I just don't get it.
Here is the man who had hit single after hit single back in the day. Even his lesser albums had excellent singles released that kept the album in the charts. So wtf happened after the album ?
For example what went through Prince's mind when he released the tragic betcha by golly wow as a single from the 3cd set that he was born to make. That cd had tons of singles with hit potential. Same with the greatest romance
...the list goes on.
Now we have another pop chart friendly cd in 3121 with a major label and what does he release as a single ??? te amo Boreazon. Hey i like the song on the album & the vid is great, but my mum could tell u it aint a single.
Sure i give Black Sweat some cred, however we now get fury when we should have had lolita after Ai. Even incense or love would have been the obvious choices next. Fury is another poor choice.
So tell me does Prince choose the singles off the album? Did warners back in the day or Prince? Because now i don't understand why he makes another modern pop cd, signs with major label and then releases the worst songs as singles. People are blaming radio but i cant, because the singles choices being made are terrible.
Just my 2 cents.

I agre with u...poor choice of singles..or not enough of them...
i love Fury..but i dont think it gonna get radio play,like some of the others might have...Look what happen when Sweat came out...The album hit #1... You know it didnt hit #1 cause of "Te amo Coreazon.....You know theres gotta be some executives telling him what would be in his best intrest...But im sure P has the final say,when it comes to picking them.....And i doubt any executives got the Balls to dissagre, or say they dont like his dissisions.

My opioion...truthfuly i dont care what singles he releases....
As long as he releases something

Prince insisted Kiss was released as a single when Warner execs couldn't hear any hit potential. Hard to believe now but true, this came from an interview with engineer David Z:

In fact, it did produce some drama before it was released. Z says the feedback that came to him from Prince's record label, Warners, was palpably negative. “The A&R guy said it sounded like a demo,” Z remembers. “No bass, no reverb. I was devastated. But Prince had been selling big numbers, and he had a kind of power that few artists at that time did, probably more than any artist ever will again. He told Warners that that's the single they were getting, that that's the one they were putting out. He basically forced Warners to put it out.” Lucky Warners. The record went to Number One in the spring of 1986, and solidified Prince's stature as The Artist To Be Reckoned With.

So Prince certainly used to be ahead of the game in regards to picking singles. As for 3121, everybody has their own favourites for what should be a single. I never thought Te Amo was right for a single, but it did get quite a bit of airplay in some countries. Black Sweat was a great choice for single, I really can't understand why it didn't do better, other than it should have had b-sides and club remixes. After the relative failure of those singles it was evident that no matter what singles Prince puts out, they will fail unless Prince promotes them himself more by playing the actual song on tv shows and doing interviews. Other than that, I think he's now seen as more of an album artist than a hit single one, if even that - it's just been too long since he had a big hit.

metalorange said:

Prince seems to exacerbate the 'singles' problem by playing non-single album tracks on shows.

If he went out and played his latest single on every show (like most artists) rather than chopping and changing, he would be more likely to get the song into people's brains.

If Fury is the single choice, then I can't see why in the fuck he chose to play lolita & satisfied on American Idol. Okay, so it gives people a 'taster' of the new album, but many songs are growers and need repeated listens.

Actually, I quite like the single choices for 3121 so far. Three singles, all aimed at completely different markets. However, I do agree that "Black Sweat" could have been an even bigger hit had it been released with remixes, extended versions and samples etc. DJs would have been playing it non-stop.

But Prince really hasn't been a "singles" artist for a long time - at least since Diamonds & Pearls IMO (apart from maybe "TMBGITW"). He's been more focused on promoting albums and tours rather than making charts or getting on the radio. I just don't think there's much money in it for him anymore. There's no way he's going to be able to compete with the younger acts in that regard.

Controversy said:

yeah that had to be one of the worst single choices ever.

i disagree about "The Greatest Romance" though since that is a very
good song. it failed to chart because prince/arista fucked up with
the single since there was no video to push the song on tv until it
had already fallen off the charts again.

radio played it quite a bit though and there was generally a lot of
interest in the song.

The point about Prince having "hit single after hit single 'back in the day'" is a bit of skewed rose-tinted view.

If one looks at the chart positions, it's more a case of fair-to-middlin', with spikes of success.

Case in point: the Parade singles, the Lovesexy singles etc.

After TBMGITW, it seemed Prince was enamoured with the idea of replicating the success of that drippy hit by releasing further ballads as the lead single - This has rarely shown any signs of success, as it always feels like an anti-climax and kind of smudges over any momentum of a new project.

Case in point: Emancipation, Rave.

IMHO, it would make much more of an impact by going for a one two punch of two upbeat numbers, and saving the ballad for single 3 or 4.

The singles market is rather different these days than what it was 20 years back, as is the popular music industry in general, especially for artist like Prince who is past his commercial peak as a 'new exciting talent' (as it were).

Because of this, I wouldn't worry so much about the singles choices these days, rather the overall content and quality of the releases. Specifically where singles are concerned; Prince doesn't do himself ANY favours by releasing 1 track CDs, or only using album tracks as b-sides. If his biggest market is the existing fanbase, then getting them to boost a single's chances of success has to be by including material on the singles that they can't get elsewhere.

This means: B-SIDES, exclusive mixes, videos, content.

I haven't bought a single since TGRES because they just haven't been worth bothering with any more.

toejam said:

All artists are focused on promoting albums, and many of them do it by promoting singles. That's the only reason record companies still bother with these loss-leaders.

anyways, i don't buy his singles anymore for the same reason as NouveauDance. No point, just to receive tracks you already own / some shitty remix.
[Edited 6/12/06 8:22am]

disagree about lots of singles on emancipation....i thought betcha by golly wow was the obvious choice for a first single and it did well in the uk considering it was released after the album, reaching number 11 and was on the chart for two months and got good airplay, i dont think anything else would have done as well and it was in the same vein as his uk number one two years previous, tmbgitw....so there
[Edited 6/12/06 8:58am]

He hasn't released a truly great single since Hate U, in my opinion.

Some good, but none I could call great.

I think fury is a great choice and after that have lolita as the next.

Omadon said:

I think you put your finger on one of Prince's biggest problems. I thought
Black Sweat had great potential as a hit single. He should've added a few
club mixes and extended version to get it played in the clubs too.

However the main problem was that Prince didn't promote the single at all!
Yes, he went on TV shows, but did he play Black Sweat?... No. He played Fury
instead. Was Fury a single at the time?...No, Black Sweat was. He needs to
realise that these days you have to keep hammering away with the same track
on as many formats as possible to have a hit, not playing random selections
from your album, and not playing the single!!

He pulled the same stunt with Rave. Instead of Playing The Greatest Romance
on every show he appeared on, he consistently plugged Baby Knows instead!
(which was never even scheduled as a single release), plus of course he didn't
make a video for Greatest Romance until months after it had been released!
[Edited 6/12/06 22:27pm]

blackbob said:

Betcha was a soppy piece of shite. Terrible cover and the worst video i've ever seen. No way was this the obvious choice for first single.
I could name 10 better songs off that box set which would have done better.
Please also dont compare tmbgitw to betcha....cos it aint even close.

Controversy said:

ustabee

it wasnt the single

it was the b-side

but that was long ago

I thought the greatest romance thats ever been sold was a bad choice to be the first single (if at all) off of rave.

Controversy said:

I thought prince did a good cover of that song. I thought he did a bad job on every day is a widening road

kpowers said:

Well im glad you like it and I agree with winding road.

kpowers said:

Controversy said:

sorry but you are wrong...i thought it was a great version of a great song and it was his last sizable hit in the uk...the greatest romance wasnt a hit because it wasnt a good enough song ,the same with black sweat...good groove but no real melody and at the end of the day...it just wasnt good enough and thats the truth.

blackbob said:

Betcha was a hit in the UK??? How well did it chart? I'm not doubting you, i'm just suprised it did anything.

blackbob said:

Discussions about singles always go round in circles like this. You would have to prove to me that every single ahead in the charts at the time of Prince's single releases was 'good enough' to be there on merit alone - which I very much doubt. A not so great tune can do well in the charts with the right amount of promotion - radio play, video rotation, appearances, etc.

As for Betcha, I thought it was a pretty poor choice for single, but yes it did do well in the UK relatively speaking (11). It was a poor choice as much because it was the first cover version Prince had released when really there was no need, for someone so famous for being an original song writer. Prince got a lot more radio airplay back then off the strength of his reputation and TMBGITW being such a big number one for him a while before. After Betcha, The Holy River reached 19 and was his last UK chart hit I think, with an appearance on TOTPs and a few shows in the UK, now was that a good or bad choice for single? Personally I think there were still stronger single choices on Emancipation ahead of that.

metalorange said:

Has Prince EVER done well with a ballad as first single? TMBGITW wasn't really in support of an album. It seems like an uptempo track to leadoff Emancipation would have made more sense.

Sleep Around, perhaps. A cool video, and a nice single edit.... some remixes... it could have been an excellent single.

Damned if I Do would have been a nice follow-up, and THEN go with a ballad.

Prince's single choices have consistently been horrible, and even when he's made decent choices he's sabotaged them by not promoting them properly.

The most famous and obvious example is If I Was Your Girlfriend, which very nearly completely derailed the SOTT album's success.

man they should have just released "Face Down" as a single.

better yet, he should have released "Days of Wild" as one,
soon as he got out of his contract.