The rock room is a huge fan of unrealized and unreleased musical documents. The special moments where an artist is caught up in the throes of creativity, he or she’s defenses down. Private home recordings, demos, and studio experimentation. While these recordings can be unplanned and imperfect, they are also windows into the mysterious elements of the creative process.

Spinning in the rock room today is the first retrieval for release to come from Prince’s substantial Paisley Park vault. Released in 2018, Piano and a Microphone 1983, was recorded during the interim between Prince’s sprawling and critically acclaimed 1982 record 1999 and 1984’s epic, Purple Rain at Prince’s Kiowa Trail Home Studio in Chanhassen, MN.

While Prince’s definitive musical statements arrived fully formed on his studio albums, the genesis of his songwriting remains as enigmatic as the man himself. This recording sounds like a secret and provides just enough insight to keep listeners guessing.

Like a fragment torn from the pages of a lost songbook, the cassette found in the confines of Prince’s vaults documents a 1983 home studio session as it happened. He reigns supreme over 88 blacks and whites, replete with audio verité foot taps, sniffs, and off-mic asides. Prince said to Guitar World in 1998, “I record everything I do, just like Jimi Hendrix.”  

It’s possible that this studio rehearsal was to get tracks down for later refinement, but it became a stream of consciousness that moves between the new, the remembered, and the in progress. Prince seems to have a cold on the recording, but this doesn’t affect the soulfulness of the performance in anyway. It plays as one extended and improvised composing sequence.

Stripped of both production efforts and his band, these songs in their formative state illustrate Prince’s rhythmic acumen and penchant for experimental melodic connections. It also provides insight into how he constructed his songs from the bottom up with essential elements captured from the moment of inspiration.

He discovers a melodic thread and fearlessly follows it, unraveling it while investigating every strand.

Prince asks his engineer for some echo and to turn the lights down, as he bangs out a barrelhouse intro to “17 Days,” to begin the session. He adds some rhythmic mouth grooves and a soft “Good God!,” over the intro piano part.

“17 Days,” retains the funkiness of the officially released version, which would be the flip side to the 1984 single, “When Doves Cry.” Prince plays it here in a jumpy soul review style with falsetto ah’s and dynamic piano playing.

It soon slips into the heliotrope drizzle of a short version of “Purple Rain,” in what may be its first demo appearance. This performance disappears as quickly as it appears and trickles into a welcome recitation of Joni Mitchell’s “A Case of You.”  A fantastic and original pairing.

“Mary, Don’t You Weep,” follows and is given a definitive reading. Prince’s vocals range from a bluesy slur to a gritty gospel howl on this 1959 single by the Caravans; which took its inspiration from a Civil War era spiritual. Prince slips in some lyrics from “Strange Relationship,” which would find a later home on 1987’s A Sign o’ the Times, before segueing in a full performance of the song. Decorated in rubato piano and an other worldly vocal, the performance spotlights another of Prince’s many singing styles.

“International Lover” had appeared on Prince’s 1999, album the year prior, and this private version is stunning. More akin to a back alley piano bar, then a classic double album, Prince lets this version breathe deep before lending his own mouth rhythms at its conclusion. Its soul is very similar to the 1999 B side, “How Come U Don’t Call Me Anymore,”

“Wednesday” is a delicate and transparent piece and was later recorded for an in-progress version of Purple Rain with vocals done by Jill Jones. It ended up not making the cut, but here it does and has a jazzy outro that concludes with Prince asking his engineer to flip the tape.

The first seven songs of this recording run concurrent documenting the creative process in its flow state. “Cold Coffee and Cocaine,” picks up on side two, a completely unreleased track that is sung in a husky “Jamie Starr,” voice; a production pseudonym used by Prince. The song is a cool percolating contemporary blues replete with late night lyricism and  James Brown scatted asides.

The collection concludes with the circular “Why the Butterfly’s,” another unreleased piece, that extends past 6 minutes. Constructed around a childlike pulse, Prince’s gently improvised lyrics are based around inquisitive questions for the song’s “Mama.”

Everything about this posthumous vault release is alluring, the era, the vibe, and the performance. Listening is like sanctioned aural voyeurism; a glimpse into the inner workings of a singular talent and his search for the perfect sound.