“Sign O’ The Times”: Double the Prince Pleasure

Prince is experiencing a well-earned shower of love for the 40^th  anniversary of his revered 1984 LP Purple Rain. The ripple effect continues with appreciation for what many consider his best album, Sign o’ the Times.

This virtuoso double album was released in 1987 by Paisley Park and Warner Bros. Records. Prince’s ninth studio release was birthed from a whole lot of chaos. First, it was his first solo LP after breaking off with The Revolution. It followed an abandoned project with The Revolution called Dream Factory, which turned to mist after they split up. He wanted to bill himself as “Camille,” with an auto-tuned zhuzh to his voice to add a more feminine dimension. This, too, did not see the light of day but the “Camille” persona turns up on Sign o’ the Times. Finally, a triple album called Crystal Ball was nixed by record executives for financial risk reasons.

So Prince, using his superpowers of whittling and rejiggering, emerged with a double album of enormous scope and soul. Sign o’ the Times may not have had the commercial success of Purple Rain but is a masterpiece in its own right.

The cover art is a dreamscape of a gritty city and musical instruments. A partial image of Prince is in the lower corner, bespectacled and out of focus. This is more about the music than the man.

The opening track is one of ponderous bleakness. “Sign o’ the Times” is the first rock song to reference the AIDS epidemic with its opening lyrics: “In France a skinny man died of a big disease with a little name/By chance his girlfriend came across a needle and soon she did the same.” He goes on to bemoan gang violence, drug addiction, the explosion of The Challenger, and economic inequality. Undone by the tragedies of the era, Prince aches for the world’s misfortunes and wraps up with hopes for a peaceful future. It’s a blend of politics and pain, a haunting, beautiful treatise as affecting as Marvin Gaye’s “What’s Going On?”

He then lifts us out of the mire with the joyous anthem “Play in the Sunshine,” an ode to staying positive, dancing and loving one another. The opening lyrics, “I wanna play in the sunshine, I wanna be free/Without the help of a margarita or Ecstasy” set an inspirational, aspirational tone. The sounds of children playing in the intro and a climax of otherworldly instrumentation for the outro make for glorious listening.

Sign o’ the Times delivers so much in its double-album format, with 16 individual tracks that both nail down and expand upon the winning Prince formula, with his blend of down and dirty and the celestial. There’s a maturity here that allows him to address the nitty-gritty of dysfunctional relationships, as he does in the squirmy “Strange Relationship” and the uncomfortably intimate “If I Was Your Girlfriend,” both unique think pieces with his signature high-level funk.

We get some trademark straight-to-sexuality tunes with “It” and “Hot Thing,” both with an emphasis on doing the deed but with a subtext of wanting something more substantive. One of the album’s bigger hits was his duet with Sheena Easton, “U Got the Look.” Not much more than a dueling testament to sexual attraction (“Your face is jammin’/Your body’s heck a-slammin,’/When love is good/Let’s get to rammin’), it’s a danceable joy. Easton’s gutsy soprano plays beautifully off Prince’s naughty vocals.

“I Could Never Take the Place of Your Man” (featuring one of Prince’s best guitar solos) is a poignant story of a single mom, abandoned by her man and yearning for a serious relationship. He tells her he cannot provide anything beyond a one-night stand.

One of the sweetest tracks in the Prince canon is “Starfish and Coffee,” co-written with Susannah Melvoin, his girlfriend at the time (and sister of Revolution member Wendy). It’s a tale about a childhood classmate of Melvoin who was unapologetically unique in her clothing choices and appetites. It’s an uplifting, tuneful track celebrating radical acceptance and allowing our freak flags to fly.

“Housequake” is a down-home funk track, celebrating good times at house parties. “Camille” is on hand here, and the goofy “Housequake” dance is laid out. “It’s Gonna Be a Beautiful Night” is a live performance that brings in a cool rap from drummer Sheila E., a one-stop shopping party tune of the era. “The Ballad of Dorothy Parker” is an homage to a witty waitress (not the writer) with whom he takes a bath as they bond over their love of Joni Mitchell.

There are purely earnest, beautiful tracks on Sign o’ the Times, songs like “Slow Love,” “Forever in My Life” and “The Cross,” all tributes to romantic love and spirituality.

Sign o’ the Times concludes with “Adore,” a sublime love song. Its lush instrumentation and heart-opening lyrics allow Prince to retain some cheeky wit while making clear a profound adoration for his loved one (again, Susannah Melvoin). It’s a superb way to wrap up a double album that contains so much delicious content. It’s a testament to the lovely Susannah – and the man himself.

-Ellen Fagan

Fair use image of Sign O’ The Times