ARRANGED in a mid-afternoon frenzy after The Enigma Once Known As

Prince let his extensive entourage know he wanted to play a club-sized

post-SECC show, local promoters MIG had to find venue, facilities, and

audience in less than 12 hours. They did. How was it?

Roadies pushed flight cases through the audience, asking us to ''make

a hole''. DJ's mixed Symbol-esque dialogue with previews of the New

Power Generation's evidently funktastic Exodus album.

At 1.51am, the NPG began an hour of inspired jam-session funk. If the

material itself was rarely staggering, TAFKAP's presence was that of a

real star not far from the peak of his creativity and freed from the

shackles big venues and audiences impose.

His vocals soared; his musicianship was nothing short of phenomenal;

his performance was as involving as it was intense.

The hitherto-unheard material draws on Sly Stone, George Clinton, and

James Brown, with one verse of Girls and Boys slipped in. The one truly

incendiary moment came when he told us to hold on to our wigs before he

picked up his bass and proceeded to career through Days of Wild.

It ended with a kiss for Mayte and the injunction to ''all go home and

have safe sex tonight''.

Inevitably, his own-brand Purple Rainmate condoms were available in

the foyer at #2 each.

As he escaped into the waiting stretch-limo which had reversed at high

speed the wrong way down one-way Sauchiehall Street for him, we knew we

would never be able to stare into the blackness of his Raybans from this

close a vantage point again.