Controversy

Warner Bros. Records

My sexual preferences really aren’t any of their business.

This album is so named because of the negative press Prince received for his previous album Dirty Mind for being so racy, Prince anticipated a similar response for Controversy, in which sex remained his central theme. It is an album with contrasting themes: sex and politics. It was because of these two themes the album was branded disjointed by critics of the day.

Prince recorded Controversy throughout the spring and summer of 1981, his first solo project at the Kiowa Trail studio his home on Lake Riley, Minnesota between 1981 to 1985. The final mixing was completed at Sunset Sound in Hollywood, during which he recorded Private Joy the album’s late addition. Controversy sold 400,000 copies and peaked at number 21 in the Billboard charts, and was later certified Platinum (1m copies) by RIAA, on 11 January 1985.

Annie Christian is the name of a fictional character created by Prince to depict Satan and evil deeds (Annie Christian / Antichrist) and to reference key events of the day, the growing tensions with Russia, but in particular gun control amid the aftermath of the murder of 28 African-American children in Atlanta and the shooting of John Lennon (Prince was performing at The Ritz in New York for the Dirty Mind Tour on the day of Lennon’s murder).

Performers

All instruments

Prince

Keyboards

Matt "Dr." Fink ^{Jack U Off}

Drums

Bobby Z. ^{Jack U Off}

Data

Production

Prince

Label

Warner Bros. Records

Distribution

Warner Bros. Records

Cover/Design

Allen Beaulieu

Released

39 years, 5 months ago on 13 November 1981

Running Time

37:18

US Chart Peak

21

UK Chart Peak

Not charted

Prince Album

#4

Orig. Formats

Tracklist

1. Controversy (7:14) ¹
2. Sexuality (4:20)
3. Do Me, Baby (7:47) ^{1 & 2}
4. Private Joy (4:25)
5. Ronnie, Talk To Russia [feat. Lisa Coleman] (1:48)
6. Let's Work (3:57) ¹
7. Annie Christian (4:21)
8. Jack U Off (3:12)

¹ Released as singles.
² Written by André Cymone.

Singles from Controversy

Controversy

Warner Bros. Records

Released

2 September 1981

US Chart Peak

70

UK Chart Peak

-

Format

1. Controversy [Edit] (3:35)
2. When You Were Mine (3:44)

Controversy [Maxi Single]

Warner Bros. Records

Released

2 September 1981

US Chart Peak

70

UK Chart Peak

-

Format

1. Controversy (7:14)
2. When You Were Mine (3:44)

Sexuality

Warner Bros. Records

Released

16 October 1981

US Chart Peak

No Release

UK Chart Peak

No Release

Format

1. Sexuality (4:20)
2. Controversy [Edit] (3:35)

Let's Work

Warner Bros. Records

Released

6 January 1982

US Chart Peak

104

UK Chart Peak

-

Format

1. Let's Work [Edit] (2:56)
2. Ronnie Talk To Russia [feat. Lisa Coleman] (1:48)

Let's Work [Maxi Single]

Warner Bros. Records

Released

17 February 1982

US Chart Peak

104

UK Chart Peak

-

Format

1. Let’s Work [Dance Remix] (8:02)
2. Ronnie, Talk To Russia (1:48)

Do Me, Baby

Warner Bros. Records

Released

16 July 1982

US Chart Peak

-

UK Chart Peak

No Release

Format

1. Do Me, Baby [Edit] (3:57)
2. Private Joy (4:25)

Supporting tour

Controversy Tour

1981/2

• 59 shows from 20 November 1981 to 14 March 1982

Controversy – review

We enter uncharted territory for non-Prince fans. It is for some impossible to imagine that Prince existed before his 1999 album. Yet there was not only life but a glorious one it was too. Controversy is both massively and foolishly overlooked. Considered by many as an album with a split personality Prince underlines the roots that would in later albums superbly fuse black with white music in a way that would redefine modern music. The title track, still able to pack a punch even today, sets the album back off down the same controversial path where the very dirty, Dirty Mind left us in 1980. Prince lets his pervy side rear its head with Sexuality and Jack U Off, to then slow down nicely with Do Me, Baby. The album then changes theme to the issues of the day: Cold War (Ronnie Talk To Russia) and gun control (the perplexing Annie Christian). However the top tracks are wonderful, Private Joy and the rallying Let’s Work. Controversy is fun, raucous and charged, laying the way to propel Prince out of obscurity. And although the subject matter is of its time, the album has not dated at all. The albums got more serious after this so consider the two-faced Controversy the evolutionary creature before Prince’s Revolutionary age.

Controversy is rated 3.5 out of 5 by Goldies Parade.

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