Day 10: ‘Batman’

Looking over a few of the previous posts it might seem that this blog’s primary purpose is to encourage Prince to get his kit off. While it’s not not that, I can prove it isn’t the entire focus by skipping over Prince’s next album (which features him fully birthday-suited*). I have this on vinyl so it already gets a healthy rotation, and I don’t feel it needs a grilling.

*Saying this, the bat on the front of ‘Batman’ shows no sign of clothing either.

This makes way for the next soundtrack in Prince’s arsenal. The opener on this is fantastic: ‘The Future’ is a track that I feel would fit into so many good DJ sets but I’ve never heard on a big system. Even though I know this one I’m having it in my playlist, for sure.

I know I said we were skipping this, but it is a strong look

Naturally there are a few slower, less interesting bits to cater for the slower, less interesting bits of the film. ‘Partyman’ brings it back with a fun bit of funk, but it’s energy in ‘Trust’, which the intro teases and then the track delivers with a great guitar and bass riff. It’s a good album and feels a bit more leveled that the bumpy rides you get with albums containing the bigger hits. After experiencing the rather jumbled and confusing ending with ‘Batdance’ (and seeing I wasn’t the only one), I went looking for a few of the tracks that never made it onto the album, namely ‘Dance With The Devil’: a fan-favourite that was cut for being too dark. It’s a nice, brooding tune that stirs and grows; certainly a better closer than ‘Batdance’ manages to be but I wonder if it’s original obscurity (less so now, thanks to the internet) has allowed it to stew in a bit of hype for a while.

Overall I’m choosing ‘The Future’ because I think it’s the most under-used Prince tune and ‘Trust’ because it ticks all the boxes. This also album signals that I’m a third of the way in, and I’ve already amassed a healthy playlist of Prince songs that are new to me.

Album rating: 9.0/10

Playlist so far:

The Future

Trust

Hot Thing

The Ballard Of Dorothy Parker

New Position

Girls & Boys

Pop Life

The Beautiful Ones

Purple Rain

Something In The Water (Does Not Compute)

Private Joy

Party Up

When You Were Mine

Why You Want To Hurt Me So Bad

Sexy Dancer

Crazy You