder/ Earth Wind And Fire epic. The Jazzy, smoochy 'Do U Lie ?' is a pleasant and slinky respite from such pomp. 'Kiss' then takes its isolated place in the remorseless parade of overdone semi-ideas, followed by the melodically beguiling 'Anotherloverholenyohead' (yes, it is a stupid title, isn't it). Finally, the showpiece ballad, 'Sometimes It Snows In April' (an even worse title) ends the record on a folksy acoustic note and mourns the aforesaid departed Tracy. I feel that Prince is, on the whole, best at this most sentimental and foppishly despolate, but this is appalling kitsch and doesn't work at all. I dunno. Is it possible, or even advisable, to take Prince seriously ? Do I have to watch Dynasty to have an attitude ? I find this record laboured and trite and self-satisfied and won't be listening to it again. 
Prince & The Revolution – Parade By Steve Sutherland They use to say the genius of Hendrix was that his guitar acted as an extension of his total being, that he agonised and fantasised through that axe. Well, the same applies to Prince – everything he treats has a Midas touch, a litmus feel for the most effective groove, an intuitive trust at the erogenous zones where the physical and spiritual collide in orgasm. I believe Prince is currently pop’s greatest operator, a wizard, a true star. He’s calculating and innocent – one eye tearful, coy, expressing hurt, the other cocked, laughing, coquettish, showing off. And, of course, sex is his sacred plaything. He’s Freudian beyond fault and fabrication and there’s a shocking intelligence working us up into a lather inside these songs. They’re amoral in that lust and love, pleasure and pain, are indistinguishable, immoral in that he’s aware of the dandy outrage of it all, and boldly hedonistic in that Prince advocates all experience enriches life. So Parade is a soft-porn paradise, a sensual sacrament, supposedly the soundtrack to our doe-eyed hero’s next exhibition of narcissism on film. The first side’s well weird, nursery rhyme songs subjected to sensory overload, Prince luxuriates in submitting himself to his senses. Side two, if anything, is more illicit, more abandoned to delight. Mayfield, Marc Bolan and Jane Mansfield licking off their fingers after something good and dirty. Mountains is delightfully daft cosmic vaudeville. And then there’s the finale, this LP’s Purple Rain, Sometimes It Snows In April, an acrobatic ballad that employs the simple sentimentality of country music to express deep loss so poetically, so personally – it’s indecent when his vocal spirals into luscious grief, celebrating the sadness to the very last sols. I’ve heard tell that, while I’ve been under this spell, lesser mortals have been saying dull things about revivalism and Beatles fetish. But when all’s said and done you’ll realise Parade eclipses everything else you’ve heard this year. Seriously, Godlike.
By Paul Grein Kiss by Prince & The Revolution jumps to N°2 on this week’s Hot 100, while The Bangles’ Manic Monday, which Prince wrote under the pseudonym Christopher, leaps to N°3. That makes Prince the first songwriter to be able to claim authorship of two of the top three pop singles since, well, since Prince scored in November 1984 with Purple Rain at N°2 and Chaka Khan’s I Feel For You at N°3. Kiss also jumps to N°1 on this week’s dance/disco club play chart, a week after hitting N°1 on the black chart. It’s Prince’s fifth N°1 dance hit, following Controversy, 1999, When Doves Cry, and Let’s Go Crazy. And that doesn’t count several other N°1 dance hits that Prince wrote but didn’t perform, including I Feel For You, Sheena Easton’s Sugar Walls and Sheila E’s A Love Bizarre.
By Brian Chin Prince’s Parade album (Paisley Park/Warner Bros.) isn’t so much a return to roots as a return to form. Better edited and less indulgent than Around The World In A Day, even its left-fielders are far easier to take because they are less determined to be grand narrative statements or mood-setters, and therefore are more worthwhile as songs, cut from cut. We know from the last album that Prince will go to any length to remix tracks, so we’re confident in recommending even the shortest cuts for examination : New Position, Girls And Boys, and Mountains are all club possibilities, while Christopher Tracy’s Parade should satisfy those who want more of the psychedelic Around The World. But our personal fave is the segue of the chart-topping Kiss into Anotherloverholenyohead, which to us seems an even better full-length jam than the extended version of Kiss itself.
Parade
Amalgam of tracks recorded for the motion picture Under The Cherry Moon, as well as several other compositions not slated for the film. Like the preceding album, Around The World In A Day, Parade confounds by Prince’s refusal to hitch his star to a predictable formula, preferring to offer rewards via the album’s experimental spirit. Highly orchestrated and craftily arranged, the album succeeds best with tracks like Anotherloverholenyohead, Mountains, Boys And Girls (sic) and the first single, Kiss. 
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