Prince – For You

My variant:
Matrix / Runout (Side A, Variant 1): 0 SUB BSK-1-3150 JW1 #1
Matrix / Runout (Side B, variant 1): 0 BSK-2-3150 JW1 #3

Mind you, For You didn’t mark the very start of Prince’s musical pursuits (dig if you will his contributions in The Lewis Connection, 94 East, and the storied demos he cut at Chris Moon’s Moon Sound Studios in 1976). It's a tentative debut that planted the seeds for the hallmarks that would shape Prince—as both an influential musical prodigy and pop iconoclast. What’s unfortunate is that some view it as a fluffy disco-minded, pop-soul curio that showcased the wunderkind’s budding virtuosity. But, there's more under the surface, though. As disco reached its cultural zenith, this kid was sticking to his guns at producing, arranging, and playing this whole shebang, even as the hacks at Warner Brothers were initially eyeing Verdine and Maurice White to produce him in helping to realize their vision of building him as their new Stevie-like sensation (how dare they?) With the extravagant studio budget Warners projected for this album, this kid was insistent on milking their bargain for everything it was worth and then some (Oberheim and Arp synthesizers, the Polymoog, synth basses, the works…etc, etc.) Talk about an ultra brave risk for a major-label debut and new artist that could’ve backfired right at the height of disco. For any ordinary, run-of-the-mill cat, this would’ve been their first and last shot. Luckily, Prince’s gifts caught folks’ ears and garnered moderate attention. Even more remarkably, the music here is rooted in the elegant pop-soul/funk vein that roamed late 1970s R&B, with flashy rhythmic elements bubbling underneath (study closely at the grand instrumental breakdowns during “Just As Long As We’re Together,” “I’m Yours,” and “My Love Is Forever”), which this kid would perfect as his defining iteration of 'the Minneapolis Sound' in a two-year span. Sure, there are underdeveloped spots (his lyrical context was risqué, but it hadn't been sharpened yet). After all, even those spots are irable at best for this wunderkind who was about to flip the terrain of pop for the next ten years.

My original 1978 Jacksonville pressing of this one still sounds great. Even though I don't own the 2016 Kevin Gray vinyl reissue, I can't imagine it sounding lesser than this one. This album always had a rather brittle, cold texture in its mix, but there's still some fascinating engineering on this one. The early Warners CD sounds decent, too, but I prefer the slight audio level raise and clarity of the 2009 Japanese SHM-CD, although that wasn't at all remastered