Publication: The Times [UK]
Date: August 24, 1990
Section: Features
Length: 582 Words
Title: "A Talent Too Thinly Spread"
Written By: David Sinclair

Prince Graffiti Bridge
(Paisley Park 7599-27493-1)

GRAFFITI Bridge, Prince's fourth movie soundtrack, has more in common with the throwaway Batman score of last year than it does with his magnum opus, Purple Rain. Spread over four sides, the album gives little indication of what the forthcoming film is about, save that it will unfurl to the super-funky-sexy sound of party animals on the hoof.

A notorious workaholic (he is still touring the Batman album the week that Graffiti Bridge is released) Prince displays a lordly impatience with his material. The songs are quick, flighty sketches, embellished with ornate vocal dabs and flourishes but often set against the sparsest of instrumental backdrops, with little or no colouring beyond the basic drum or drum-machine tracks. Melodies and riffs are thus subjected to inordinately harsh exposure and, frankly, much of Graffiti Bridge wilts in the glare.

A duet with funkmeister George Clinton sounds a good bet in principal, but the resulting ''We can Funk'' amounts to little more than a twitchy outburst of vocal crossfire and a hang-tough groove. Similarly, the rapprochement with his old Minneapolis sparring partners Morris Day and the Time promises more than is actually delivered on the several one-dimensional dance tracks on which they are featured.

Of the unusually high quota of guest artists it is Mavis Staples who best gets the measure of the situation with her powerhouse performance of ''Melody Cool'', stabbing across a riff with considerably more poke than most.

The problem with Grafitti Bridge is one of quality control. Who is there around these days to suggest to Prince that a song

which he has just single-handedly composed, produced, sung and played all the instruments is not quite up to scratch? When he is putting out material of the calibre of the jaunty opener ''Can't Stop This Feeling I Got'' or the ''Thieves in the Temple'' single, there is no problem. But the title track, which sounds like a bizarre cross between a Pepsi commercial and ''In an English Country Garden'', is one of many here that could have benefited from some revision.