What's up with the vault? Please fill me in!

Okay, it's possible that Prince has created a gazillion songs and another gazillion unreleased songs and that these still exist somehow somewhere...i mean, i truely think so but it's also possible that this vault and the unreleased songs that everyone is endlessly waiting for never really existed in the first place.

I don't know where or when this myth began, yes myth, because from what i gather, it's just a figment of someones imagination and there is no beginning or end to this vault story, just nothing more than 'Prince has a vault full of unreleased songs'.

So, what's the deal with the vault anyway?

COnsidering a couple of thousand of us have seen it and can verifiy it exists...

Well, I guess it means nothing since you wn't beleive it until you see it for youself. Your loss.

Dauphin said:

I don't know, please tell me what you know about 'it'...like what is 'it'?
[Edited 10/3/04 20:39pm]

Isn't there a picture of it in, umm, Chaos and Disorder I think?

Also, I know I've seen footage of it in at least one TV special.... Oprah, maybe? Beautiful Strange?

savoirfaire said:

and the songs? How are they kept?

Check out the book "The Artist Formerly Known As Prince" in there they have an interview that details when his vault was being built. Door is thick like a bank vault.

savoirfaire said:

There's a picture of it on his album called The Vault

Santana has something very similar -- has ALL kinds of stuff, very cool -- saw it on a tv show -- I think it's in his attic.

edit: now... "the hall of records" (and we're not talking vinyl) is something to wonder about!
[Edited 10/3/04 22:19pm]

Anita Baker was said that it looks like a large library.

His engineers also have told about being able to pick songs they wanted to pull out of the Vault for further mixing.

(oops i wasnt supposed 2 say that edit)
[Edited 10/3/04 22:45pm]

priceless said:

Oh..and Prince himself said that he needs to "make more room" because he has so much music that he is doing recently in an interview.

aint this the newbie who thinks LETITGO was an original video.....?snigger

this site is a place of study..do your homework then u may be allowed to ask silly questions or make daft statements.

jonylawson said:

I'm glad u said so...now what are you going to do about me?

we gonna teach ya good! now, ask another question and listen 4 the answer...

When I was at the first Celebration; during the tour they showed us "The Vault". It was a big room with a big lock on a medal door, and there was tons, and tons of reels-it looked like a library.


nn

neronava said:

Man imagine the temptation to just run on in there and grab an armful of those tapes! I imagine those reels would be analog tapes dating back years and years. Wonder if he is getting his engineers to transfer everything to Digital?

lets all hug the newbie..

Snap said:

another newbie here... I am actually glad the question was brought up... I have secretly wondered the same thing. After all, when Prince first came out, he was not black, then he was 1/2 black, 1/2 Italian, he was 16, then I am hearing about Mayte who is Puerto Rican was supposed to be an Egyptian princess. My point is, there have been some tall tales told to help create the mystery and persona of Prince. I was beginning to think the "Vault" was one of those tales. I am glad to hear that some people have "actually" saw not only the locked door, but looked in and seen reels and reels of tapes. I don't think P would go that far to maintain a fabrication. Would he?

prodigalfan said:

Many of us have heard some of the material...so we know what could be in there.

A small suggestion for those that are new...hang out a little bit. See what gets asked, don't make blanket assumptions, and respect some of the answers that are given. There are very knowledgeable people on here and they do know they are talking about

priceless said:

449 views. I think you scared some people.
[Edited 10/4/04 13:26pm]

jonylawson said:

Not a newbie, but equally skeptical. We all know the lengthy list of outtakes, remixes, concert recordings, etc. All that alone could fill a vault. BIG DEAL. We've heard 90% of that, through boots, trades, downloading, etc. Ten different versions of Come or Days of Wild don't add to his mystique. His legend is such that it's presumed that there are additional tapes featuring hundreds, if not thousands, of unreleased songs. If they've all been released on bootleg, then it's not such a big deal. And some of us think that most of it has already leaked out. Sure, some notable exceptions (Wally, Bloody Mouth), but they are so few and far between as to suggest that the vault isn't all it's cracked up to be.

If somebody wants to challenge that assertion, please provide something other than "I've seen the vault, it's a lot of tapes and looks like a library." That doesn't mean anything, unless you know what's on each tape. It could be shelves of drum loops and bass samples, and endless noodles without songs for all we know. If you know something substantial, spill it.

TheJourney4all7 said:

had me shaken for a minute

jonylawson said:



And I know someone who insisted on pronouncing LETITGO like Vitiligo.


Oh, wait... I'm a newbie too.
[Edited 10/4/04 14:33pm]

papabeat said:

Thing is, Prince isn't the only artist to have a huge collection of unreleased material. Hell, everybody has SOME unreleased stuff. The fact that he stores it in a vault is undoubtedly a deliberate measure to boost his mystique.

papabeat said:

You don't take the word of actual eye-witnesses?

Ever own a copy of a book by Uptown?

Their numerous books, over the years, have documented hundreds of uncirculating unreleased tracks. These books are based on actual interviews with dozens of ex-band members, engineers, ex-employees, they're based on hard physical evidence, such as studio logs and time-sheets.

Besides the several hundred songs that are circulating, there is roughly an equal number that it is documented, and not circulating (at least they haven't been bootlegged - traders have much more).

Who knows what has been recorded since Prince tightened the reigns in the late 90s, I do recall BorisFishpaw recently stated here on this board that virtually nothing is known about Prince's recordings since the mid-90s.

I personally think Prince's recording activities have slowed down, but the amount of fully-recorded unreleased songs, alternate/earlier versions of released songs and live recordings is staggering by anyone's calculations.
[Edited 10/4/04 16:23pm]

Dauphin said:

I'm one of those thousands and I can verify it exists.

every recording artist has things that haven't been released yet, it's just that p decided 2 put his in a vault, 4 some crazy, mystique-ridden reason. i have a lot of things in my unlocked "vault", but only about a quarter of it is finished. now if i shared just that quarter of my work, we'd be dancing for at least 4 years. and i write everyday. how much of this work in prince's vault is finished? how many finished remixed versions? all told, i have about 534 finished works, remixes and all in my "vault", and that's only about a quarter of the things i have written over the past 20 or so yrs. also, i am always finishing something, but it stays in there, until i ge good and ready 2 give it 2 u. just a guess, but p is prolly the same way. just a thought.

I bet you anything it is just exaggerated because Prince likes the whole mystique surrounding him and his music.

I'm not denying that it exists, but who really cares? When he releases shit like the High album (or half of the rubbish on The Chocolate Invasion) it really makes you wonder how bad some of that unreleased stuff must be...

I haven't heard a really great unreleased Prince track since the 80's anyway....

Oh, and the whole "do-your-homework-before-you-can-be-a-member-of-our-exclusive-club' attitude stinks and is very, very arrogant.

It's the old school mentality of "I-know-something-you-don't-know".

Get a life.

MattyJam said:

Who cares? We clearly all care or we wouldn't be discussing it. Who doesn't want to hear more Prince music from his shit-hot glory days.

And High and TCI were not Vault stuff, since that music was released in timely fashion after it was recorded, pretty much like most of his other albums, just they were released as downloads, not physical CDs.

I know that. That's exactly my point. If that's how bad his released tracks are, imagine how bad some of the unreleased stuff is....