The New Yorker writer likes the new Prince album, but still felt uncomfortable listening to it. This is why: "Prince didn’t have a will when he died. Every act performed with his music is done without his permission. Even the people who seemed to know him well speak of him as a mystery. Who, then, is qualified to say that they have any inkling of what he’d do with his songs? Recently, things got even more complicated: around the time that “Welcome 2 America” was released, news broke that many of Prince’s siblings had received buyouts from the independent music publisher and talent management company Primary Wave, giving it the largest stake in Prince’s estate. During his life, Prince was vocal about ownership, autonomy, and control. He did not want middlemen to take shares of his streaming revenue; he changed his name to a glyph partly in protest of what he saw as an onerous recording contract. The infrastructure profiting off Prince in death is the one he’s criticizing on 'Welcome 2 America'”.

An amazing read in the CBS about Prince and his legacy, remembering him five years after his untimely death in an accidental overdose of painkillers. In July, 'Welcome 2 America', the first full previously-unreleased studio album of Prince material is to be released posthumously. It will be the tenth posthumous Prince album release overall (all the other albums were a mix of re-releases and newly mined gems). 'W2A' is an album about racial inequality and social injustice, recorded more than a decade ago just outside Minneapolis, crackling with relevance today. This album is just a small part of what Prince has recorded and stashed in his vault, which he couldn't come into since he has - forgotten the password. There's roughly 8,000 Prince's recording left unreleased, which means we could get a Prince album every year for the rest of the millennium.

Prince's former lover and backing singer Sheila E. has announced that she’s making a biopic about her relationship with the musician - “Coming soon…Sheila E. to release ‘Girl Meets Boy’, a film telling the beautiful story of her time with Prince. Stay Tuned”, Spin reports. Sheila E. first met Prince at a concert in the late ’70s, years later she ended up contributing vocals during the 'Purple Rain' recording sessions as well as opening Prince’s 'Purple Rain' tour when the two developed a fleeting romantic relationship. They became briefly engaged after Prince proposed in 1987, but by the 1988-89 Lovesexy Tour, their relationship fractured. Over the years they remained close friends who would periodically join forces on-stage.

The IRS has determined Prince’s estate to be worth $163.2 million — nearly double the $82.3 million valuation put forth by the estate, NBC reports. Court documents put the balance of the discrepancy largely on music publishing rights and “recording interests.” As a result, the IRS is seeking an additional $32.4 million in federal taxes, as well as a $6.4 million “accuracy-related penalty” for “substantial” assets undervaluation. Prince left no will, leaving it to his estate to wade through some messy legal waters. All of this legal drama has meant that Prince’s heirs, his six siblings, have yet to see a cent of their inheritance. Meanwhile, the estate has paid out tens of millions to consultants and lawyers.

David Bowie, Gorillaz, Black Sabbath, New Order, kd Lang, Notorious BIG, My Chemical Romance, John Lennon, Grateful Dead, Neil Young, Prince and Pink Floyd, among others, are releasing exclusive records on Record Store Day. The big day is on April 18.

Prince‘s 1984 film 'Purple Rain', Martin Scorsese’s classic concert film for the Band, 'The Last Waltz', and Milos Forman’s movie 'Amadeus' about Mozart have been added to the US Library of Congress’ National Film Registry for this year. The Library of Congress adds 25 films to the registry annually, recognising aesthetically, culturally, or historically significant films that showcase “the […]

Prince’s classic double-album '1999' has been remastered for the very first time and expanded with 35 previously unreleased tracks for an upcoming Super Deluxe reissue. The new edition of the album will be available in deluxe and remastered versions, out Nov. 29. Released in 1982, the album was Prince’s first true crossover success, and catapulted […]

Prince's songs 'Manic Monday', 'The Glamorous Life', and 'Nothing Compares 2 U' made other artists famous (The Bangles, Sheila E., Sinead O'Connor), and Warner showed us this week how they sounded like at the start (quite similar to quite different). "Indisputably the best and the most accessible album to come from Prince’s vault yet... It’s […]

Prince's estate is about to release a new 15 track album, featuring the original versions of the iconic hits that he wrote for other artists. The 'Originals' spans the period from 1981 and 1991 and includes his original takes on Sheila E.’s ‘The Glamorous Life’, the Bangles’ ‘Manic Monday’, Kenny Rogers’ ‘You’re My Love’, and […]

Prince’s unfinished memoir, 'The Beautiful Ones', will be released in October, three years after his death. It covers his life from his childhood to his final days and it will contain Prince’s unfinished manuscript alongside photos from his personal collection, scrapbooks and lyrics, including his original handwritten treatment for his 1984 hit 'Purple Rain'. When […]

Prince's former sound engineer George Ian Boxill has been ordered to pay the late musician's estate nearly $4 million for releasing an unauthorized EP of songs by Prince. Boxill released the 'Deliverance' EP to streaming services in April 2017 in violation of a contract with the late singer. Boxill claimed the recordings on the EP […]

Last year there were 16.8 million vinyl albums sold in USA, up 14.6 percent from 2017., marking the 13th consecutive year of growth for the format. 16.8 million is also a new yearly high for vinyl album sales since Nielsen Music began tracking sales in 1991. Ten biggest selling vinyls were 'Guardians of the Galaxy' […]

NME has a list of the best long-running songs in pop, from The Orb and their 'Blue Room', an album length song of 39 minutes and 57 seconds, to Prince's almost Eurovision-short 'Purple Rain' at just 8m42s.