The Vault: Old Friends 4 Sale (1999)
1. The Rest of My Life
2. It's About That Walk
3. She Spoke 2 Me
4. 5 Women
5. When the Lights Go Down
6. My Little Pill
7. There is Lonely
8. Old Friends 4 Sale
9. Sarah
10.Extraordinary
Another one of those dreaded “contractual obligation” albums. That’s really all this was. Prince owed his former label one more record, and this was him tossing it their way. His real name is on the cover again — not the infamous symbol — which is always the sign that business, not inspiration, is at the helm. For most fans, it was getting impossible to keep track of what Prince *wanted* to release versus what he *had* to. And oddly enough, sometimes the “have to” albums were better. This one just might be the best of the bunch.
If there had been just a little more care put into this thing, it could have easily stood alongside some of his best work. There are glimpses of greatness throughout, but you can tell his heart isn’t all the way in it. A lot of the album feels a bit lopsided — three of the songs eat up more than half of the record’s 40-minute runtime. That leaves the rest of the tracks to play more like fragments than full songs.
Still, what’s here is often gorgeous. This is “mature” Prince — all smooth arrangements, jazzy flourishes, and adult sensibilities. It’s a long way from the electrified funk wizard of his early twenties who played every instrument on every track. Most of these songs drift along effortlessly, more focused on mood than on memorable hooks. It’s not that the melodies are bad — they’re just not built for radio. There’s nothing here that screams “hit single.”
The best thing on here, by far, is “She Spoke 2 Me”, which had actually appeared years earlier on the Girl 6 soundtrack. That version was nice — this one is even better. He stretches the song out into a full jazz jam by the end, and it’s brilliant. That same jazz-leaning vibe quietly pulses through a lot of what’s here, and it’s a big part of the album’s overall charm.
Yes, the record feels uneven. But stick with it. There’s a lot to like once you stop trying to hear it as a hit machine and start listening to it as a relaxed, low-stakes collection. For what it’s worth, most of this material was recorded years before it ever got released — so it’s really no surprise that it feels like a time capsule from a slightly different Prince era. But even half-hearted Prince is better than most at full speed.
Go back to the main page
Go to the Next Review