Prince, ’20Ten’ – 2010 New Album Preview

The article talks about the pre-release reception of the album ‘20Ten’ by Prince and compares it to the post-release reviews and criticism received by the album. 

Prince Rogers Nelson was a popular American singer, songwriter, musician, dancer and actor. An expert in playing multiple instruments, the singer was known for his amazing genre-crossing work and flamboyant stage appearances and can easily be regarded as one of the greatest artists in the history of music. His songs wonderfully integrated the wide variety of Funk, Rock, Soul, Psychedelia and Pop. 

Prince had decided to unleash a new album in the summers of 2010 and this album was named as ‘20ten’. The announcement of the album was considered as a celebratory masterpiece by the singer and marked the commencement of his international tour in 2010. The album has been written, produced and recorded entirely in Paisley Park Studio owned by the singer and featured appearances by several maestros like Maceo Parker, Shelby J, Liv Warfield and Elisa Dease. 

The singer had decided to release his album in a unique way by ensuring the availability of the album through several newspapers over Europe. Prince had revealed the name of his upcoming album while receiving the Lifetime Achievement Award at the 2010 BET Awards and considered the album to be a personal diary of the titular year. 

The announcement of the release of the album had created a buzz amongst his fans who eagerly awaited his upcoming track list and the singer ensured that the album would be free of internet piracy by not letting the album be released on the digital platform (though the album is available for a peer to peer download). The album had been distributed amongst the audience via multiple newspapers like Daily Mirror and the Daily Record which led to a significant increase in the sale of the newspaper with an increase of about 45000 additional copies being sold on the day of the release of the said album. 

The much awaited album opened to mixed reviews and opinions where some critics felt that the album could be considered the best performance by the artist while there were other critics who commented that the album might have its own best moments but did not consider the entire album to be the best of the efforts by the singer. A few critics also felt that the album was utterly boring and was not worth the hype generated prior to the release of the album and stated that the album could capture the interest of the audience from afar but couldn’t hold on to the same interest when the audience would view the album from close quarters.

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