THE PURPLE ONE’S FLOWER POWER

“PARADE. MUSIC FROM THE MOTION PICTURE ‘UNDER THE CHERRY MOON.’ ” Prince & the Revolution. Paisley Park.

Color the Purple One paisley. Apparently Prince didn’t get all the flower power out of his system with last year’s mind-bender “Around the World in a Day,” because his new one kicks off with a march of the toy soldiers featuring sawing strings, twittering flutes, fanfaring horns and images of “strawberry lemonade.” You can almost taste the colors, man.

Later, the vaguely ominous arrangement of “I Wonder U” raises the ghost of the Beatles’ “Walrus,” and the incidental instrumental “Venus De Milo” emits a melancholy sweetness that recalls Brian Wilson’s “Pet Sounds” orchestrations.

“Parade” isn’t exactly a lazy album--Prince offers some new sonic slants, and one track is strikingly touching. But his return to the gimmicky psychedelia and the presence of several throwaway cuts keep it far below the level of his best records. The songs might work fine in the context of the movie they were written for, but unlike the “Purple Rain” sound track, “Parade” doesn’t stand very well on its own as an album.

It’s more of a holding action--good enough in its strongest moments to keep your faith alive, but too dull and aimless elsewhere to raise much passion. It certainly lacks the clarity, reach and ambition of Prince’s ground-breaking records--from “Dirty Mind” through “1999” to “Purple Rain”-- and it’s possible that he’s finally hit a plateau after that dizzying ascent.

Those who feared that the libidinous Prince was about to corrupt Western Civilization can relax: He’s toned down the lasciviousness, and he’s also lightened his religio-sexual-apocalyptic load. While that leaves him less subject to repetition and self-parody, it also makes him less provocative. This music just isn’t about very much.

Well, it’s still mostly about sex. But “Parade” is no more sexually explicit than the music of most of the acts hip-thrusting their way onto the charts these days. What most of these others don’t have is the musical imagination that Prince still commands.

His most effective move is paring down his sound to a sort of minimalist funk. “New Position,” a sprightly plea for variety, rides on a clang that sounds like a steel drum coming up from under six feet of water. In “Girls and Boys” he locks into a funny, slinky sax-drums riff that embodies the circling courtship dance that he’s singing about.

And the hit single “Kiss” is as bare-bones as you can get: mainly scratching guitar and drum beats accompanied by a whoosh like wind raised by a punch. “Kiss” also is marked by Prince’s impossibly high singing--downright thrilling until he tears into a shriek and starts sounding like Donald Duck on helium.

Elsewhere, though, Prince spends his time constructing and shifting big slabs of sound, without much impact, and offering conventional, Stevie Wonder-ish soul-pop, without much inspiration.

But on the closing cut he turns it all around and comes through with the most heartfelt and vulnerable song he’s ever recorded. “Sometimes It Snows in April” is a tender requiem, and Prince’s straightforward, natural delivery conveys the ache as he struggles to absorb a loved one’s death. It concludes the album with an emotional kick that eclipses much of the record.