At Midyear, Mysterious Prince Reigns--Again : Midyear Top 10

More than any album of the past six months, Prince’s “Lovesexy” rates highly in every key area associated with pop-music excellence: Originality, vitality, commentary, entertainment, provocation and humor.

Without sacrificing his usual dance-floor exuberance, Prince injects the songs--including “Eye No” and “Anna Stesia”--with the most radical gospel vision heard in contemporary pop since Marvin Gaye’s sex ‘n’ salvation testimonials.

While Prince rival Michael Jackson is equally capable of brilliant moments on record, Jackson has yet to find the means--or the will--to consistently reveal himself in his music. This leaves Jackson’s albums often sounding more skilled than inspired.

Prince combines skill and inspiration in “Lovesexy” in ways that enrich his art by making the music seem totally revealing, yet leaving the artist profoundly mysterious.

The other entries on today’s list of the 10 most distinguished albums of the first half of 1988 underscore the emotional and geographical range of pop music over the last six months. The datelines range from Hollywood and Nashville to Paris and Reykjavik.

1. Prince’s “Lovesexy” (Paisley Park)--For reasons stated above, this is Prince’s most consistent and embracing album since “Purple Rain.” The nine songs showcase the artist’s strengths as a marvelous tunesmith and as a seductive provocateur .

2. The Sugarcubes’ “Life’s Too Good” (Elektra)--A great record is like a great rally in tennis--each time the ball comes back, it poses a new challenge. In that spirit, there’s something wonderfully elastic about the Sugarcubes’ fresh, inventive, slyly veiled music that makes you look at it a little differently each time it pops through the speakers. For signposts to this Icelandic entry, try the the arty instincts of Talking Heads, the folk-ish warmth of 10,000 Maniacs and the mainstream energy of the Pretenders.

3. Tracy Chapman’s “Tracy Chapman” (Elektra)--As strikingly effective as the songs and vocals in the year’s most celebrated debut are, the most valuable thing about this Boston-based artist’s album may prove to be its role in expanding the boundaries of mainstream pop. Suzanne Vega made the Top 40 safe last year for female singer-songwriters who work in a modern folk style, but Chapman’s tales of urban disadvantage (childhood racial scars in “Across the Line,” the poverty cycle in “Fast Car”) have an even more liberating ring.

4. The Jesus and Mary Chain’s “Barbed Wire Kisses”(Warner Bros.)--The brothers Reid are either the biggest pop innocents of the ‘80s or the absolutely worst commercial strategists. How else do you explain a 16-song compilation of odds and ends (mostly old B-sides) from a band whose only two albums were almost totally ignored by most radio programmers and rock fans in the United States? Though it does include “Sidewalking,” a track that has been getting exposure on college and alternative radio stations, the album is more difficult to absorb than either of the London group’s two magnificent studio collections. The Jesus and Mary Chain’s music combines disarmingly romantic melodies with dark themes and relentless guitar dissonance. Part of it is wonderful, part of it is in some musical twilight zone, almost all of it is intriguing.

5. Run-D.M.C.’s “Tougher Than Leather” (Profile)--While the use of rock signatures in rap once seemed to be simply commercial strategy, this New York trio welds rock sensibilities and hip-hop dynamics into a stirring, artful rock ‘n’ rap vision. By refusing to walk any stylistic line, Run-D.M.C. has made an uncompromising album that shows how powerfully and naturally these two styles can be joined.

6. Talking Heads’ “Naked” (Sire)--This is a work of considerable range, with blessed moments that recall the giddy, life-affirming spirit of the Heads’ “Remain in Light” and the unsettling anxiety of much of the band’s early work. For all its influence and imagination over the last decade, the Heads have been somewhat cold and reserved. What makes “Naked” (recorded in Paris with producer Steve Lillywhite) so fresh is its more consistent humor and warmth. Always clever, David Byrne is more willing to exhibit some heart.

7. Graham Parker’s “The Mona Lisa’s Sister” (RCA)--Parker has a way of getting revenge on old foes (he once struck back at what he felt was an unsupportive record company in “Mercury Poisoning,” and he jabs critics here with “Don’t Let It Bring You Down”), but Parker re-emerges after years of commercial neglect and critical indifference to show that good work indeed is the best revenge. Key tunes explore feelings of disappointment and doubt, but there is also an endearing, uplifting spirit based on faith in one’s abilities.

8. Lyle Lovett’s “Pontiac” (MCA)--If Randy Travis and Jimmie Dale Gilmore represent today’s best in polished and wind-swept (respectively) alliances with country music tradition, this Texan with a Tom Waits-like fondness for eccentricity in both hair style and musical identity represents the music’s most imaginative expansion. Alternatively cynical and wise, innocent and hopeful, Lovett can be as evocative as Kris Kristofferson or as independent as Townes Van Zandt.

9. The Pogues’ “If I Should Fall From Grace With God” (Island)--The wildness of this Irish band’s boozy pub-rock persona shouldn’t obscure the songs’ clear-eyed observations about matters of conscience and heart. Also produced by Steve Lillywhite.

10. House of Freaks’ “Monkey on a Chain Gang” (Rhino)--The L.A.-based duo of Brian Harvey and Johnny Hott combines influences as rich as John Lennon, John Fogerty and Lightnin’ Hopkins into unusually thoughtful and affecting tunes about searching for values and emotional balance in the wake of disappointments and loss.