Prince and The Revolution: From the soundboard - 1984 Birthday Show

The housequake in Princeland I hinted some days ago is out there:

Ladies & gentlemen, be ready to be completely blown away by Prince and The Revolution, during the legendary 1984 birthday show. That show was one of the most appreciated by hardcore Prince fans, already in its previous incarnations as a fan recording.

Previously, the set "26" from 4DaFunk was the best available from this show, with a clear sound quality improvement over previous versions.

But now we have a full, pristine, crystal clear soundboard recording, released by an anonymous fan (who will never receive acknowledgement enough), with the audio treated by Free Boot Generation & 4DaFunk (in their first joint release, if memory serves me correct), and with great artwork provided by SquirrelGrease.

This is one of the Prince fan releases that put your socks off, that get you in funk nirvana and that is just about the best evidence to show to the judgement:

Yes, members of the jury: Prince onstage, in 1984, and in the superb company of The Revolution, was absolutely untouchable. Recordings like this make me think that "inspiration" is no word enough to describe the state of the whole band. The whole show is awesome, from begining to end, but there are parts which simply are the uberdefinition of quality & soul: the begining of Something in the water (does not compute) or the groove in Erotic City... but there are many, many, many more gems to discover here.

This release is a class in itself, and it shows how things should always be done in Princeland: from fans working together, for fans, no money involved, and with a level of attention and class in the whole set (from the exquisite care in the audio treatment and edition, to the fantastic artwork, to the extreme respect to recover the spirit of the show from the raw soundboard recording) that is really a model to follow.

All in all, this is clearly the release of the year (if not of the decade) in Princeland, and we all have reasons to rejoice about these levels of magnificence, released for free, strictly out of love for good purple music.