Today on Hidden Gems we are going to look into one of Prince’s underrated album besides the legendary “The Black Album” and the unreleased “Camille” album is his eighth studio album and final album Prince and The Revolution did together and that album is Parade AKA the Under the Cherry Moon soundtrack.

Coming off from the mix reviews from his seventh album Around the World in a Day, Prince and the Revolution started recording Parade from April 1985 to early 1986 and was released on March 31, 1986, a few months ahead before Under the Cherry Moon was released on July 2 of 1986. While the movie was Prince’s directorial debut and flop in the box office, Parade was a hit with music critics with its many different genres it was mixing in and up from song to song. While critics loved the album, many of Prince’s fans were divided by this album, some think the album was a charming mix of different music styles, while others felt like the music was overblown. The best way to understand how the fans felt was from a quote from Rapper Chuck D from an interview in UK music magazine Select:

“Prince turned off a lot of the black followers [with the album]. I couldn’t understand that. People don’t want artists to endlessly repeat themselves, yet they can’t tolerate change either. Prince changes all the time, always working on the public’s imagination, always trying to keep ahead of them.” – Chuck D

Parade as a whole was a great album and great soundtrack, its too bad this album has been forgotten over the years and is worth the listen here are a few tracks that sum up what Parade was and is still one of his most underrated albums he created.

Christoper Tracy’s Parade
Under the Cherry Moon
Mountains
Do U Lie?
Kiss
Sometimes It Snows in April