''Plectrumelectrum'' is the thirty-sixth

studio album An album is a collection of audio recordings (e.g., music) issued on a medium such as compact disc (CD), Phonograph record, vinyl (record), audio tape (like 8-track cartridge, 8-track or Cassette tape, cassette), or digital distribution, dig ...

by American recording artist

Prince A prince is a male ruler (ranked below a king, grand prince, and grand duke) or a male member of a monarch's or former monarch's family. ''Prince'' is also a title of nobility (often highest), often hereditary, in some European states. The ...

, and the only to feature his backing band 3rdeyegirl. It was released on September 26, 2014 by NPG Records under a renewed license to

Warner Bros. Records Warner Records Inc. (known as Warner Bros. Records Inc. until 2019) is an American record label. A subsidiary of Warner Music Group, it is headquartered in Los Angeles, California. It was founded on March 19, 1958, as the recorded music division ...

. ''Plectrumelectrum'' received generally positive reviews from critics. Prince released the album '' Art Official Age'' simultaneously.

Music and lyrics

According to Randall Roberts of the ''

Los Angeles Times The ''Los Angeles Times'' is an American Newspaper#Daily, daily newspaper that began publishing in Los Angeles, California, in 1881. Based in the Greater Los Angeles city of El Segundo, California, El Segundo since 2018, it is the List of new ...

'', ''Plectrumelectrum'' is a

rock Rock most often refers to: * Rock (geology), a naturally occurring solid aggregate of minerals or mineraloids * Rock music, a genre of popular music Rock or Rocks may also refer to: Places United Kingdom * Rock, Caerphilly, a location in Wale ...

album with lyrics and sound effects characteristic of Prince's "noble weirdness" and "sense of humor". Abigail Covington of ''

The A.V. Club ''The A.V. Club'' is an online newspaper and entertainment website featuring reviews, interviews, and other articles that examine films, music, television, books, games, and other elements of pop-culture media. ''The A.V. Club'' was created in ...

'' said that "it takes a no-nonsense approach to

funk Funk is a music genre that originated in African-American communities in the mid-1960s when musicians created a rhythmic, danceable new form of music through a mixture of various music genres that were popular among African-Americans in the ...

and for the most part plays near the shallow shores of rock 'n' roll's enormous waters." ''

Rolling Stone ''Rolling Stone'' is an American monthly magazine that focuses on music, politics, and popular culture. It was founded in San Francisco, California, in 1967 by Jann Wenner and the music critic Ralph J. Gleason. The magazine was first known fo ...

'' reviewer Jon Dolan described the record as "a set of exploratory funk-rock jams".

Critical reception

''Plectrumelectrum'' received generally positive reviews from

music critics Music journalism (or music criticism) is media criticism and reporting about music topics, including popular music, classical music, and traditional music. Journalists began writing about music in the eighteenth century, providing commentary on ...

. At

Metacritic Metacritic is an American website that aggregates reviews of films, television shows, music albums, video games, and formerly books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted average). Metacritic was created ...

, which assigns a normalized rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream critics, the album received an

average In colloquial, ordinary language, an average is a single number or value that best represents a set of data. The type of average taken as most typically representative of a list of numbers is the arithmetic mean the sum of the numbers divided by ...

score of 61, based on 18 reviews. '' Q'' magazine said that "the sound of rinceworking with a lean combo is so refreshing, and a welcome first in his mammoth catalogue." Kyle Anderson of ''

Entertainment Weekly ''Entertainment Weekly'' (sometimes abbreviated as ''EW'') is an American online magazine, digital-only entertainment magazine based in New York City, published by Dotdash Meredith, that covers film, television, music, Broadway theatre, books, ...

'' felt its hooks and band dynamic make it a better album than '' Art Official Age''. Neil McCormick of ''

The Daily Telegraph ''The Daily Telegraph'', known online and elsewhere as ''The Telegraph'', is a British daily broadsheet conservative newspaper published in London by Telegraph Media Group and distributed in the United Kingdom and internationally. It was found ...

'' wrote that "the rock format appears to have concentrated him on songwriting basics." In a less enthusiastic review for ''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''NYT'') is an American daily newspaper based in New York City. ''The New York Times'' covers domestic, national, and international news, and publishes opinion pieces, investigative reports, and reviews. As one of ...

'',

Jon Pareles Jon Pareles (born 1953) is an American journalist who is the chief popular music critic in the arts section of ''The New York Times''.Stephen Thomas Erlewine Stephen Thomas Erlewine (; born June 18, 1973) is an American music critic and former senior editor for the online music database AllMusic. He is the author of multiple artist biographies and record reviews for AllMusic, as well as a freelance ...

wrote in his review for

AllMusic AllMusic (previously known as All-Music Guide and AMG) is an American online database, online music database. It catalogs more than three million album entries and 30 million tracks, as well as information on Musical artist, musicians and Mus ...

that the album does not try anything new, but called it "a quiet thrill to hear Prince spar with worthy partners, as he does throughout this record."

Commercial performance

The album debuted at number eight on the ''Billboard'' 200 and sold 26,000 copies in its first week. In its second week of sales, the album dropped down to number 47 on the chart, selling 7,000 copies, bringing total sales to 33,000 copies.

Track listing

Charts

References

External links

Official website
{{Authority control 2014 albums Prince (musician) albums Albums produced by Prince (musician) NPG Records albums Warner Records albums