1999 (Prince album)
Template:Use mdy dates Template:Infobox album 1999 is the fifth studio album by the American singer-songwriter and musician Prince, released on October 27, 1982, by Warner Bros. Records. It was his first album to be recorded with his band the Revolution. 1999Template:'s critical and commercial success propelled Prince to a place in the public psyche and marked the beginning of two years of heightened fame via his following releases.<ref name="RSguide" />
1999 was Prince's first top 10 album on the Billboard 200, charting at number nine upon release, and was fifth in the Billboard Year-End Albums of 1983. "1999", a protest against nuclear proliferation, was a Billboard Hot 100 top 20 hit, peaking at number 12. It has since become one of Prince's most recognizable compositions. "Delirious" reached number eight on the Billboard Hot 100, while "Little Red Corvette" peaked at number six, becoming Prince's highest charting US single at the time. "International Lover" was also nominated for Best Male R&B Vocal Performance at the 26th Grammy Awards, which was Prince's first Grammy Award nomination.
1999 received widespread acclaim from critics, and was seen as Prince's breakthrough album. On March 24, 1999, 1999 was certified quadruple platinum by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA). Following Prince's death in 2016, the album re-entered the Billboard 200 and peaked at number seven, besting its original performance on the chart thirty-three years earlier. A re-release and remaster of the album, including 35 previously unreleased recordings, was released in November 2019.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
1999 has been ranked as one of the greatest albums of all time by several publications and organizations.<ref name="rollingstone1999">Template:Cite magazine</ref> The music videos for both "1999" and "Little Red Corvette" received heavy rotation on MTV, making Prince one of the first Black artists to be prominently featured on the television channel.<ref>Template:Cite magazine</ref> According to the Rolling Stone Album Guide (2004), "1999 may be Prince's most influential album: Its synth-and-drum machine-heavy arrangements codified the Minneapolis sound that loomed over mid-'80s R&B and pop, not to mention the next two decades' worth of electro, house, and techno."<ref name="RSguide" /> It is also included on Rolling Stone's 500 Greatest Albums of All Time. In 2008, the album was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame.<ref name=":0">Template:Cite news</ref>
Composition
The album's opening title track, "1999", was also its first single and initially peaked at Template:Abbr 44 on the US Billboard Hot 100.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref> It was subsequently re-released following the huge success of its follow-up single and 1999Template:'s second track, "Little Red Corvette", which peaked at Template:Abbr 6 on the US Billboard Hot 100. Lisa Coleman - who sang on the album - recalled how Prince came up with "Little Red Corvette" after sleeping in her pink Mercury Montclair Maurauder.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Shortly after being reissued, "1999" hit Template:Abbr 12, and subsequently became one of Prince's most recognizable compositions.<ref>Template:Cite magazine</ref> Its composition, and inclusion in the album, may have been originally prompted by a suggestion from the record company.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
The music videos for both "1999" and "Little Red Corvette" were significant as two of the first videos by a black artist to receive heavy rotation on the newly launched music video channel, MTV, after heated controversy over its failure to promote black performers.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref> The two tracks were later combined as a double A-side single in the United Kingdom, where it peaked at number 2. A subsequent single from the album and its third chronological track, the rockabilly-influenced "Delirious", still managed top ten status in the United States at Template:Abbr 8, but a fourth, the double-sided single "Let's Pretend We're Married"/"Irresistible Bitch", got no further than Template:Abbr 52.<ref>Template:Cite magazine</ref>
While "Little Red Corvette" helped Prince cross over to the wider rock audience,<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> the rest of 1999 retains the funk elements featured in previous albums and is dominated by the use of synthesizers and drum machines. The album is, however, notable within Prince's catalogue for its wide variety of themes in addition to the sexual imagery which had already become something of a trademark on his previous work.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> "Automatic", extending to almost ten minutes, starts side three of the album with a prominent synthesizer melody and bondage-inspired lyrical imagery which, transplanted to the music video for the track (with a scene that depicted Prince being tied up and whipped by band-members Lisa Coleman and Jill Jones), had been deemed too sexual for MTV in 1983.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
"Something in the Water (Does Not Compute)", an ode to a harsh lover, is the centerpiece of a preoccupation with Computer Age themes that would continue into future albums.<ref>Template:Cite magazine</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref> This is also reflected in various aspects of the album's instrumentation, with Prince fully embracing the gadgetry and sounds of emergent electro-funk and 1980s sequencing technology on tracks like "Let's Pretend We're Married" and "All the Critics Love U in New York", songs that widen his use of synthesizers and prominently feature the use of a Linn LM-1 drum machine.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> 1999 also contains two ballads in "Free", a piano piece encouraging people to count their blessings and be thankful for what they have, and "International Lover", a slow-paced love song for which Prince received his first Grammy Award nomination in 1984 under the category of Best Male R&B Vocal Performance.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
Artwork
The album's cover features elements from the front cover of Prince's previous album, Controversy; namely the eyes and the "Rude Boy" pin in the "1999", the jacket studs in the "R" and the smile in the "P". The "I" in "Prince" contains the words "and the Revolution" written backwards (as "dna eht noituloveR"), both acknowledging his backing band and foreshadowing the next four years of his career.
Release
1999 was released on October 27, 1982, by Warner Bros. Records. It was the fifth album released by Prince. 1999 was Prince's first top ten album on the Billboard 200, peaking at number nine. It was fifth in the Billboard Year-End Albums of 1983. Following Prince's death in 2016, the album re-entered the Billboard 200 and peaked at number seven, besting its original performance on the chart thirty-three years earlier. It also peaked in the top 10 in New Zealand, reaching number six on the New Zealand Albums Chart in 1982.
Remastered, Deluxe and Super Deluxe re-issues
The album was released as a Remastered, Deluxe and Super Deluxe edition on November 29, 2019. The most elaborate re-issue contains five CDs featuring previously unreleased tracks, and a live DVD, with a total running time of 5 hours & 53 minutes.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> It reached the top 20 of the charts in Belgium, the Netherlands and Hungary.
Critical reception and legacy
Template:Music ratings 1999 was well received by contemporary critics. Reviewing for Rolling Stone in December 1982, Michael Hill praised Prince for "working like a colorblind technician who's studied both Devo and Afrika Bambaataa and the Soulsonic Force, keeping the [1999Template:'s] songs constantly kinetic with an inventive series of shocks and surprises."<ref>Template:Cite magazine</ref> The Village Voice reviewer Robert Christgau was more reserved in his praise. While conceding that, "like every black pop auteur, Prince commands his own personal groove ... stretching his flat funk forcebeat onto two discs worth of deeply useful dance tracks", he also believed that the musician's only reliable subject remains race, leaving the critic with doubts about the messages behind the sex and apocalyptic songs.<ref name="Christgau"/>
Retrospective appraisals have been even more favorable. According to The New Rolling Stone Album Guide (2004), "1999 may be Prince's most influential album: Its synth-and-drum machine-heavy arrangements codified the Minneapolis sound that loomed over mid-'80s R&B and pop, not to mention the next two decades' worth of electro, house, and techno."<ref name="RSguide">Template:Cite magazine</ref> Paul A. Thompson of Pitchfork noted the way Prince "marshal[led] the Reagan years and the LM-1 for his own purposes" has rarely been replicated and called 1999 a "rare record that has come to define its era while also existing outside of it, a masterpiece that immediately precedes the albums Prince fashioned, conspicuously, as masterpieces." Thompson also described the album as a "computer breathing."<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Also writing for Pitchfork, Maura Johnston wrote in 2016 that through the "balancing synth-funk explorations...taut pop construction, genre-bending, and the proto-nuclear fallout of lust, 1999 still sounds like a landmark release in 2016". Johnston further praised Prince's "singular vision and willingness to indulge his curiosities" for creating an "apocalypse-anticipating album that, perhaps paradoxically, was built to last for decades and even centuries to come."<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Writing for PopMatters, Eric Henderson called 1999 a "massive, sexy, rump-shaking, and sometimes even disturbing masterpiece" and stated that even though it may not be better than Dirty Mind, Purple Rain, and Sign o' the Times, the album represented a "quantum leap in sophistication and scope." Henderson also claimed that 1999 raised the bar for '80s funk.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
1999 has appeared on professional listings of the greatest albums. In 1989, Rolling Stone ranked 1999 16th on its list of the 100 Greatest Albums of the 1980s.<ref name="rollingstone1999" /> In 2003, VH1 placed 1999 number 48 in its list of the 100 Greatest Albums.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> The album was also part of Slant MagazineTemplate:'s list The 50 Most Essential Pop Albums<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> and the magazine listed the album at number 8 on its list of Best Albums of the 1980s.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> In 2003, the album was ranked number 163 on Rolling Stone magazine's list of The 500 Greatest Albums of All Time. It maintained the rating in a 2012 revised list,<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> and was re-ranked number 130 in 2020.<ref>Template:Cite magazine</ref> The album was also included in the book 1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref> The album was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame in 2008.<ref name=":0" />
Track listing
Original album
Template:Track listing Template:Track listing Template:Track listing Template:Track listing Alternate formats
- Originally released on vinyl as a double LP (the first of a number of double sets from Prince), 1999 was cut to a single vinyl edition in some countries, omitting "D.M.S.R.", "Automatic", "All the Critics Love U in New York" and "International Lover"; this single LP was reissued as part of Record Store Day 2018.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
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Some countries in 1983, such as Brazil and Kenya, opted to issue the release as two separate vinyl albums, 1999 I and 1999 II.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
- The original compact disc version of the album was also cut, omitting "D.M.S.R." There is a notice on the back cover of the original compact disc pressing that reads "To enable the release of 1999 as a single compact disc, the song 'D.M.S.R.' has been omitted from the original LP edition." Later compact disc pressings (from a 1990 reissue onward) included the track.
- On the cassette release, "Free" was placed after "D.M.S.R." to end the first side, balancing out the lengths of both sides of the cassette.
Remastered, deluxe and super deluxe editions
The Remastered edition contains a remaster of the original album. The Deluxe edition contains the remaster and a bonus disc with all the single, maxi-single and promo mixes as well as the B-sides. The Super Deluxe edition contains four more discs: Two of them contain 24 previously unissued studio tracks, the third contains a complete live audio performance of the 1999 Tour recorded at the late show (the second of two that day) in Detroit, Michigan, on November 30, 1982, and a DVD with another complete, previously unreleased concert from the 1999 Tour, recorded in multi-cam live at the Houston Summit on December 29, 1982.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> The albums were also issued on vinyl in a 2 LP, 4 LP and 10 LP + DVD set.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> The Super Deluxe edition and the Deluxe edition are both completely out of print physically.
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Personnel
Adapted from Jack Brown, Benoît Clerc, Reverb, the Super Deluxe booklet,<ref>Template:Cite book</ref><ref name="Clerc">Template:Cite book</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref><ref>Template:Cite AV media</ref> and Guitar Cloud [42]
Musicians
- Prince – lead and backing vocals Template:Small, electric guitar Template:Small, bass Template:Small, Steinway piano Template:Small, synthesizers Template:Small, ARP Omni Template:Small, Oberheim OB-SX Template:Small, Oberheim OB-X Template:Small, Oberheim OB-Xa Template:Small, Oberheim OB-8 Template:Small, Linn LM-1 Template:Small, drums Template:Small, claps Template:Small, Pearl SY-1 Syncussion Template:Small, finger snaps Template:Small
- Lisa Coleman – co-lead vocals Template:Small, backing vocals Template:Small, claps Template:Small
- Dez Dickerson – co-lead vocals Template:Small, backing vocals Template:Small, electric guitar solo Template:Small, claps Template:Small
- Jesse Johnson – backing vocals Template:Small
- Jill Jones – co-lead vocals Template:Small, backing vocals Template:Small, moans Template:Small, claps Template:Small
- Bobby Z. – electronic percussion Template:Small, cymbals Template:Small
- Brownmark, The Count, Peggy McCreary, Carol McGovney, Poochie, Jamie Shoop – backing vocals Template:Small, claps Template:Small
- Wendy Melvoin, Vanity – backing vocals Template:Small
- Morris Day – drums Template:Small
Production
- Prince – producer
- Don Batts – engineer Template:Small
- David Leonard, Peggy McCreary – mixing, engineers
- Bernie Grundman – mastering (A&M Records)
While not performance credited for the studio recordings, band members Doctor Fink (keyboards), Bobby Z. (drums) and Brown Mark (bass) do appear in the music videos.
Singles
- "1999" (Template:Abbr 12 US, Template:Abbr 4 US R&B, Template:Abbr 25 UK)
- "1999"
- "How Come U Don't Call Me Anymore?"
- "Little Red Corvette" (Template:Abbr 6 US, Template:Abbr 15 US R&B, Template:Abbr 54 UK)
- "Little Red Corvette"
- "All the Critics Love U in New York"
- "Delirious" (Template:Abbr 8 US, Template:Abbr 18 US R&B)
- "Delirious"
- "Horny Toad"
- "Automatic" (AUS)
- "Automatic"
- "Something in the Water (Does Not Compute)"
- "Let's Pretend We're Married" (Template:Abbr 52 US, Template:Abbr 55 US R&B)
- "Let's Pretend We're Married"
- "Irresistible Bitch"
Charts
Template:Col-begin Template:Col-2
Weekly charts
Original version
| Chart (1982) | Position |
|---|---|
| Australian Albums (Kent Music Report)<ref>Template:Cite book</ref> | 35 |
| Chart (2016) | Position |
|---|
2019 reissue
| Chart (2019) | Position |
|---|
Year-end charts
| Chart (1983) | Position |
|---|---|
| New Zealand Albums (RMNZ)<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> | 24 |
| US Billboard 200<ref>Template:Cite magazine</ref> | 5 |
| US Top R&B/Hip-Hop Albums (Billboard)<ref>Template:Cite magazine</ref> | 4 |
| Chart (1984) | Position |
|---|---|
| US Billboard 200<ref>Template:Cite magazine</ref> | 22 |
| Chart (1985) | Position |
|---|---|
| US Billboard 200<ref>Template:Cite magazine</ref> | 95 |
| Chart (2016) | Position |
|---|---|
| US Billboard 200<ref>Template:Cite magazine</ref> | 200 |
Certifications
Template:Certification Table Top Template:Certification Table Entry Template:Certification Table Entry Template:Certification Table Entry Template:Certification Table Entry Template:Certification Table Summary Template:Certification Table Entry Template:Certification Table Bottom
References
Sources:
External links
- Template:Discogs master
- 1999 at Prince Vault
- Podcast Template:Webarchive
- 1982 albums
- Prince (musician) albums
- Albums produced by Prince (musician)
- Warner Records albums
- Grammy Hall of Fame Award recipients
- Albums recorded at Sunset Sound Recorders
- Albums recorded in a home studio
- Funk albums by American artists
- Art pop albums
- Dance music albums by American artists
- New wave albums by American artists