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Rating:  -
This cd is worth the price just to hear Mavis Staples belt "Melody Cool" but the other songs are such fresh beats in the inimitable way that Prince turns it out. It's still good 16 years later.
Rating:  -
As he did with "Parade", the soundtrack to his last vanity project "Under the Cherry Moon", Prince provides a musically invigorating soundtrack to "Graffiti Bridge", which is a hopelessly silly film. No matter. "Graffiti Bridge", Prince's first album of the 90's, is also one of Prince's best albums of the 90's.
"New Power Generation" serves as the title track to Prince's new band, and it's a powerful, funky manifesto. "The Question of U" is exotic and intoxicating. "Elephants and Flowers" is an upbeat song about spiritual redemption, whereas "Tick Tick Bang" is Prince at his most joyously raunchy. Although most of Prince's material is exceptionally strong here, the collaborations and contributions by other artists are a mixed bag. "We Can Funk" is a simmering duet between Prince and funkmaster George Clinton, and Tevin Campbell provides some youthful exuberance to "Round and Round". But the tracks by The Time mostly fall flat. I've personally always found Morris Day to be a one-trick pony with his effete pimp routine, and his one trick gets boring quickly.
It's obvious that with "Graffiti Bridge" Prince is trying to create the feel and atmosphere of a funky block party. But I can't help but wonder, without the tracks featuring other artists, if "Graffiti Bridge" wouldn't be more highly regarded as one of Prince's better albums.
Rating:  -
In 1990 Prince had just released sountrack music for "Batman" in 1989 and tried to do it once more but now with his own movie "Graffiti Bridge", the movie itself was a disaster but the soundtrack is considerably better, this time however he doesn't do all the songs himself. Infact he wrote the music but let some of his friend record half of the music. The Time sings three, Tevin Campbell one Marvin Staples one. There also a duet between Prince and Time and one between him and Funk legend George Clinton. Although it is fun to hear new artists, most of the Prince fans mostly care about Prince and want to hear as most as possible from Prince and not the Time or others. It feels at times that this is a middle of the road album where Prince is more focus on helping out his friends then focusing in his own music. What is remarkable on this album though is that Prince for the first time goes hip hop. The Time is a hip hop act and many of the other songs feel very hip hop influenced aswell. We all know what was coming on the upcoming 2 albums with New Power Generation, This was the soft start.
The album starts with the catchy 80's sounding "Can't Stop This Feeling I Got" It could just aswell have been released on "Dirt Mind" or something. It's a happy uptempo song with great melody. "The New Power Generation" is funky hip hop sounding, we all know he'll record album with the band later on. This was the first preview and it isn't bad at all. "Release It" with Time is a straight up hip hop song, it got loads of cool samples and influences. "Question of U" sound like it should have been on "Lovesexy" instead. It's a slow emotional ballad about faith., it got a nice guitar solo too. "Elephants and Flowers" a funky song with cool guitar riffs, one of the better. Tevin Campbell sings "Round and Round", it's a so so midtempo. Next song "We Can Funk" is a duet with George Clinton, two wonderful artists makes a pretty good song. "Joy In Repetition" is a slow paced half psychedelic song.
The Times also makes "Love Machine", follows the same trend. "Tick Tick Bang" is one of the weaker, also hip hop influenced but with guitar riffs to die for. A little messy though. "Shake" is also by The Time, is a funky number. Next up is "Thieves in the Temple" the only big hit from "Graffiti Bridge" is one of those obscure songs. Temle reflects soul or self esteem and the Thieves all the bad things. "Latest Fashion" is a duet between Prince and Time, a decent midtempo hip hop sounding song. "Melody Cool" is with Marvin Staples, is jazzy and funky. "Still Would Stand All Time" is a ballad with gospel choirs backing up, not bad but lacks the best melody. The Title track is a emotional and happy midtempo. Reminds me of "The Ladder" and "Around the World". Last song is "NPG part 2" is perhaps even more funky but not better. It's closes where the next album later would take up.
Overall. Not a bad album but quite uneven. Here many of Prince's friend get's 15 minutes of fame in the spotlight and some of the songs goes towards Hip Hop. While they aren't bad, Prince fans cares more about his songs the his friends one's. It's also a little unfocused with some very good songs and some forgettable, and with it's 17 songs it feels like a endless double-album. While Graffiti Bridge isn't bad it not one of Prince's best. If you are a big fan indeed, you should defenietly not get scared by some of the bad reviews or of the record sells, It's a decent and vastly overlooked album that was the start of the 2 upcoming albums with NPG. Grafitti Bridge is not great but it's defenitely enjoyable.
Rating: -
In 1990, Prince filmed a movie called Graffiti Bridge, which was a so-called sequel to his phenomenal 1984 film, Purple Rain. Yep, that one absolutely bombed and critics panned it to the ground. But, some of the music in that film contained some great music. The soundtrack isn't just a Prince album and it shouldn't be considered that because other artists perfrom here. This soundtrack was an all in all mixed bag. There's much to like here and the styles of music that are presented on this album is half brilliant and half dull. The opening track, "Can't Stop This Feeling I Got" is an elegant rock song with uninspired guitar hooks and bumping drum patterns. "New Power Generation" is a bumping, new-jack urban track that is one of the best on here. "Release It" is a track performed by The Time and it sounds different from anything they previously recorded. It's more of a hip-hop flavored tune, full of loops. "The Question of U" is another great, yet seductive song on this album. On this song, he does some incredible bluesy guitar work. The song is a slow, blues and old-school R&B ballad with everything you would love in a Prince ballad. "Elephants And Flowers" is a fun-based, catchy track with wild, yet funky instrumentation. "Round And Round" is a song by the young Tevin Campbell; that is a decent filler track with uninspired synthesizer work and patterned drum sequences. "We Can Funk" has Prince doing a steamy collaboration with funk master, George Clinton. The song is so funky and sexy at the same time. "Joy in Repetition" is another slow jam on here with Prince doing yet another soaring guitar solo with some airy and soft instrumentation being played in the background. "Love Machine" is another pumping funk track by The Time, with Morris Day doing some halirious, yet sexy-influenced raps and Elisa doing the lead vocals. "Tick, Tick, Bang" is a flawed attempt for Prince to mix heavy metal, rap, and soul together to create a masterful soundscape. "Shake" is a funky-dance number performed by The Time with plastic sounding guitar hooks and keyboard work. "Thieves in the Temple" is a haunting tune that has Prince playing yet another earth-shattering guitar solo. It was the only big hit on the album. "Latest Fashion" is a humorous and repetitive tune by The Time that serves as filler. "Melody Cool" is a wonderfully crafted funk-dance jam that is performed by Mavis Staples. "Still Would Stand All Time" is a powerful gospel song that beautifully showcases Prince's spiritual beliefs. "Graffiti Bridge" is really an intoxicating "grand-finale" ballad that sums up the theme of the album. "New Power Generation (pt.2)" is an patchy reprise of the first part of the song, which began the album.
The Graffiti Bridge soundtrack is ultimately a mixed bag. Most of the material is just too spiritual and the production is pretty good. But what makes the production so underwhelming is that it does have a strong hip-hop influence. The other artists from the Prince canon does some great, yet inconsistent stuff here as well. Tevin Campbell's "Round and Round" and The Time's "Shake" and "The Latest Fashion" can all be considered as filler that can be skipped over. Some of Prince's set of songs can be considered as filler as well. The flow of the album is just too cluttered because it isn't coherent. For example, after Prince does a song, a Time song pops up, and then another song by Prince comes on. Prince and the other guests that perform on the album tries to tackle as many styles of music they can, but it just gets unsuccessful and jumbled. So, the Graffiti Bridge soundtrack is a 68-minute hit and miss album that does have duds, but you have to skip around it to get to the good stuff. C-
Rating: -
I'm a HUGE Prince fan from his debut album on, but this is...well...pretty dreadful. While on a few cuts buried beneath the dross you can still hear a faint glimmer of the "old" Prince we know & love - check out "Can't Stop This Feeing" which sounds like a rock-n-roll rave-up cousin to "When You Were Mine" from DIRTY MIND, or the moody ballads Question of U, or the searing guitar workout Joy in Repetition" - most of this lame soundtrack bears all the ill-fated trademarks that would doom Prince later to making much bad music during the 90s: sub-par "rapping," dated everything-but-the-kitchen sink production sonics, tired flat drum programming, and worse of all, little in the way of killer hooks. While the real Prince loses his way climbing over Graffiti Bridge, he clutters his album with weak guest cameos from legends like Mavis Staples and George Clinton to try to mask the damage. It doesn't work. While inspired in a few beats and guitar licks and fleeting falsetto runs, GRAFFITI BRIDGE just makes you want to take the CD out and replace it with...DIRTY MIND, CONTROVERSY, 1999...you get the idea. This closes the chapter on Prince's reign during the 80s - he wouldn't bounce back til last year on his MUSICOLOGY comeback.
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