52 Weeks Of Prince: Week 41

The Last Gasp Of The NPGMC

Believe it or not, there was a time when I didn’t listen to much Prince. Truthfully, I didn’t listen to much music in general. My years in Chicago, at least my memories of that time, mostly revolve around just trying to keep my head above water. There just wasn’t a lot of joy in that time in my life, and so a lot of things fell by the wayside.

In conversation, I usually claim that I don’t link time and place to music. People often seem to create their musical taste around whatever was playing during major life events or “that one summer,” etc. I don’t do that. On the other hand, when I think of those last couple of years riding the El, I do have memories of silence. A lack of something.

Basically, what I’m trying to say is that I had to go back and listen to these albums a bit more carefully than I normally need to in order to talk about them, and that probably should make me sad, but instead I’m mostly glad I made it through that time.

photo: NPG Records

When Prince is called a “digital pioneer,” usually they’re talking about the NPG Music Club. They’re not wrong, it was a crazy experiment that most artists not only wouldn’t, but couldn’t, try. How do you keep doing monthly drops of that size without a massive vault to draw from? Mind you, the drops were usually on the slim side, but the Club members would probably have felt that way if they had gotten an album of new studio material every other month.

The real draw of the NPGMC was proximity to what Prince was up to, and on that, he delivered. At least relatively speaking. In retrospect, the fan base was always kept at arms’ length, but since we were used to being kept in the dark entirely, this was a pretty generous trade-off.

That said, any time Prince giveth, he taketh away. It was bound to end at some point. Exactly why the NPGMC closed down is not totally clear. What is clear is that in 2004, Prince released three albums as downloadable freebies for the Club, and that was (almost) the end of the Club.

The good news is that all three albums are good, if a little haphazard, collections of material already released through the Club. The bad news is it’s all stuff already released through the Club. (sooo, Club members got stuff they already owned, properly mixed and mastered, but still) Through the lens of hindsight, it’s pretty clear these albums represent a kind of Greatest Hits package for the Club, so maybe we should have expected the end of the whole shebang approaching. I certainly didn’t. The really bad news is that all these albums were and remain digital-only. They’re not hard to get, but hard copies do not exist.

Hard Times In The Windy City

At the time this all happened, I was still struggling to live in Chicago. It wasn’t until a year or two later, when some of the NPGMC content went up for sale on the website to the general public, that I was able to hear most of this stuff.

Now that I look back on it, those years are a kind of untethering of myself from the things that kept me grounded. At the time, I was just trying to survive. It didn’t always feel that way, but it’s definitely the truth with hindsight. I would hear some of these songs here and there. Occasionally an mp3 would come my way, often low quality. To me, most of them seemed like bangers. “Silicon” came my way originally under its original title “Rope of Silicon.” I remember going for a run at the top of lakeshore drive and that being the only Prince music among a small handful of New Wave and post-punk artists.

As I said before, there really wasn’t a whole lot of music in my life at that time, and a lot of Prince's music I managed to grab was just filed away for later. I kept an eye on what he was doing, made sure I knew how his work was progressing, but I didn’t get involved in it the way I had before. Probably the best I can do at this point is to talk about the albums and try to be as coherent as I can.

One note for both The Chocolate Invasion and The Slaughterhouse is that they contain tracks meant for an album called High, that for one reason or another Prince never released. In fact, High was completed and had at least placeholder album art produced, but then for whatever reason Prince moved on. Unlike most of the other unreleased albums I’ve heard of, all the tracks intended for High appear on these two albums, so it’s not like there’s some amazing stuff still in the Vault from this project. Most likely.

Can't imagine why this didn't get released. Art: Steve Parke

So much of these albums are bits and pieces of other projects. The title The Chocolate Invasion comes from a set of CDs that Prince announced on his website. That set would have included the albums The Chocolate Invasion, The Slaughterhouse, One Nite Alone, Xpectation, C-Note, a CD with the single track 'The War' and an album called The Glam Slam Club Mix. Again, effectively this would have been a kind of “box set” physical product containing tracks from the NPGMC. Which would have been kind of a mixed bag, because again all these tracks had been released elsewhere. On the other hand, I also would have considered it to be worth the expense, just to have a physical copy of 'The War' (which I still don’t have, thanks Estate) and the five albums that at the time were download-only. At the time of this writing (January 2026), only One Nite Alone has been given any kind of physical release.

The image isn't super high quality, but the discs would have come in an old-style CD wallet. Very lux. image: NPG Records

Nobody seems certain what The Glam Slam Club Mix would have been, other than a remix album. Possibly, some of the tracks may have been new, but they would have been new remixes of existing songs. Which would have been cool as a “bonus” in the context of the set, but don’t hold a whole lot of interest for me on their own.

The Chocolate Invasion

image: NPG Records

If I had to rate them, The Chocolate Invasion would probably get a lower score than The Slaughterhouse, but they are both definitely cobbled together and don’t flow the way an album should. That said, the individual tracks are often standouts of this time in Prince’s discography.

Highlights:

“When I Lay My Hands On You”

This song is…what is it? A power ballad? Maybe. We’ll call it that, but it’s also one of the more guitar-driven tracks in his early 2000’s output. The Santana-ish solo is particularly welcome. Again, it makes almost no sense to put this next to so many of these more pop / R&B tracks, which might explain why such a downtempo number ended up as the opener.

Judas Smile (aka Judas Kiss)

There are times when you can feel Prince trying to stretch himself a little, or maybe stretch what fits into various genres, and “Judas Smile” is one of those. It feels like Prince is trying to take the over-produced trends in hip-hop at that time and turn them into a brooding, angry funk workout. It’s not, in my opinion, as compelling as “When I Lay My Hands On U,” which is probably why that track ended up on Anthology instead of this one, but it’s still well worth a listen.

Gamillah

Prince’s instrumentals are (not surprisingly) underrated, and this one is a particularly good example, the soprano sax provided by Najee (a frequent collaborator at this time) is perfect for this kind of music and elevates the whole production.

U Make My Sun Shine

This is a slightly extended version of the one released on the 2001 single, and even though those few extra seconds don’t add anything to the track, I love this song so much I have to mention it here.

(NOTE: If you are listening on Tidal, there is a song included that is not on the original tracklist I worked from here. The song is called “My Medallion” and it replaces “The Dance,” probably because Prince re-made that track and put it on a later album. Since “My Medallion” slaps and the later version of “The Dance” is superior, you should check it out.)

The Slaughterhouse

image: NPG Records

This album is funkier, less over-produced and feels ever so slightly more cohesive than The Chocolate Invasion, but it always feels like a lot of Prince’s early-2000’s output was created knowing that the NPGMC drops meant that there was no need for a unifying “album” sound to exist. He was operating in a self-created, very tiny, singles market, and the work reflects that. The truth is, the tracks on The Slaughterhouse are a little better, so the album sounds better too.

Highlights:

Silicon

“Silicon” is one of my favorite songs of this period. The groove hits me just right, and as far as Prince’s “rap” songs go, this one is up there with “Sexy MF” in my opinion, even though they have nothing in common stylistically.

S&M Groove

“S&M Groove” is probably the oldest song on this album, thought to be recorded during sessions for Newpower Soul. Originally, this was released as an NPGMC drop that had a four-letter word in it. The version on the album censors this. I normally don’t say things like this, but there is an unedited version of this on the internet, and it is better than the one on the album. I love the song either way, but the smeary censoring of the vocals really slaps you in the face with a fish.

Golden Parachute

“Golden Parachute” is the kind of song Prince normally wouldn’t release. It deals directly with the politics / money situation in the music industry, and I don’t think most people would really care much about that. (Although, Taylor Swift might be changing that) I love the laid back bass line and sparse production, though, and never skip it.

Northside

“Northside” is a sign of where Prince wanted to go next. There is a blend here of the technology-driven aspects of his early work that retained that “hand-made” feeling that made albums like The Rainbow Children and The Gold Experience so compelling.

C-NOTE

image: NPG Records

C-NOTE is an odd album. These are tracks taken from recordings of the NPGMC open soundchecks on the One Nite Alone Tour. As such, it kind of completes the package of One Nite Alone Live, which gave you the show and the aftershow, and this was the pre-show.

I don’t feel the need to talk about most of the tracks individually. It’s one of Prince’s all-time best bands doing their very best work. “Empty Room” deserves a shout-out, though. This song was originally recorded by Prince and the Revolution in 1985 after a fight with Susannah Melvoin. Later, he re-made it with Sonny T and Michael B sometime in 1992. Those versions are still in the Vault. This is a live recording from a soundcheck in Copenhagen in 2002. It remains one of Prince’s best songs that have never had a studio release. Honestly, this one should have been one of his greatest hits.

NEXT WEEK: 3121 and a return to relevance.