(Featured Image: Prince from his 1977 press kit; photo stolen from Nate D. Sanders Auctions.)

Of the home demos currently in circulation from mid-to-late 1978, some are more “demo”-quality than others. Today’s is one of those tracks: “Down a Long Lonely Road,” a light sketch of a song with a not-inconsiderable gospel influence. To be honest, I don’t have much to say about it. It feels like it was recorded just to get a stray melody on tape, or even as a test to hone Prince’s abilities at layering vocals; like the much more fleshed-out “For You,” it’s an a cappella recording, with Prince harmonizing across multiple tracks. The whole “song” consists of just two lines, repeated ad infinitum: “Down a long, lonely road, I’ve been cryin’ / Lookin’ for someone to care.”

For fans, the appeal of this demo is in its intimacy: it’s a rare (if low-fidelity) opportunity to hear Prince’s ever-strengthening vocals in isolation, without the baroque studio frippery of the aforementioned “For You.” It’s also, as mentioned above, a strong early indication of the influence of gospel music on his songwriting and performance style. It’s a well-known aspect of Prince’s “origin story” that he was raised in the Seventh-day Adventist Church, from which he’d later say the “experience of the choir” was the only thing he took with him (VH1 1997). On “Down a Long Lonely Road,” he makes himself the choir, or at least a vocal group; were it not for the unusual delicacy of his singing voice, it would sound for all the world like some old Folkways recording of a long-forgotten Black church group from the 1940s.

It’s unclear–but doubtful–if “Down a Long Lonely Road” was ever intended for completion, either by Prince himself or for a potential side project. Much more likely, it was something he recorded in the moment and filed away: part of what must be interminable hours of musical detritus from a man who, lest we forget, spent the majority of his waking life in the studio. That we’re able to hear it and write about it now is an interesting bit of happenstance: this is one of the tapes that just happened to leak to collectors, so now it’s under the microscope. Next time, we’ll pick up with another such recording–but with guitar!

(Note: I was unable to locate “Down a Long Lonely Road” anywhere for streaming…if you come across it, let me know in the comments and I’ll throw up a link.)