Publication: Musician [US]
Date: October 1994
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Title: Come Review
Reviewed By: Billy Altman

Yes, you are reading correctly. Come is not an album by the artist currently known as a symbol, but is rather an album by the artist known as Prince. His Royal Purpleness, as prolific as he is enigmatic, professes to have so may completed works sitting around the house waiting for release that he has apparently decided, in the interest of full disclosure, that anything he recorded before he became a symbol should, rightfully, be credited to Prince and not to the guy with the symbol instead of a name. Just so we won't be confused, y'understand. (Right.) Of course based on the evidence so far-namely "The Most Beautiful Girl in the World" single-it remains somewhat unclear as to precisely how the music made by the symbol differs from the music made by Prince. But since it seems to matter so much to him, we'll just let him (whoever that might be) slide on it for now.

In the meantime, slide on this: As another often misunderstood genius, funnyman Lenny Bruce, once noted, "come" is a verb. And while Prince isn't the rule breaking comedian (comedian-get it?) Bruce was, he does go for the cutting edge in his own unique way here. Take for example, the opening title track, a lengthy ode to Prince's abilities in the cunnilingual arena in which after telling his mate, "Don't cough or sneeze" (ever hear the joke about the woman offering Donald Trump oral sex? "Oh yeah?" he snaps. "What's in it for me?"), this skilled instrumentalist takes a bona fide tongue solo-complete with slurps and licks. Surely a first in rock Œn' roll history.

Now admittedly, most of the rest of Come isn't quite as daring as the title track (although it should be noted that "Pheromone" is another pop first-after all, we've never had a song named after an animal hormone before). There are the usual Princely nods towards funk Œn' roll ("Loose" sounds like a musical tutorial for Lenny Kravitz) and big time R&B ("Dark" sports some neatly retro horns and keyboard), as well as an anti-child abuse song ("Race"), both of which are welcome, though utterly out of place in the moisture-obsessed context of this, er, head-y album.

Besides, everything after cut one is just so much musical foreplay leading up to the album¹s, um, climatic final track, "Orgasm", about which all one can say is that it sure is appropriately titled. Actually, those who have found Prince's rather masturbatory policy of recording virtually all of his music and vocals alone (you know Woody Allen's classic line about masturbation: "Sex with someone you love") will be happy to find out that, even though he's got a great falsetto, he did not attempt to play both parts of the beast with two backs on this track. (Though, judging from the man-woman symbol, he may well have thought about it.) As noted on the album's credits-"Partner on Orgasm: She knows." Hey, I've heard of mirrors on the ceiling but this is ridiculous.