I dunno what you're going on about with this 'craft' stuff. But it sounds like you're giving Stevie credit for putting those albums together with purpose/direction whereas P didn't. I dunno if that's what you mean but if so I don't agree bc I've read that Stevie recorded those songs found on MOMM through FFF mostly all at once and assembled the albums by choosing songs from a catalog/vault. They weren't necessarily made together to go together. When it was time for another album he (and Cecil/Margouleff) just chose from what he (they) had lying around. Of course, P has done some of that too.

As for P just throwing ideas at the wall vs Stevie - I dunno what that means. P is more 'experimental'? Versus Stevie with his synthsizer experiments. Hell, they both loved to tinker with new sounds and recording techniques. But neither was known to over produce except toward the ends of their respective runs - SOTT may be overproduced like SITKOL (but see Lovesexy vs. Secret Life of Plants for more over wrought production).

My position throughout this post has been that the quality of P's albums released between 1980 and 1987 roughly equals that of Stevie's released between 1970 and 1976. I don't agree that the quality of either output greatly outdoes that of the other. I can and have made lists of the weak songs found in each run - the numbers came out roughly equal. I can make another list of the strong songs and I expect that to also be about the same. So I can't choose one based on quality of output - I go with mood. Right now I'm still I a Prince mood. A few months ago it was Stevie. A few months from now it'll be Stevie again.