For every element of brilliance that jumps in the listener's face -- the unreal guitar solo and bridge on "I Could Never Take the Place of Your Man" or the undeniable groove of "Housequake" -- there were dozens of wrinkles to be discovered with each additional spin of the record. To listen to "Forever in My Life" numerous times is to become fascinated with the staggering of the second verse, a vocal arrangement that cements the emotion in its lovestruck lyrics in reiterative fashion. In spite of its poppy beat, the love/hate vibe on "Strange Relationship" is so vividly disturbing that it begs closer attention. And though little thought is necessary to explicate "Starfish and Coffee," listening to the transition into and out of that song makes you reflect how mind-blowing it is that what sounds like a White Album leftover fits so snugly in the middle of Prince's '80s oeuvre.

Indeed, this album is something of an '80s retrospective, all on its own. The sonic landscape drips of big hair: Synthesizers and drum machines are the primary vehicles on many of the songs. Careful observation shows, however, that the album is as much a time machine as anything else. "Adore," Prince's greatest love song, is reminiscent of the soul records His Badness was into while recording the album. What better describes love than hyperbolic exaggerations ("If God one day struck me blind, your beauty I'd still see") tempered with realistic limits ("You could burn up my clothes, smash up my ride -- well, maybe not the ride")? The power chords of "The Cross" were neither like hair bands or the speed metal of the '80s, nor were they reminders of the decade that passed before. This was more a precursor to Pearl Jam than an echo of Poison, with a Christian message that Creed keeps trying to get right. "Slow Love" goes both ways in the time continuum, its jazzy vibe going back decades from 1987 but leaping forward into the neoclassical soul that so many artists hope to achieve now.

But in case anyone listening in 1987 forgot what time it was, the title track says it all in so many ways. With lyrics pulled straight from the headlines, it gave listeners their first glimpse into the political psyche of Prince. There were elements of commentary on previous albums ("Free" from "1999," "Annie Christian" from "Controversy" and a few others), but nothing in his previous seven albums had been as directly political and sharply insightful as the song "Sign O' the Times." In less than four minutes, he tackles gangs, crack, NASA, AIDS, child murder and heroin, leaving two minutes for an instrumental exhibition. But in that initial four minutes came a demand for change, a demand for a revolution in the kind of concern that we have for each other and ourselves. Simultaneously, he flipped music upside down with that and 15 other brilliant tracks.

Like any double album worth the name, "Sign O' the Times" sprawls all over the place, leaving little territory uncovered and proving who was the preeminent artistic force of pop music in the '80s. For the first time since "Purple Rain," Prince gave listeners just as much as they could handle, nothing more and nothing less. What resulted was his last hurrah of sorts and a void now 15 years in the making: a hole created by the fact that there has been no similar album from anyone since. No artist has been ambitious or successful enough to hit every mark in the course of two discs since "Sign O' the Times." Many came close -- 2Pac's "All Eyez on Me," most notably -- but none could cover so much ground without spreading themselves a little too thinly.

Perhaps the one identifiable weakness of the album is what makes it so damn special: the title. Sign O' what times? The relevance of the subject matter, even on the songs that are not about the ageless topics of love and sex, has not waned. Little of the music sounds dated. Perhaps the ambiguity of that definite article in the title is as brilliant as the rest of the LP, which has a specificity that will remain applicable long after the Challenger explosion referenced in Prince's lyrics is forgotten. "Sign O' the Times" is the sign of anytime, a landmark achievement from another era that continues to show us how much one man can accomplish alone in a recording studio.

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