rumours were prince was behind the leak,so he could have a legendary bootleg classic.This could be true,back in the day i used 2 listen 2 the electrifying mojo in fact i was one of his biggest fans,he,s the one who got me hooked on prince,one night in 93 i turned it on mojos show he had prince special going on but it was different this time it was a live concert
of him singing these songs called rave,ill take u there,jus my imagination,housequake and dmsr,well i went crasy hearing this 4 the first time
so i immediately called the station up and mojos engineer answers the phone,it turned out mojo wasnt there cause he was out of town 2 atend his brothers funeral in florida,i asked hgim where could i find that concert,he replied that i couldnt and that it was a gift 2 mojo from prince himself and hinted that mojo had lots of rare goodies prince sent him,but i think i got him in trouble
tho cause when mojo came back,i asked him about the concert,i could tell he was shocked and mad! that he didnt want that material played on the air,so maybe it is true prince is behind at least some of the boots outthere

It would be cool to think Prince was the one behind the original Black Album bootleg and all the circulating outtakes and soundboard concerts etc, but I've yet to hear any solid evidence that he's leaked anything intentionally. I'm sure he sends recordings to friends, bandmembers, record executives etc on the condition that no one else can listen to them. The fact is that sometimes these gifts get in the wrong hands and next thing you know everyone's got a copy of them!. As for The Black Album, they had already pressed a few hunderd copies before Prince abandoned it, so it's not suprising that it got out.

Cool little story about Mojo - sounds like the Small Club boot you're talking about.

It was 87, way before net tunes or the New Power generation, this is 80's Prince here. Someone at the pressing plant, took a mother and cut some wax out of it, and passed the copies around, some got to bootleggers.
Prince claims the album was written when he was very depressed, and didnt want it 2 get out. He claimed it was by one of his negative personalities of the time (Spooky Electric).
I don't know why he pulled te plug, its very good, not as good as S.O.T, but betta than Lovesexy and Batman.

Remember, it was cancelled from release just 7 days before it was due to hit the shelves - it had already been pressed.

When the pressing plant was ordered to destroy all copies, it wouldn't take a genius to snag a few copies, and it wouldn't take a genius to get a copy, copied, and get it out there.

This is one of the most (in)famous, and written about stories in Prince's career. Give a hoot, read a book.

tane1976 said:

No.


Record Service GmbH,WEA, Alsdorf ( close to Hamburg) , Germany.


Record pressing plant.( Warner Bros.)




They didn´t cut some wax out of it, they saved a certain amount of records ( hundreds? thousands?) from destruction.

terrystarr said:

That's a strange conclusion you draw. Prince is giving music to Mojo which ends up getting played on air so that means Prince is behind bootlegs?
[Edited 11/4/05 5:08am]

RepoMan said:

Repoman ,you are such an expert on Prince

Nikki23 said:

That has nothing to do with being an expert or not. If Prince thinks you're cool and decides to give you a tape which you pass it on to a friend, sell it, broadcast it or whatever, then how does that mean Prince is behind bootlegs being leaked?
[Edited 11/4/05 5:34am]

I'm surprised Mojo would get mad about a concert boot being playing on his show. I remember one night in '88 that Mojo played the entire Black Album on his show. He would interupt every once in a while and say, "shhh...The Black Album." I'm sure it was either '88 or '89 because I was working at KMart at the time, and stayed in the stereo department listening to it the whole time.

RepoMan said:

I think u jus anwsered ur own question,rather prince intentionally leaked them or not,buy giving material 2 so called cool friend or friends he put himself in that situration,u cant say that some of the boots didnt get out that way ...so 1 could say that prince is behind some of the boots that got out!

terrystarr said:

Some fans just want to believe Prince was behind it when there's no evidence of that at all. Talk to some people who worked for him or collectors who got tapes that he gave to girls or engineers. The only thing that can be said is that Prince was never particularly interested in the whole bootlegging scene until he went independant.

Anything else is pure speculation.

KoolEaze said:

Yup.

My GF worked in a record store (FOOKS Records) in Heerlen (NL) at that time.
They had a frequent visiting customer who also was a bit of a Prince freak.
One day he cam in with a plastic bag full of Black Albums (approx. 8-10)
He told my gf that he got 'em from his uncle who worked at Record Service. He sneaked them out when they were destroying the whole pressing. The LP's were pressed, packed and ready for shipment when suddenly they had to be destroyed.

I bought one from him and the store manager bought one as well.
Dunno what he did with the other albums.

A few weeks later he got the Lovesexy CD weeks before it was released.
I didn't even had a CD player at that time

TweetyV6 said:

That pretty much tallies with story I read in Q magazine in the UK. They did an article on a UK record collector who paid £12,000 for one of the saved copies.

Basically somebody was told to burn all of the prints, but they decided to save a few (I seem to remember 8).

Allan

headhunter said:

Fortunately, I only payed HFL 50,- for it. (approx USD 25)

I don't even have the Black Album. Is it even any good? Was it originally titled the Black album when he DID plan to release it? If so, when you name an album the Black album.....it's obvious that he leaked it out on purpose for a scandal and publicity. If not then sorry to talk about something, when I have no clue what I'm talking about!

luv4all7 said:

luv4all7 said:

It originally had no title. It appeared on the Warners released schedule as "Something" by "Someone".

If you listen/read the lyrics to Le Grind, the spoken intro gives the album's unofficial title, The Funk Bible. It was never intended to be 'the next Prince album' after Sign O' The Times, that was Graffiti Bridge - it was gonna be a side release, with no mention upfront of Prince - much like Camille was to be before it, and the Madhouse albums, all from same time frame.

The title, The Black Album, simple comes from the easiest way to describe it, because of it's all black cover, and of course The Beatles had The White Album - and it stuck.

Prince didn't leak it, he wanted the copies destroyed - the mythology around the album was somewhat placated by it's official release in 1994, but fans still wonder about the intricacies of the events that led to it's cancellation. Unfortunately, as you can see in this thread, fact and fiction are all too easily jumbled up.

For the best account read Per Nilsen's DMSR.

//
[Edited 11/4/05 12:31pm]

I don't know, I'm kinda thinkin' maybe he was behind b'cuz in the video for Alphabet St. it says don't buy the Black Album and then on the 1st song on Black, LeGrind, Camille (Prince) says something like good I'm glad U found me. Think about it. I had an orignal album in '88. Prince really wanted 2 change the direction of his music then and he knew his fans would have a hard time adjusting 2 it. So if a fan really wanted 2 hear that type of music from him then they would simply have 2 gi in search of and find it. But 4 Prince it was time 2 start his spiritual revolution. But of course Camille reared his funky head again on the B-side (Black side) of I Wish U Heaven.

vinyl?

TweetyV6 said:

NouveauDance said:

Very good! P wanted to call it "The Funk Bible" but, changed it cuz he didn't want to offend anyone. This is what I have always thought; P doesn't do anything without thought. Therefore, he wouldn't have cut a whole album, then afterwards think "No, this is evil...I can't release this." Nah, P KNEW the vibe of the material before he even started cutting it. I do think he wanted a bonafide bootleg out that he had control of. A party album. A street album. Look, this was off of the heels of MANY blacks saying that P had sold out like a motherfucker with UTCM and that he didn't like black women, etc. That shit pissed him off, so to answer that, he's going to come out with some hard ass, wicked shit like "Bob George", "Le Grind", "2 Nigs/ West Compton", etc. That's P saying "Look, ya'll think I'm not funky?! Ya'll think I've gone soft? O.K., here's something for ya'll." He knew the shit was too rough to release as an "official" album, but he knew it was going to get heard. He wanted his "street cred" back. And to answer the "he doesn't like black women" what does he do? SOTT breaks out with Boni AND Cat in the forefront. They were the reverse of Lisa and Wendy.

blackguitaristz said:

I quote:


Of course I know some people will say it's a lie and believe that what they THINK is true rather than someone who was close to Prince at the time it all happened.

RepoMan said:

I can dig it, player. Opinions are just, opinions. I just gave mine, that's all. Anyone could take what Fink said as gospel,... or not. That's the beauty of it all.

Problem is PRINCE should have this PUNK FUCK U ATTITUDE and SCARED OF NOTHING.. DEVIL or NOT.... Ministers will tell you DO NOT FEAR! THAT is the DEVIL....People who R Not fans or Critics saying Shit are JACKASSES and SHOULD B Banned. Ya Don't LIke HIm? Then ya have No PLACE EVER Being AROUND HIM....Ya JERKS! Ya Have NO Taste and NO Good OPINIONS ANYWAYS!!! STAY at HOME Listening to GILBERT O SULLIVAN...ALONE AGAIN..... NATRALLY.....LOL... Only COOL and YOUNG Should B WITH PRINCE ANYWAYS....LOL....Go take ya EX-LAX...!
[Edited 11/4/05 15:33pm]

BEAUGARDE said:

Yeah!
I always wondered what the motivation for that black-labelled Camille b-side was!!!
Makes one wonder, don't it?


Prost!

I bought the Black album on tape as a Bootleg on St Marks Place from those sidewalk vendors in 87 for 7 bucks. LOl...

nayroo2002 said:

P is an artist and a true artist's job is to keep one guessing and to be entertained at the same time.

ufoclub said:

Black album in vinyl, yes. The original LP

Zelaira said:

I remember that dude!!!! I got all my Prince boots from him.....he was alway right their right off of third ave.....right in front of the hotel.....do you remember the graphic artist guy who used to make home-made pics of Prince in different situations??? I got one called "little red corvette" with Prince in a red suit.....anyway moving on.....
[Edited 11/5/05 11:51am]

Zelaira said:

I think I got my 1st copy at that same vendor.
Around '87 sounds about right.
The copy I bought ran a tinny bit fast
so years later when I got my 2nd copy
it sounded slowed down.
I think that was the first bootleg I ever bought.
Yeah at St. Marks.
I'd heard about it & I couldn't believe I found a copy.
I think I paid $10.
I almost didn't buy it because I thought it was too expensive.

BEAUGARDE said:

You're thinking way too much about it. THINK about the concept of the album. THIS. WAS. NOT. THE. NEXT. PRINCE. ALBUM. It was gonna be released as is, with a black cover and no mention of the artist. The intro to Le Grind is congratulating the purchasee on finding the album, as if it was underground. Of course it wouldn't take long for it to become common knowledge that Prince was behind it, but that's kind of the point - It's an "underground" record, to silence the critics and those detractors who thought, since Purple Rain, he was selling out to a white audience (as some saw it).

BEAUGARDE said:

Now you're just making stuff up.

The Black album was almost exclusively made up of previously recorded material, a lot like the released Graffiti Bridge, C&D and OF4S.

There is a largely a logical and clear progression in Prince's music, the progression from SOTT to TBA and Lovesexy can be clearly heard in the Paisley Park releases (namely Madhouse) and the out-takes that are circulating from this era. The Black album was not leaked by Prince as a way of testing out new sounds, accept the facts and opinions of those who worked closely with Prince at the time, since their accounts match very closely.