Plectrumelectrum

Music and lyrics

According to Randall Roberts of the Los Angeles Times, Plectrumelectrum is a rock album with lyrics and sound effects characteristic of Prince's "noble weirdness" and "sense of humor". Abigail Covington of The A.V. Club said that "it takes a no-nonsense approach to funk and for the most part plays near the shallow shores of rock 'n' roll's enormous waters." Rolling Stone reviewer Jon Dolan described the record as "a set of exploratory funk-rock jams".

Critical reception

Plectrumelectrum received generally positive reviews from music critics. At Metacritic, which assigns a normalized rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream critics, the album received an average score of 61, based on 18 reviews. Q magazine said that "the sound of [Prince] working with a lean combo is so refreshing, and a welcome first in his mammoth catalogue." Kyle Anderson of Entertainment Weekly felt its hooks and band dynamic make it a better album than Art Official Age. Neil McCormick of The Daily Telegraph wrote that "the rock format appears to have concentrated him on songwriting basics."

In a less enthusiastic review for The New York Times, Jon Pareles wrote that Plectrumelectrum is limited by its "rigorous, deliberately retro back-to-basics mandate" because Prince is better at synthesizing styles together rather than reproducing them. Stephen Thomas Erlewine wrote in his review for AllMusic 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

All tracks written by Prince except "PlectrumElectrum", written by guitarist Donna Grantis, arranged by Prince..