As a member you will receive at least 4 CDs

Remember when Year 2 was announced and some cynical Orgers suggested that a 'CD' may mean anything from a full album down to a CD single?
At the time, I thought that there was no way that Prince would rip us off like that and I signed up regardless.
How stupid was I?

ONA was an EP - fact. Half of it was available in Year 1, too.

NPGMC said that the CDs would be just like CDs you'd buy in stores.

Well, if I saw a CD in a record store for $25 ($50 if ONA Live is the last release of the membership) that was packaged in a crappy cardboard case and half the material was something that I'd already got, then that CD would stay on the shelf.

Then, there was six months of nothing...

Let me tell you about my 'live' experience.

After being a Prince fan since 1985, the dream of being able to see him live from one of the front rows was finally becoming not only a possibility, but a downright certainty.
On the day of the pre-sale, I tried over and over again on my broadband connection to buy a ticket to any of the shows in my area (UK Manchester or London). The website was painfully slow and would never allow me to get to the checkout page no matter how many times I tried. Finally, I was greeted with the Sold Out message - can you imagine how I felt???
After that, I was so pissed off with Prince and his crap club that I didn't want anything to do with the rip-off merchant. I didn't bother looking at the official site (there's no point looking at it at the best of times), or the Org - I was so annoyed with it all.
Think how I felt a few days later when I heard, from an unofficial source (yes, the Org) that tickets had been available all the following day! It would have been nice if the NPGMC had emailed local members apologising for the poor performance of the website and informing them that tickets for the shows were back on sale.

So now, I'm eagerly awaiting ONA live. Or rather, I'm not. I have no enthusiasm for it at all, as it will just remind me of a golden opportunity missed. I'm sure I'm not the only one who feels like this.

My NPGMC experience can now be summed up like this;

-One day in June when I received ONA (why didn't they have a CD ready for release the moment you joined?)
-One day in September of extreme frustration and several days after of incredible disappointment.
-One day in late November/early December when I receive (hopefully) a CD set of material that anybody will be able to buy anyway.
-A day next year when I receive an email asking me if I want to rejoin where I'll be able to tell NPGMC exactly what I think and they can completely ignore my thoughts.

-That's it!

If you're going to post a reply to this thread with a 'I think membership is worth the money' type reply, then please don't bother - I've already heard it. I am truly happy that you've enjoyed your membership, and I hope that your concert experiences were some of the best nights of your lives. I'm not being sarcastic here, I'm really glad that some people have felt that their $100 was money well spent (but please remember that your concert experiences cost a lot of $$$ extra!!!). I just wanted people to hear about my experience with NPGMC and realise that I'm not just complaining about nothing (although I'm sure someone will disagree). I'm sure that I'm not the only one who is in the same situation, either. And as for the people who joined in locations where Prince isn't even going to consider touring, I'm so sorry for you. You must feel totally ripped off!

Looking forward, I will be most intrigued as to how the NPGMC will progress (if it does). Downloads don't seem to be the way forward as most internet users are still on 56k connections and ultimately, a download is a download whether it's from an official source or an 'alternative' source. It's the same result either way and you can bet that most people will use the cheaper (free) route when it comes to it.
The CD route clearly hasn't worked either. Prince has been unable to provide 4 seperate albums and, now it's definite that the end of December means the end of 2002 membership, it seems more likely that ONA Live will be the final release of the year. (Strange but true, this is THE Prince who has boasted in the past of how many songs he's got in the vault. Are those songs not quite as good as you'd like us to believe Mr Nelson? Are you unable to make a decent CD or two out of those vault tracks?).

As a last comment, I would like to say that I have been, and still am one of the biggest Prince fans ever - I promise you. There's not one of his CDs that I won't listen to all the way through and enjoy (yes, even Rave). I have supported him constantly from '85 onwards and this post is written purely because of the disappointment that I've felt from his club. I still love Prince's music, but I'm getting more and more agitated about his business practices.

Ultimately, I would love to be able to eat my words. I would love to be Orgnoted on 1st January 2003 and told by some NPGMC supporter how stupid I was to doubt the club and asked how I feel about Xenophobia and The Best Of 0)+> that were sent out with ONA Live.
I would love my faith in Prince to be restored again.

Its amazing how much a paltry $100 a year can inspire such nuerotic over anlaysis and bitching from worthless losers. Why is anyone STILL crying about NPGMC?

Haystack said:

I like Haystack.

I think a lot of NPGMC members will agree with you.
I think he is going to have to pull one fucking amazing rabbit out of his hat to get many members to re-up for next year.

SOunds like plain ol sour grapes to me

I have noticed thast for every crybaby like this there are 3 people like me that took full advantage of the club and got more than $100 worth. I was front row at no less than 5 gigs and 2 aftershows (which were free to members). I went to the celebration and I was front row all of those 7 nights. I got the free CD single Prince gave us the last night. I got into the free soundchecks. I bought myself one of the cloud guitars through the members retail section.

I have had no problem ordering tickets for any gigs. I have had nothing but grreat expereinces as a loyal NPGMC member from day one.

Right on man, eye would love to eat the words eye've said also.. hopefully that will happen.

Eye totally agree with u Haystack, U've earned total respect for that letter from me.


Thanks for that, cause u basically said my same thoughts

Well, I will say that in year 1 of the club, I felt like the club was active at least one day per month when we could go and get the downloads. This year, when you boil it down, the club was "active" for me on these occasions:

1. The day I joined.
2. An awesome concert in April, during which my wife enjoyed 2nd row seats. Awesome.
3. The day I received ONA piano CD.
4. Who knows what will happen between now and December 31?

So, although my year 1 experience was 100% downloads, they did keep me jammin' for 30 days before the next set of downloads dropped. Year 2 basically featured one concert for me, which was great, but it didn't seem like a year-long experience of course. I nearly completely discount ONA piano as I heard 75% in year 1.

Just a comparison...that's all.

*
[This message was edited Sat Jan 25 16:52:57 PST 2003 by Enigmoid]

How the fuck did this thread get so many votes in such a short time? Wow!

Good points: I received the ONA CD and got to see the Detroit soundcheck

Bad point(s): I bought Detroit ONA concert tickets through Ticketmaster (with the NPGMC password). At that point, I had been a member for all of Year One and 1 month or so of Year Two. I got something like 22nd row, and the guy in front of me (who just joined THAT DAY) got better seats than me. The very front rows were just the public.

It was explained later that Ticketmaster screwed up in Detroit, and it wouldn't happen again.

hey what ever u say, i just ain't gonna read all that, its not my bedtime yet