There are very few artists with a discography of both size and quality to rival that of Prince. To author a book detailing information about each of these songs must have been a daunting task; however, when an author has the obvious admiration displayed here for the artist in question it must also be one of joy.
While other books cover some points in Prince’s career in more detail, with any book (even one like this at 650 pages) attempting to cover every song (including posthumous releases) written by Prince, it is not going to contain sizeable amounts of information about every single song and some entries here do not receive much more than a cursory mention.
Each song / album is dealt with in chronological order. An introduction to each album / period of Prince’s career sets the context and as you might expect songs that are now widely considered more important to the overall story of Prince receive more attention. Benoît Clerc does offer opinion throughout the book (though not about every song) and while this is mainly positive, he is not afraid to point out where he believes Prince may have mis-stepped. Listed alongside each song is the length of the song, the composer(s), the musicians involved, whether the song was a single or a B side, release dates, UK and US chart rankings and recording details such as the technical team and the location of the recording.
It is unlikely that every person reading this book will approach it in the same way that I did (reading it from beginning to end) as it could easily equally serve as an encyclopaedia of Prince to dip into as much as a tome to read from cover to cover. I chose to read it this way to accompany a run-through of all the albums reading a little of the book after or alongside my listening. Tackling the book in this way, allowed me to completely immerse myself in each album and each song.
Scattered throughout are fact boxes entitled Headphones at the Ready and For Prince Addicts. Headphones at the Ready focuses in on small sections (just a few seconds in some cases) of tracks and provides information about how an effect was obtained or how Prince sometimes referenced his previous work.
For Prince Addicts add extra minutiae to key facts about a particular song or album and other “ticket shaped” inserts mention some of the more interesting or “unknown” moments that have occurred throughout Prince’s life on stage.
The book itself, which is heavy and feels particularly excellent quality, is extremely well laid out and easy to navigate should you wish to focus in on one song. It also looks beautiful and a wide variety of excellent photographs feature throughout.
How much you take or learn from this book depends on what you bring to it and the previous knowledge you have of the purple one. If you are familiar with the books by Duane Tudahl (covering much shorter periods of time bringing to life some of Prince’s most important studio sessions) and you are looking for something similar here (although there are more than enough anecdotes and quotes from those involved at the time), you may find that you are disappointed. However, for learning key facts about almost every song (With This Tear by Celine Dion for instance, is missing) Prince has been involved with, then this is an extremely rewarding and essential read.
Written: April 2023