MINNEAPOLIS — Is the Prince estate finally listening to complaints from hardcore fans?

On Oct. 9, the estate and NPG Records released the “Calabama EP” as a follow-up to the controversy over the posthumous “Timeless” album that dropped in late August.

After former New Power Generation trombonist Greg Boyer posted on social media that month that he added music in recent years to a “Timeless” tune, the estate admitted it had embellished the original Prince 2003 recording of the song “Calabama.” That news shocked Prince fans who expect the tracks from Prince’s vault to be released as he recorded them.

“What happened was wrong, and I hope it doesn’t happen again, but this is the correct way to resolve it,” @CaseyRain — a musician and YouTuber who focuses on Prince — wrote on X. “Finally — we get to hear it as Prince left it, which is what we all wanted.”

The estate has released a four-track EP with the original “vault raw” version of “Calabama” as well as the enhanced version from “Timeless,” plus treatments by Prince as a one-man band and another with his actual band from 2003.

The new EP has appeased fans.

“I want to take a moment to thank the Prince Estate for the release of the ‘Calabama EP’ to right the ship,” wrote Chris Horton, @funkatopia on X. “The Calabama Vault Raw track is a work of art and full of life. It boggles my mind why anyone would want to modify it any way whatsoever. It is FAR superior than the ‘Timeless’ version and I can’t comprehend why anyone would feel that it was necessary. The added horns didn’t simply add a minor nuance, they completely altered the song. They are two distinctly different songs.”

Neither Londell McMillan nor Charles Spicer of Prince Legacy LLC (and co-producers of “Timeless”) responded to requests for comment.

They did post a press release on Prince’s social accounts. After writing that “Calabama” was the only track on “Timeless “with additional music added,” they urged, “Hear the similarities and differences firsthand and gain more insight into the process and the responsibility of releasing music from this one of a kind Prince Vault.”

Released on Aug. 28, “Timeless” is a 10-track retrospective album from the vault with Prince tunes dating from 1977 to 2016.

Calabama

Judging by social media comments, fans prefer the raw version of “Calabama.”

“The no horns version of ‘Calabama’ is funkier, more authentic and better in every way,” said NYU professor De Angela L. Duff on her weekly YouTube channel program “What Did Prince Do This Week?”

But fans are happy that the estate listened to their comments about the enhancements to the “Timeless” track.

Calling the EP a step in the right direction, @purpledatabank said on X, “It shows that expressing our opinions does matter and does have an impact. ... As it turns out, it appears we can ‘change what we can’t control.’”

The course correction for “Calabama” still concerns fans about future releases from the current administrators of the estate, who took over in 2022.

“The Estate’s clumsy press release about the ‘Calabama EP’ shows that their misguided agenda was to prove to us that their decision to modify the song was correct,” wrote outspoken fan Donny English on X. “But, it backfired badly because now everyone feels even stronger that they have poor judgment.”

Meanwhile, the Prince estate is releasing a limited number of copies of “3121 Las Vegas Live,” for Record Store Day on Nov. 27. Drawn from Prince’s 2006-07 residency at the Rio Hotel & Casino, the three-vinyl, two-CD release has been widely praised by fans pining for more live recordings from the Purple One’s vault.

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