Over the last 10 years, his retail distributions have been fairly unorthodox. As far as labels go, he’s seemed to have already hit most of the majors already with one-offs (BMG, Sony, Universal) and, with the exception of Sony, he’s not really returned for repeat deals. He’s already done both Target & Best Buy (TRC was distributed by BB owned Redline.) What would be a good “next” move? Though he has the earned benefit of spearheading his business ventures and, at least as he puts it, wants to show other artists an alternative to convention, we can’t pretend a new or even an artist with 2-3 modestly successful releases could maneuver the confines of the industry and adopt the purple template as their own. I guess it’s more a general example than a literal one as someone like Avant couldn’t ink a deal with Big Lots at this point, much less Target.

Musically, I think the Lotus Flower disc in particular is the strongest of the 3, Boom & Love Like Jazz being my standouts thus far. I’ve listened to MPLSSound a handful of times but I don’t find myself wanting to hear much of it. It’s weird sort of. As much as his early 80’s output, production-wise, is defined by the Linn, it was an effortless combination of several elements that made it what it was; not *just* the Linn’s prominence sound-wise. Having the “classic” elements alone won’t compensate for say lax songwriting on recent Linn-driven output (Props & Pounds, Undisputed, There’ll Never B Another Like Me.) As far as Bria Valente’s album is concerned, I dug some of it more than I anticipated. I couldn’t help but think she’d be more at home on an Marc Mac or OM Lounge compilation versus a Prince outing. I’ve read some unfavorable comments about her voice here but, apt as they may be, I’m sure the story would be different if she’d been on say, Play With The Changes instead of Planet Earth.