Performing pretty well for a 33-year-old album—and explaining why the arguments and legal bickering surrounding Prince’s music catalog and fabled “vault” of unreleased music continue to be a big deal, money-wise—Purple Rain is suddenly back near the top of Billboard’s Hot 100. Specifically, the album’s deluxe re-release is sitting at No. 4 on the chart of music’s fastest-moving albums, while simultaneously topping the “Top Soundtrack Albums,” “Top Vinyl Albums,” and “Top Catalog Albums” charts, as well.
Released last month, the two-disc set (or three, if you feel like springing for the Expanded Edition) features a “Paisley Park” remaster of the original album, overseen by Prince himself before his death last year. It also comes with From The Vault And Unreleased, which features a number of tracks—including new versions of “Possessed,” “Electric Intercourse,” and “We Can Fuck”—that have never been heard before. (Even, a press release claims, in the extensive Prince bootleg community.)
The album was released by Warner Bros., which maintained the licenses to a number of the artist’s earlier works, despite signing a deal in 2014 to return much of the control over his catalog to the man himself. Plans for the re-release—which has reportedly sold roughly 50,000 copies across its various versions—have been in motion since that same period, two years before Prince’s death.