Re: A-J News: Prince reclaims name

From: B. Graff (b.graff@mailcity.com)
Date: Wed May 17 2000 - 07:53:02 MET DST

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    Not to go off on a tangent, but....
     
    >Prince, charging that Warner Bros. exercised >too much control over his music, switched his >name to a symbol in 1993.

    Having read the excellent _Prince: the First Decade_ by Per Nilsen, I think Prince's claims that he didn't have any control or power with Warners are pretty much lies and the complaints of a spoiled artist. From the beginning of his career, he got pretty much everything he demanded (a 3 record deal instead of the average 1 or 2; self-production as an 18 year old; arrangements to release his excess material via the Time, Sheila E & Vanity 6 [he wrote and played everything on all of their albums]; Warners funding for his movies, etc) but whenever stuff didn't go exactly his way he got all pissy. In the end, I think he wanted out of his deal because he realized he could make more money doing his own distribution.

    I think Prince is/was a genius, the last classic "traditional" (i.e., before hip hop) artist we'll see but you have to take his comments with a grain of salt, especially when you consider how little creative input he gave to his proteges -- which included firing Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis from the Time because they had the audacity to start doing outside production work and dictating to George Clinton how his work on Paisley Park would sound.

    Anthony

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