An untouched vinyl version of a long-lost Prince album entitled the ‘Black Album’ have been discovered.

In 1987, Prince was planning to release The Black Album LP and ordered 500,000 copies to be pressed by record label Warner Bros. However, as the date closed in for release, Prince became obsessed with the theory that the album was ‘evil’ and demanded that all copies were to be destroyed.

Shortly after Prince passed away, a promo version of The Black Album became the most expensive vinyl record ever sold on Discogs when it was flogged for $15,000. Now, another copy has been listed on the same website priced at $27,500 (£20,600).

“In 1987 he was working at Columbia Records Canadian pressing plant in Canada,” explains former Warner Bros executive vice president and rare record dealer Jeff Gold, of Recordmecca.

“When ‘The Black Album‘ was pulled and the copies that had been made marked for destruction, he kept one copy for himself. He never realised its rarity or value until reading about the discovery of the U.S. copies in Rolling Stone and contacted me.”

Gold helped the seller list the item on Discogs which looks to have already been sold.