Once again thank you all for all replies..

my point of discussion is:

as a fan (like you all) of Prince, and a fan that ONLY thanks to bootlegs (and respective bootleggers..) had the chance to hear those fantastic extended versions of the singles A and B-sides, i really would like to have the hypothesis of buying in some shop those songs in CD format, and not to have be searching for them weeks and weeks on the net, and to find them in a quality not comparable with the CD quality.
Bruce Springsteen, with his "Tracks" box-set and the bonus CD on the "Essential Springsteen" gave exactly that hypothesis to all his fans that wished to have, in a "legal" way.., all his vynil production not yet available in CD and even those songs never released because of space limitions and artistics reasons or whatever. He (Bruce) didn't gave anything free, what he "gave" is the opportunity of anyone, without necessity of having net, to buy (and thus enjoy) more songs from him. As a fan, i think a Springsteen fan is much more satisfied with this "commercial offer" from his idol that what Prince has been doing towards his own fans. Independently of the quality of the "Crystal Ball" songs, it's evident that a prince fan who paid for those 4 CD's should have been presented with much more minutes of music and a more "production quality" (a real booklet with inside information from the creator for instance..). Bruce did just that with his releasings..

Are we satisfied that we have to pay 0.99 Eur (or Dollars) for a 128kbp (or even less rate) mp3 file? That we have to make our owns CDs and if we really want a artistic Prince CD we have to do our own booklet and covers? That is nice if you choose to do it, it's really not nice if you are forced to do that... Pratically all these A and B sides extended versions were only available in USA, UK, Australia and Japan...for instance in my country (Portugal) i could only have accesss to 3 or 4 of those releases, what is pratically nothing.. These songs are extraordinary, are a proof of Prince genius, i'm deeply sad that i can enjoy Bruce work in all its amplitude and to do the same with Prince i have to behave as a kind of digital pirate...

Only depends of an artist what is released..Bruce, Orchestral Manoeuvres In The Dark, Pet Shop Boys, Bob Dylan, The Beatles and others decided that his fans deserved what they did with their expanded editions and special box-sets..didn't we all, Prince fans, deserve to have access at least to what was already released in vynil long ago, in the 80's? An artist without nobody to enjoy his work is nobody, if you sing a song and nobody listens to it, if you shot a photograph and nobody sees it, if you build a house and nobody lives there..creation is communication, if an artist doesn't communicate artistically with no one his work is empty, what he creates doesn't "lives", doesn't "breathes"...what is the use of creating songs if nobody or only a few guys in some places can enjoy it?

Wouldn't you like to have what you find on the net available as "legal" quality releases in some shop? Can you deny that you would like to have from Prince what Bruce fans are having with the "Tracks" box-set?? I have no doubt, all A and B-sides of Prince deserve (and we too) a commercial release with his total colaboration, not to talk about some chosen outtakes.. You can interpret the word respect in my tile as the respect a seller has to have regarding his client... a seller only survive with clients, prince would have to have a "normal" job if we, his fans, weren't giving our money for his songs, independently of the undoubtful quality of those songs..

I can tell you that the biggest genius of the Portuguese music died with a lot of monetary difficulties because he could never refuse to play his songs everytime someone or some group of persons asked him, almost all his gigs were made in response to any at-the-moment request and almost all of them without any monetary return, he did this all his life and even with his job as a teacher he needed his friends help to survive, and never the lack of money stopped him of creating more and more brilliant music, and that music only could make sense if it reached the people...for him the music he created belonged to everyone who felt happy by listening it, his music was a way of him feeling a part of this thing we call humanity...could Prince, with all his millions, that earns more with the sales of an album in USA than this man earned all his life, understand this way of loving music? I believe he can, but presently maybe not...

TheDeacon said:

why would the UNRELEASED stuff be under warner control?

Edu said:


I certaintly can't speak for everyone but I have heard a number of the un-released tracks and for every brilliant track there are at least 3 I think are garbage and better off left in the vault. I don't necessarily need to have every note of music prince ever took the time to record on cd. And I have been an avid fan since 1978.

I don't need 6 versions of "We Can Funk", or three versions of "Witness".
I would like to have a clear digital copy of A Better Place to Die" or the original version of Old Friends for Sale. However, don't want poop like Electric Intercourse, Wonderful Ass, All My Dreams, Girl O' My Dreams, etc. I don't want a bunch of outtakes from the "I'll do Anything" sessions. I could go on and on but I think you get my point. Everybody doesn't like everything. Which is what i said in my earlier post. Therefore there will always be someone unsatisfied, just as was the case with a number of the tracks on Crystal Ball.