Album Drop
Prince’s Vault: ‘Timeless’ Brings 10 Rare Tracks From 1977 to 2016
Prince’s legendary Vault has opened again, and this time the estate is giving fans a remarkably broad look at the Purple One’s musical evolution.
Prince is back with a collection of music fans have been waiting years to hear. The Prince Estate has released Timeless, a 10-track vault album spanning nearly four decades of recordings and offering an extraordinary glimpse into the late superstar’s unmatched creativity.
Released Friday, August 28, through the Prince Estate and Legacy Recordings, Timeless arrives during the 10th anniversary year of Prince’s death and pulls together rare and previously unreleased recordings from almost every major period of his career.
From a recording made when Prince was just 19 to one of his final live performances, the album Timeless makes one thing abundantly clear: the Vault still has plenty of surprises.
Prince’s Vault Spans Nearly 40 Years
Unlike many posthumous collections that concentrate on one particular era, Timeless deliberately jumps across Prince’s career.
The journey begins with “I Am You,” a horn-heavy funk track recorded in Minneapolis in 1977 when Prince was still a teenager. Written, arranged, performed and produced almost entirely by the young musician, the song offers an early glimpse of the restless creativity that would eventually make him a global superstar.
The album then moves through the decades with “Tick Tick Bang” from 1981, “Heaven” from 1985 and “I Wonder” from 1989.
The collection continues with “With This Tear,” a 1991 recording that Prince later gave to Celine Dion, followed by the previously unreleased 1995 slow-burning R&B track “Stone.”
The chronology continues with “Calabama” from 2003, “The Guilty Ones” from 2007 and “Bestest Friend” from 2012.
‘The Guilty Ones’ Gets a New Music Video
The Prince Estate is also spotlighting “The Guilty Ones,” a previously unreleased recording from 2007.
Recorded at Paisley Park, the song features background vocals from Marva King and Shelby J., bass from Josh Dunham and drums from Cora Coleman-Dunham. Prince wrote, arranged, produced and performed the track.
A new official music video accompanies the release, combining live performances and archival footage from across Prince’s career.
The track gives fans another chance to hear Prince experiment with his signature blend of rock, funk, and soul long after his classic 1980s period.
View this post on Instagram
The Emotional Final Chapter
Perhaps the most poignant moment on Timeless comes at the end.
The album closes with a live performance of “How Come You Don’t Call Me Anymore?,” recorded at Oakland’s Oracle Arena on March 4, 2016, just weeks before Prince died.
The recording captures the artist performing for an audience near the end of his life, with the crowd’s reaction adding an emotional dimension to the archival release.
Prince died on April 21, 2016, at his Paisley Park estate in Minnesota from an accidental fentanyl overdose.
Ten years later, that final-era performance now sits alongside recordings made almost four decades earlier.
Full ‘Timeless’ Tracklist
The 10-song collection features:
- “I Am You” — 1977
- “Tick Tick Bang” — 1981
- “Heaven” — 1985
- “I Wonder” — 1989
- “With This Tear” — 1991
- “Stone” — 1995
- “Calabama” — 2003
- “The Guilty Ones” — 2007
- “Bestest Friend” — 2012
- “How Come You Don’t Call Me Anymore?” (Live) — 2016
Why ‘Timeless’ Matters
The collection arrives as Prince’s influence continues to stretch across generations of musicians.
Rather than presenting another greatest-hits package, Timeless focuses on the enormous depth of his unreleased catalog. The recordings reveal how consistently Prince experimented with funk, rock, soul, pop, and gospel-inflected sounds throughout his career.
Grammy-nominated engineer and producer Chris James mixed and mastered the project; he previously worked on Prince projects and recorded “Bestest Friend” at Paisley Park.
Estate co-manager L. Londell McMillan and compilation producers Charles F. Spicer Jr. and Chris James helped shape the collection.
Available across major streaming services as well as CD and vinyl formats, Timeless is another reminder that Prince’s musical story didn’t end when he died.
The Vault is still talking, and 10 years after Prince’s death, the world is still listening.
