Prince - 1999 (1982)

 

1999 is the fifth studio album by American singer-songwriter and musician Prince, released on October 27, 1982, by Warner Bros. Records. It became his first album to be recorded with his band the Revolution. 1999's critical and commercial success propelled Prince to a place in the public psyche and marked the beginning of two years of heightened fame via his following releases.^[9]

1999 was Prince's first top 10 album on the Billboard 200, charting at number nine upon release, and was fifth in the Billboard Year-End Albums of 1983. "1999", a protest against nuclear proliferation, was a Billboard Hot 100 top 20 hit, peaking at number 12. It has since become one of Prince's most recognizable compositions. "Delirious" reached number eight on the Billboard Hot 100, while "Little Red Corvette" peaked at number six, becoming Prince's highest charting US single at the time. "International Lover" was also nominated for Best Male R&B Vocal Performance at the 26th Grammy Awards, which was Prince's first Grammy Award nomination.

1999 received widespread acclaim from critics, and was seen as Prince's breakthrough album. On March 24, 1999, 1999 was certified quadruple platinum by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA). Following Prince's death in 2016, the album re-entered the Billboard 200 and peaked at number seven, besting its original performance on the chart thirty-three years earlier. A re-release and remaster of the album, including 35 previously unreleased recordings, was released in November 2019.^[10]

1999 has been ranked as one of the greatest albums of all time by several publications and organizations.^[11] The music videos for both "1999" and "Little Red Corvette" received heavy rotation on MTV, making Prince one of the first black artists to be prominently featured on the television channel.^[12] According to the Rolling Stone Album Guide (2004), "1999 may be Prince's most influential album: Its synth-and-drum machine-heavy arrangements codified the Minneapolis sound that loomed over mid-'80s R&B and pop, not to mention the next two decades' worth of electro, house, and techno."^[9] It is also included on Rolling Stone's 500 Greatest Albums of All Time. In 2008, the album was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame.

 The album's opening title track, "1999", was also its first single and initially peaked at No. 44 on the US Billboard Hot 100.^[14][15] It was subsequently re-released following the huge success of its follow-up single and 1999's second track, "Little Red Corvette", which peaked at No. 6 on the US Billboard Hot 100 (like other Prince songs, it again charted after his death, reaching No. 3).^[16] Lisa Coleman - who sang on the album - recalled how Prince came up with "Little Red Corvette" after sleeping in her pink Mercury Montclair Maurauder.^[17] Shortly after being reissued, "1999" hit No. 12, and subsequently became one of Prince's most recognizable compositions.^[18] Its composition, and inclusion in the album, may have been originally prompted by a suggestion from the record company.

 The music videos for both "1999" and "Little Red Corvette" were significant as two of the first videos by a black artist to receive heavy rotation on the newly launched music video channel, MTV, after heated controversy over its failure to promote black performers.^[20][21][22] The two tracks were later combined as a double A-side single in the United Kingdom, where it peaked at number 2. A subsequent single from the album and its third chronological track, the rockabilly-influenced "Delirious", still managed top ten status in the United States at No. 8, but a fourth, the double-sided single "Let's Pretend We're Married"/"Irresistible Bitch", got no further than No. 52.

 While "Little Red Corvette" helped Prince cross over to the wider rock audience,^[24] the rest of 1999 retains the funk elements featured in previous albums and is dominated by the use of synthesizers and drum machines. The album is, however, notable within Prince's catalogue for its wide variety of themes in addition to the sexual imagery which had already become something of a trademark on his previous work.^[25] "Automatic", extending to almost ten minutes, starts side three of the album with a prominent synthesizer melody and bondage-inspired lyrical imagery which, transplanted to the music video for the track (with a scene that depicted Prince being tied up and whipped by band-members Lisa Coleman and Jill Jones), had been deemed too sexual for MTV in 1983.

 Something in the Water (Does Not Compute)", an ode to a harsh lover, is the centerpiece of a preoccupation with Computer Age themes that would continue into future albums.^[27][28] This is also reflected in various aspects of the album's instrumentation, with Prince fully embracing the gadgetry and sounds of emergent electro-funk and 1980s sequencing technology on tracks like "Let's Pretend We're Married" and "All the Critics Love U in New York", songs that widen his use of synthesizers and prominently feature the use of a Linn LM-1 drum machine.^[29] 1999 also contains two ballads in "Free", a piano piece encouraging people to count their blessings and be thankful for what they have, and "International Lover", a slow-paced love song for which Prince received his first Grammy Award nomination in 1984 under the category of Best Male R&B Vocal Performance.