Prince - Lovesexy: Homemade Deluxe Version

So it isn't my favorite Prince album, but there are a lot of people who love it so I figured why not. I love the b-sides, remixes and outtakes more than the album, but Alphabet St. is easily one of Prince's strongest singles, on par with the best songs of his career, and Glam Slam and the title cut are great songs. Actually, Lovesexy, the song, is rather incredible. It's clear how inspired Prince was to put that song together, what with all of the loops and extra voices running throughout it, though I wish the rest of the album sounded as invigorated.

This is my version of what Lovesexy would be if it were a two disc deluxe edition. The album is sourced from a very nice vinyl rip posted by Twofootputt. They had already edited it into nine tracks so you don't have to listen to the whole album continuously, and the only thing I changed was the end and start points for I No and Alphabet St. as well as making it 16/44 for CD. The single tracks are all taken from T's 12" Collection whereas the unreleased tracks are the best versions I could find. I have a version of this in FLAC too, but I figured I'd see if anyone was interested in this enough for me to post that first. Information about the tracks follows below in the track list.

I'm sure some will disagree with me, but who else thinks the cover art for Lovesexy is atrocious? I'm amazed how much creative control Prince got with Warners, yet he still bitched about them not letting him do what he wanted. They destroyed 500,000 plus copies of The Black Album, let him run back and record a new album that didn't seem radio or listener friendly, and then they let him put THAT on the cover! What did he have on them? A VERY informed person once hinted to me that when Prince re-signed with Warners in the early nineties, it wasn't necessarily with the expectation that he would continue to be a huge recording star, supposedly it was for a far more important ulterior motive. Of course I asked what but I never got an answer. Any guesses, cause I still don't have a clue, and all of the obvious things I pointed at they told me were incorrect.


Prince - Lovesexy: Homemade Deluxe Version
UPDATE: This is the old version. A new and MUCH IMPROVED version is online here. I'll leave this up for documentation but get the newer version, it's got a new transfer that sounds much better and additional tweaks have been made.


Disc 1:

01 I No
I know I've said this before, but in case you're not familiar with it, the music for I No was actually recorded for The Ball, an unreleased track from the original Crystal Ball album. The lyrics have been changed and the track seems to have been sped up a bit, but the backing track is still basically the same. The end of the song, with all the voices talking or arguing, was also in The Ball and was part of a segue that lead to the song Joy In Repetition.

02 Alphabet St.
03 Glam Slam
04 Anna Stesia
05 Dance On
06 Lovesexy
07 When 2 R In Love
08 I Wish U Heaven
09 Positivity
10 Escape (Free Yo Mind From This Ratrace)
This is the full length version of this song. It appeared as the b-side to Glam Slam.

11 The Line
An unreleased song from the Lovesexy sessions, Prince apparently thought this was fantastic but everyone else he was working with gave a lukewarm reaction. The lyrics are based on a poem by Ingrid Chavez.

12 Scarlet Pussy (7" Version)
The 7" and 12" versions of Scarlet Pussy are more than edited or extended versions of the song. They are significantly different mixes. Listen to the percussion for an example. This is one of the few songs credited to Camille, despite it not featuring a standard Camille vocal performance. This was the b-side to I Wish U Heaven. On it's label, the background is completely black apart from the peach lettering for the song title and the artist credit, which belonged completely to Camille.

Disc 2:

01 Cross The Line (Live Intro)
I'm not terribly familiar with the Lovesexy tour shows, so I'm assuming this intro was played at the beginning of the shows.

02 Alphabet St. "This Is Not Music, This Is A Trip"
The 12" remix of Alphabet St., this is a mostly instrumental track similar to a dub remix.

03 Glam Slam (Remix)
The 12" remix of Glam Slam.

04 I Wish U Heaven (Part 1, 2 & 3)
The 12" remix of I Wish U Heaven, sometimes this track is referred to as Take This Beat due to the lyrics in Part 3.

05 I No (Remix)
Nothing is really known about this unreleased remix of I No. It may be incomplete, it may even be unfinished. I have a slightly different version of this on a cassette that does not fade in at the beginning, but otherwise it's no different.

06 Alphabet St. "This Is Not Music, This Is A Trip" (Alternate Remix)
This unreleased remix features a lot of new vocals that appear nowhere else. Apparently some promo copies listed an additional remix of Alphabet St. that was about as long as this version, although when those copies are played the standard version of "This Is Not Music, This Is A Trip" appeared. As good as the regular remix is, this is pretty damn fantastic. Really a shame it was never released.

07 I Wish U Heaven (Alternate Version)
08 Positivity (Alternate Version)
Both of these are outtakes from the Lovesexy sessions. They each have differences from the released versions, although Positivity has the most notable difference as Cat performs the Music Is The Key rap she did on Cindy C.

09 Scarlet Pussy (12" Version)
From the 12" version of I Wish U Heaven. During the instrumental break in the middle of the track, if you listen closely you can hear Prince going on about something, but it's buried very deep in the mix. If anyone knows of an easy way to adjust this track so it's out of phase, let me know as that might be a way to figure out what he is saying. Very strange track, and as I mentioned earlier, a different mix from the 7" version.

Madhouse - 24 (1988 Version)

So I noticed not nearly as many people have download the Jill Jones album compared to the other Prince-related albums I've been posting. That's probably my own fault as I made it available as part of another post. I'll probably repost it later this week just so it's clear where the links are. That said, this and the next three Prince posts are going to be for the Madhouse albums, although I'm not doing them in order. Instead I'm starting with the 88 version of 24 which, like it's 93 counterpart, is unreleased. This is, in my humble opinion, the superior version of the 24 album. I wouldn't rank it as high in terms of quality as 8 or 16 but that's not saying it's bad in any way. Rather, it's very synth and drum machine oriented, although it comes from around the same era as the Batman album so that's really no surprise. Otherwise, the only people we know for sure are on this recording are of course Prince and Eric Leeds, although samples of Anna Garcia, Appolonia and Vanity appear throughout the final four tracks, The Dopamine Rush Suite. Appolonia's appearance is simply Prince re-using her vocals from In A Spanish Villa, whereas Vanity's vocals are from the still unreleased Vibrator and have also been sampled on 8 and Orgasm from Prince's Come album.

Despite this album remaining unreleased, Prince must have been pleased with it to some extent as a lot of the material was reused in one way or another, although that doesn't necessarily mean any of it saw release. 17 (Penetration) was given to Miles Davis who did record his own version, although that recording remains unreleased and is not circulating among collectors. Miles' recording almost saw release on a box set Warner Brothers were preparing covering his years with the label, but Prince prevented it and another recording from being released. That other recording was Prince's studio-based collaboration with Miles, Can I Play With U?, although that's another story. 19 (Jailbait) was briefly considered for the Batman soundtrack and was actually used in an unreleased early trailer for the film. Many have compared the sound of 18 (R U Legal Yet?) to Batdance, but who knows if there was ever really a connection there. Otherwise, The Dopamine Rush Suite was edited down to a single track and saw release upon Eric Leeds' first solo album, Times Squared. I've heard it said that some of the recordings from that album may have been Madhouse outtakes as Prince shares co-writer status on almost every song, but again, only Eric and Prince probably know and it's not likely we'll get any answers about this in the near future.

Finally, I want to share some details regarding this copy of the album. While this is a lossless FLAC, I don't want to give any illusions that it's a perfect, CD quality copy of the album. The sound quality is VERY GOOD, but upon inspecting the spectral data, it looks like it may have come from a very good quality cassette rip. Here are some examples from Adobe Audition, and you can click on the images to load them in full size if they're too small to examine within this post.

18 (R U Legal Yet?)


24 (Orgasm)


Nonetheless, as cassette rips go, this is excellent. Also, on most discography listings I see track three listed as a 19 (A Girl and Her Puppy) and four as 20 (Jailbait), but I've always been suspicious of that and believe it to be inaccurate, so I've switched their labels around so that three is 19 (Jailbait) and four is 20 (A Girl and Her Puppy). If that sounds confusing, don't worry, the track listing has stayed the same, I've only changed the titles so the songs listed as 19 and 20 are still the same songs.


Madhouse - 24 (1988 Version)

FLAC Part 1

FLAC Part 2

V0 MP3

01 17 (Penetration)
02 18 (R U Legal Yet?)
03 19 (Jailbait)
04 20 (A Girl and Her Puppy)
The Dopamine Rush Suite:
05 21 (The Dopamine Rush)
06 22 (Amsterdam)
07 23 (Spanish Eros)
08 24 (Orgasm)


PS - This album has no official cover art, so while looking for an appropriate image Google presented me with the following. For those unaware, I am cursed to hunt Disney rarities in the same way I am cursed to look for Prince stuff. No, I don't collect figurines or anything like that, rather I hunt rare Disney films and workprints. Anyway, DAMN YOU PRINCE ERIC! DAMN YOU!!!

New Order - 1988 Demos, Rehearsals and Other Ephemera

This is a really great collection of New Order rarities from the Technique era, but rather than go into details about the contents, I'm going to share the original text file included with the FLAC files I've converted these MP3s from. Credit goes out to Tom Hulme for leaking the tape and sharing his thoughts and The Happy One for further elaborating on the details and getting the files out there. Details follow below:

A unique collection of Technique-era demos/monitor mix playbacks/Hooky live playing, as well as several unreleased mixes of 'Blue Monday 1988'.

Digitized from Tom's Hulme's tape, which he received from an engineer at the recording sessions.

He writes:


"In 1988, I was a simple bricklayer working in Box, Wiltshire, UK. Just around the corner from the executive houses I was building was Peter Gabriel's Real World studios.

Incredibly, I just wandered in there one lunchtime to find an empty studio full of instruments, where New Order were recording. The engineer from that recording session gave me a cassette.

The cassette is labeled A&M Studios and has "*New Order* (Various Takes)" typed on both sides. On Side 1 is hand-written "Ideas from Recording etc Jun/Jul etc". On Side 2 is hand-written "Rehersal [sic] - 25/4/88".

Side 1 starts off with some rather tinny jamming, samples, etc. However, the sound quality soon improves and there are lengthy jams, short snippets of conversation (presumably from Peter Hook and Barney Sumner) and various samples of instrumentation, including a couple of rough takes of complete songs. Most of the music has no vocals, but there are a couple of tracks with vocals. Not being a huge New Order fan, I'm afraid that I can't say whether these are early rehearsals of known songs or unreleased rarities!

Side 2 consists of numerous remixes of Blue Monday (I know that song!). They all differ in as far as they have odd samples, loops and synthesizer parts incorporated. It is also interspersed with some rough jams by the boys (and girl!), some bass lines by Hooky and a bit of noodling from Barney.

This tape is totally original and a one-off. I have not made any copies, so it is a totally unique piece of New Order memorabilia."


Tom did a surprisingly good job of summarizing on what was on this tape, and as the following will illustrate, the contents are anything but straightforward for anybody wishing to understand how the group works. Like the best of any sort of art, it raises more questions than it answers!

Incredibly, we have not one but *three* sets of rarities on this tape.

First: unreleased mixes of Blue Monday 1988, different variations made for the band, likely composed for their approval. I believe the version without the 'ah boy this is too much' samples was eventually edited down to become the 7" version, while a version with the samples became the 12" version, though in these mixes the samples are sequenced and are different than the released version. I believe that this is what the "03/03/1988" date refers to.

The entire tape (on both sides) most likely originally consisted of these mixes. Somewhere along the line (likely starting on April 25th) this was taped over with monitor mixes and rehearsals taken from the Technique sessions. You can tell because there is forward bleed-through throughout the first side of Blue Monday 1988, including through a long segment of ambient room recording while the band work on the bass synth line of what I would guess was then known as 'Much Too Old', soon to be reworked into what was released as 'Fine Time'.

Over that, we have a tiny bit of guitar and bass noodling (the latter nothing less than a brief attempt at something akin to 'New Horizon' by Section 25!), and then, for me the highlight of the whole tape, a full demo of Dream Attack, with STUNNING basswork by Hooky at the start. Then we have Hooky playing along live to the backing track and monitor playbacks of the same, similar bass playback along to a work-in-progress Mr. Disco, and various riffs, including a nascent 'The Happy One' and 'All The Way'. This continues on side two, with more Hooky riffing. Then we have rehearsal-type samples of 'Guilty Partner', 'Don't Do It', and what we've termed 'Unknown #2', which didn't survive the cut, though some of the ideas on that number were likely carried into "All The Way"

I believe these all came out of the 4/25 session, as it's clear that the songs were still being composed at that time.

And over that, we have the start of the tape, which totals about 9 minutes, and features more work-in-progress samples of the songs that so far have been composed. Alas, the quality on these is lower than the rest of the tape, I reckon that they're probably at least a couple of generations off. I think these tracks are later than that follows, since we have nearly-complete backings for 'Mr Disco', 'Don't Do It', 'Best and Marsh', and 'MTO' with 'Loveless' being mostly-recognizable. Only 'Run' on here is still in early (slower tempo) form. We also have, for the first time, two samples of songs that never made it to completion. The second in particular features a gorgeous Sumner riff that I swear is naggingly familiar, but I can't place it! I think these were composed over the June/July 1988 timeframe and are what 'Ideas from Recording etc Jun/Jul etc' refers to.

And there you have it!

This version has been mastered by drewc, who also handled some of the live soundboard material that appeared on the first box of tapes which was sold on eBay several years ago.

Where warranted, fades has been inserted, as well as silences, etc being removed, so that the contents could, at 79 minutes exactly, fit onto a single CD. There were multiple playbacks of the Blue Monday 1988 remix material on the tape, all have been included here, although it appears that there's only two different remixes, which were repeated over and over it seems, as can be evidenced by the bleed-through during the long ambient room recording.

Enjoy. I know you've all been waiting to hear this, and I hope it doesn't disappoint!

THO

This is split into two archives for downloading, one for each side of the tape, so make sure you get both. Enjoy!


New Order - 1988 Demos, Rehearsals and Other Ephemera

Side One: "Ideas from Recording etc Jun/Jul etc"

01 Loveless
02 Mr. Disco
03 Don't Do It
04 Run (Early Version)
05 Unknown #1
06 Best and Marsh
07 MTO
08 Unknown #2
09 guitar and bass checks
10 Dream Attack (Demo)
11 Dream Attack (Hooky bass over playback)
12 Dream Attack (monitor playback)
13 Dream Attack (Hooky bass over playback with piano)
14 Mr. Disco (Hooky bass over playback)
15 Low-Fi Hooky Riffing
16 Hi-Fi Hooky Riffing
17 More Hi-Fi Hooky Riffing
18 All The Way (Hooky Bass)
19 low-volume ambient recording (Blue Monday playback plus bass synth to MTO)

Side Two: "Rehersal - 25/4/88"

01 All The Way (Hooky Bass)
02 'The Him' style riff (Hooky Bass)
03 Blue Monday 1988 (No Samples Version, cuts off)
04 Guilty Partner (Rehearsal Takes)
05 Don't Do It (Rehearsal Takes)
06 Unknown #2 (Rehearsal Takes)
07 Blue Monday 1988 (No Samples Version, start is missing)
08 Blue Monday 1988 (No Samples Version)
09 Blue Monday 1988 (Alternate Version 1)
10 Blue Monday 1988 (Alternate Version 2)


PS - If you're craving more New Order gems, you should visit Recycle and The Power Of Independent Trucking. I'm sure you'll find both sites utterly essential, although Recycle is dedicated specifically to the Joy Division and New Order legacies.