Sign O' The Times (Super Deluxe)

Sign o' the Times is the ninth studio album from the multi-talented purple Prince. The record was originally released as a double album on March 30th, 1987 and features a number of Prince's finest recordings. The record was originally produced by Prince himself and was released as a joint effort by Paisley Park Records and Warner Bros. Records. The album was originally suppose to be an album titled Dream Factory, released under Prince's alter ego Camille. When that album project was scrapped, Prince proceeded to use the music for a triple album titled, Crystal Ball. Unfortunately, this idea fell through and the project was shortened into what is now considered one of the Prince's most memorable albums. With the release (and quick disappearance) of the 1999 deluxe edition, I didn't hesitate to purchase this one. The previously released Purple Rain deluxe had some questionable remastering done and the bonus tracks weren't exactly quality sound. 1999 sadly went out of stock before I could get my paws on it. This was due to the abnormally high price that they generally asked. Unfortunately, I didn't notice the price drop and eventually it disappeared. Only to re-appear as a horrendously expensive collectors item. So, I was glad that I managed to pick this one up on time and I certainly haven't regretted it. I honestly didn't expect this book to be as big and heavy as it was. I was considerably impressed with the overall quality when I took it out of the box. The actual cardboard box it arrived in featured the album logo on it. A nice little touch. The outer case is fairly sturdy and I can't see it being damaged at all. It looks great with lots of bright colours bursting out of the album cover. The book inside with all the discs and pictures etc is also very well put together. The photographs are all nice and clear. The text is a good size and is very easy to read. I would have preferred that the discs were held in small slip cases instead of being slotted into a little pouch. Sometimes this can cause scratches to the discs. But that's just a little gripe and I wouldn't say it takes away from the overall product. According to the sources online, this Sign o' the Times deluxe box-set collects all the available recordings that Prince made in 1987. There's a total of forty five previously unreleased studio recordings and a complete two hour double disc live show recorded on June 20th, 1987 in Utrecht during the albums European tour. The super deluxe edition features eight CDs in total. The original album is on discs one and two. Disc three features album singles and extended 12" renditions. Discs four, five and six features all of the unreleased extras. These three discs themselves are the real gem of the box-set. There's a few duds in there but the majority of the four hours of music is to die for. The live show, The final performance of the Sign o' the Times tour, it's spread over discs seven and eight. It's a New Years Eve benefit concert at Paisley Park. The book features a mass of fantastic photos from Jeff Katz and Prince's archives. There's also a lot of liner notes from the likes of Dave Chappelle, Lenny Kravitz, engineer Susan Rogers and many more. It's an impressive looking beast of a set. All the music in this box-set was remastered by Bernie Grundman. He has clearly put a lot of effort into making sure the that album, all the b-sides, 12" singles, dub mixes etc are all of the highest quality. Until I acquired this box-set, I honestly didn't think Sign 'o the Times needed a remaster. But after hearing what Bernie has done for the album, I am glad they went ahead with it. The music has been given a nice subtle kick up the rear. The guitar has more bite, the bass and drums are clearer with a bit more lower end to them. It gives the music a little extra kick. Of course, the real die hard fan will be concerned about whether the music has been brick walled or not. Thankfully, it has not and not just that, it's considerably nicer on the ears than the original CDs. Gone are the little tape hisses etc found on the original prints. This is about as immaculate as music can get. You'll find this sign copy is a hair louder than the old copy but subtle enough that it makes no real difference. The live album on discs seven and eight is a little quiet than the album itself. I'm not sure if that's down to the recording itself or if it was a choice during the remastering process. The live show is really good. It's a warts and all performance, sounding good and consistent through out. I have been listening to Prince for just over fifteen years now. I'm not what you'd call a die hard fan. I don't know the history, all the information on everything released here. That isn't my thing. But from a purely listening experience, this collection is an easy 10/10. It's beautifully packaged, superbly remastered and all the unreleased goodies are to die for. If you're looking for more '80s Prince to add to your collection, this Sign o' the Times box-set isn't even worth questioning. It's a must buy, end of. Don't question it. You'll love it!

Even as a long-term Prince fan, I admit that I almost balked at the price of this box set... but after hesitating on the Super Deluxe 1999 set (and ending up paying considerably more than it would have originally cost) I bit the bullet and have got to say it is worth every penny. The packaging is superb in itself and the 8CD&1DVD box set is presented as a hardback book (the size of a vinyl) with all the discs packaged in the very back of the book which has a beautiful selection of photos and references the history of what built up into Sign O The Times. Music wise, the first 2 discs are the original 1987 remastered and it sounds absolutely fantastic. The 3rd disc has b-sides, single edits and promo bits but to my ears it is discs 4, 5 and 6 - 3 discs of previously unreleased material from The Vault - amazingly clear (no bootleg quality here) of material that grew during sessions for what would have been 'Dream Factory', 'Camille', 'Crystal Ball' before being omitted from the final 'Sign O The Times' configuration. So good that I've had them playing through my headphones almost non-stop for the last 18 hours. Discs 7 & 8 are audio of a live 1987 Concert from Holland with true soundboard quality. Finally you have a DVD concert from New Year at the end of 1987 - the last concert of the SoT tour ending at Minneapolis. For those of you hesitating at the price - don't. It's worth every penny and an investment. Once it sells out I can imagine this popping up on other sites for near £250-£300 (and then you really will be kicking yourselves). It is a shame that we had to lose an artist of Prince' calibre to get to see this type of release - I cannot imagine it would have ever been released in his lifetime. But it is a truly emotional experience to listen through this whole collection and know that we lived in the in the same moment of time as this musical genius...

Sign o’ the Times is a great double dollop of funkiness which kind of peters out by ‘side 4’ but has some awesome tracks prior to the tail off. The title track is one of the best songs ever, by anyone, full stop. Taking the electronic beats to the extreme with a great bass line it counterpoints Prince’s smooth naturalistic vocals. “Play in the Sunshine” provides a bit of fun along with the enormously funky “Housequake” and the kooky “The Balled of Dorothy Parker”. Prince is a great storyteller. “It” has Prince returning to one of his favourite subjects. “Starfish and Coffee” seems to go with the Dorothy Parker tune and then we’re back to sex again with “Slow Love”. “Hot Thing” is from the same brain space as “Housequake” and keeps the album bouncing from one eclectic vibe to another. “Forever in My Life” for me is the weakest track on the first disc, but it’s short and sweet and does have a good percussion loop. The second disc starts off very promisingly with the Sheena Easton duet “U Got The Look” and features one of my favourite lyrics – ‘did I say an hour? My face is red, I stand corrected…’ The attitude oozes from both performances and while it’s one of the more accessible of Prince’s tunes it demonstrates his ability to pen a catchy song and pull in choice talent when required. “If I Was Your Girlfriend” is my favourite track on the second disc if not the whole album. The singing is geeky and soulful, the sentiment is weird and romantic, the music atmospheric and lamenting. Okay, it descends into a Prince ‘perv out’ by the end of the track, but hey no-one’s perfect and it kind of completes this strange track. The very jolly “Strange Relationship” kind of sums up the kind of co-dependant situations we can sometimes fall into with members of the opposite sex and along with the overly long and ‘Purple-Rainy’ story-song “I Could Never Take The Place Of Your Man” kind of marks the end of my listening interest in this album. I really don’t rate the last three tracks which feel like they've been tagged on to fill up the second disc.

Just came in. Perfect condition. Superb collection!

This whole package is stunning. I baulked at the price like many fans but finally decided to take the plunge when I found it discounted and delighted I did. Visually it's stunning, the size of an LP but an inch deep, and the imagery is vibrant. It catches my eye whenever I enter the room. As mentioned by other reviewers, the discs themselves are stored in pouches. I've never been a fan of that but in this particular case it works and I've had no examples of scratches, with all the discs in perfect condition. It's also easy to remove the discs without causing any damage. The music is fantastic. I've been a fan for 30 years and have always found something to enjoy in every Prince album and live work right up to Hit N Run Vol.2 . However this period in his career is certainly one of the strongest and arguably he was at his peak. The quality of these songs is staggering and has now made me question how much of decline he did go through. I was mildly disappointed with the additional material on the Purple Rain Deluxe, whereas this has the feel of real quality. I've not yet watched the live DVD but the music is wonderful. If you are a fan of Prince and can spare the cash, I highly recommend you treat yourself.

When I heard about this release I had to pre order immediately without any hesitation and I am glad I did. Arguably the best album by Prince has now got even better! Full with so many great new tracks. Not to mention the two concerts with it as well! (One in audio one on dvd) which is a fantastic bonus to have. The Sign O The Times movie concert, as great as it is, is very polished and edited. Where as this collection lets you see and hear the concerts as they originally were for those attending at the time and I love it. The additional tracks are overwhelming at first as there are so many! But after a few listens there are certainly some set to become future Prince classics. However I will admit some tracks I do questiom why they were added and are there more as a filler. For example, 3 versions of A Place In Heaven, one of which is backwards (really?) Am yet to go through the book but what I have seen so far is stunning! If you ever enjoyed this album in the past or you are a Prince fan, you should seriously look into buying this set.

What can I say, Prince would get 5 stars for the music and its great to be able to hear some of these gems from the vaults along with the mater piece Sign Of the Times. Beautiful that the box set is, every single CD and the DVD in mine were scratched and scuffed. For anything brand new I'd expect it to be in brand new mint condition, let alone when I am paying out £150 for something. From reading other reviews sadly many box sets have had this issue and I feared a replacement would just bring me more scratched discs, so had to return for a refund. £150 really is steep though for what we are getting, I would far prefer to be able to just buy the CDs in standard cases at a more reasonable price and the option to buy the book perhaps on its own. Maybe that will happen further down the line and I can buy them again that way as I would love to own the music physically. Don't get me wrong, I don't fault the music and Prince's genius, I am thankful to the estate releasing the music we probably would not have heard otherwise, but come on lets have it perhaps in a less dressed up and affordable way. Time are hard for many in these crazy covid times.

I've received Sign O' The Times Super Deluxe Edition and what an amazing addition to the Prince collection this is. The original album has been remastered and sounds clean, sharp and as relevant now as it did then. There's also a further 8 disks containing b-sides, vault tracks, live performances and a live dvd, covering the many iterations of songs that eventually became the finished Sign O'The Times album. It also comes with a 120 + page book as well, which contains the disks. The surprise though, is the size of this presentation. I was expecting a boxed package similar to the Deluxe 1999 edition. What I received is a LP sized box containing a large kard back book that stores the 9 disks. This will not fit along side your regular CDs. This belongs on a bookshelf. It also comes packaged in a cardboard box with the peace symbol on. Whilst it's pricey, you can see that a lot of love, care and attention has gone into this product. 10/10

Ok, first of all I may be biased because I love almost everything he ever did and love quite a bit of bootlegged material as much as the official releases, but this is quite simply the most exciting Estate release so far. First, the box is awesome and normal vinyl record sized, so it fits nicely in my collection. The book and pictures are great, many of the essays are interesting (barring one that interjected too much opinion instead of facts), and of course, whether you’re an 80’s only kind of ridiculous fan or a whole career enthusiast, it’s hard to argue that SOTT isn’t the most complete awesome representation of Prince, and a must have for any true music fan. Definitely the best of his first decade in the industry. 2nd decade o(+> (the love symbol) gets my vote, 3rd The Rainbow Children, and probably Art Official Age for latter career, but really it’s all worth listening to… So, the original album isn’t flawless, perhaps due to the forced editing to a 2 record set, but that editing brought highlight U Got The Look to the album, so...anyway, album 1 could stand alone as a fantastic album, album 2 definitely needs the anchor of the other album to feel complete, again, probably because of the forced editing down from the original triple record. BUT MAN ALIVE this box is the best dip into the vault yet, it will be hard to out do this, except when they perhaps get to the post-1996 vault stuff, as that stuff has very little in the way of bootlegs, whereas the Purple Rain, 1999 & SOTT reissues have many previously bootlegged things on them. However, even with the previously leaked material, it’s so nice to have quality releases of this stuff! Just wonderful revelations... my only complaint is I’d like to see more album formatted sequencing. One, who wants to have the same song repeated in different form one after another, or tracks that don’t flow well? That’s been a huge damper on any thought of getting the vinyl, at least a digital version can be programmed or playlisted into something enjoyable. Could’ve done all the 7” versions together, all the remixes as a set without running Hot Thing after Hot Thing. Could’ve even saved some space by adding the non-album b-sides to the end of the main album.... oh well, I suppose the chronological order is the simplest way, but again, I’ll be sticking with CDs. Anyway, beautiful set, amazing material, even the mailing box is so fun with its giant peace symbol... A MUST HAVE COLLECTION

Zu Prince ist eigentlich alles gesagt - der geniale Mozart unserer Zeit, schöpferisch ohne Ende, immer herausfordernd. Da ist er eher der Schostakowitch unserer Zeit. Und selbst die -- damit hat er seinen Ruhm begründet, auch wenn es nur ein kleiner Teil seines Schaffens ist -- oftmals wiederkehrenden Funkrythmen werden mit überraschender Musik hinterlegt und nie langweilig. Fast jede Band und jeder Solokünstler überleben sich selbst, weil ihnen nach ein paar Alben nichts wirklich Neues mehr einfällt. Bei Prince ist es auf hohem Niveau völlig anders. Dieses Album zeigt genau das eindrucksvoll: Ein Klangabenteuer nach dem anderen. Die DVD zeigt ein Konzert, dass Prince 1987 gegeben hat. Für mich ist das die Scheibe, die hier verzichtbar ist. Die Bildtechnik aus den 80ern macht keinen Spaß - so war es damals eben, aber es geht um die Musik. Ja, die ist gut. Man sieht aber eine Show, weniger ein Konzert. Und eine Show aus den 80ern mit naiver Laszivität hat heute irgendwie keinen Reiz mehr. Prince ist Sänger und "Tänzer", aber von seiner Virtuosität an den Instrumenten, insbesondere an der Gitarre, aber auch Bass und Klavier, bekommt man nicht so sehr viel zu sehen. Zum Inhalt ist eigentlich fast alles von anderen Rezensenten gesagt. Persönlich meine ich: Wer Prince als den Mozart unerer Zeit versteht, der wird hier wieder bestätigt. Als Liebhaber muss man dieses Album haben. Es gibt einfach wieder viel Geniales zu hören, viel Überraschendes, und auch ein wenig Schrott. Aber wer will ihm das vorwerfen? Es ist nicht Schrott, weil er zu wenig gemacht hat, sondern er hat sich beim Experimentieren ein wenig verhoben. Das passiert nur denen nicht, die nicht experimentieren. Und das nennt man dann wohl Mainstream. Lieferung war gut. Die Silberlinge haben teilweise Fingerabdrücke, was man verstehen kann, wenn man das Buch in der Hand hat. Man kann die CD's nicht maschinell einschieben. Sie werden in Schlitzen von starker Pappe eingeschoben, die zudem vertieft sitzen, damit die Scheibe nicht rausrutschen kann. Gut durchdacht und sehr stabil. Das aber geht nur mit der Hand einzulegen. Mit Handschuhen wird es schwer. Und dann passiert's halt. Ja, einige Scheiben haben ganz leichte Kratzer. Das ist nicht so recht zu entschuldigen, gilt aber für fast jeden CD-Kauf. Die Funktion ist nicht beeinträchtigt.

Estas ediciones son increíbles. La cantidad de contenido extra tanto visual como auditivo hacen que valga completamente la pena tenerlo en tu colección de Prince.

Play Sign O'the Times alongside some other big LPs with a 1987 release date.. The Joshua Tree, Hysteria, Faith, Whitney, Bete Noire, Cloud Nine, Paid In Full, Bad and BAD; perhaps only The Cure's Kiss Me, Kiss Me, Kiss Me approaches it in sheer volume of material but Prince beats Smith and company for variety. Serious fans know the original album is possibly Prince's greatest. They also would've heard a lot of the b-sides and remixes, which are interesting at least, and brilliant at best. Of the extra tracks, the best ones appeared in the 1990s on Crystal Ball, but there are still plenty of riches. Get this before it disappears.

I just received the set this afternoon (October 6, 2020). I have not yet listened to the CDs or watched the DVD (I will add more to this review after I have listened and watched) - but I am absolutely overjoyed simply reading the lavish and lovingly-created hardback book that is included in the set. It has loads of magnificent photos that I neve remember seeing before. It also has pages of photos of Prince's hand-written lyrics. It also has several essays and interviews with key people involved in the making of the original album. So often these greatly-anticipated Box Sets can be a bit of a disappointment, but I'd say that this is quite possibly the best Box Set of the many that I own. The set arrived very safely packaged in sturdy cardboard inside a box, all surrounded by those little protective air-bags that Amazon and other shippers use.. I have examined the condition of the set very carefully, both inside and out. I checked each individual disc. Everything is in absolutely pristine condition. The exterior (LP-record size) box containing the Box Set itself has no scratches, marks or dents. I am absolutely delighted everything is in such perfect condition. To all fans of this magnificent and iconic album: if you are able (admittedly this is a very expensive set), please grab this wonderful set before it becomes unavailable or the price shoots up to absurd levels. I hesitated with Prince's other deluxe box sets (1999 and Purple Rain) and I now regret that decision. This set is absolutely magnificent and (I feel) is very worthy even of Prince's own perfectionism and legendary selectiveness when it came to issuing his music.