Lets start with The Netherlands, where i come from.

As i recall it Prince was really BIG in our country during Sign of The Times and also, but a bit less, during Lovesexy

His breaktrough in the dutch charts came with a few singles from Purple Rain, but as he was 'new' for the main public here, that wasnt his real breaktrough as far as see it.
Nonetheless, he scored hits after that with Raspberry Beret and Kiss and both ATWIAD and Parade became gold records. He was slowly getting a tight fanbase with those albums.

Both albums also scored very high in the 'album of the year' polls (i remember Parade being voted best record of 1986, by the 'serious' music journalists).
It were also those critics who were raving about Princes concerts in The Netherlands, during his parade tour.

So, when Sign of the Times came out that album truelly 'bombed' over here, going platinum (still not selling as much as U2's The Joshua Tree), I remember it being played at almost every (birthday) party i went to around that time, especially U got the Look was a very popular (party)song.
The reactions on his concerts in the Netherlands in 1987 were almost 'hysterical', people and press were all raving about the man, calling him the new genius of popmusic, naming him the best what had happened to pop-music since The Beatles, and so on.

When Lovesexy was released i remember that a lot of the new fans Prince had gained, were dissapointed with it. Their complain was often that tracks like Eye know, The title track and Positivity were TOO experimental, too difficult to listen to. Among those people Anna Stesia was often their most favourite song from the album.

Alltough the album did get very mixed reviews, Prince succeeded to give three big stadium concerts in Rotterdam because of his great live-reputation. The real fams were raving again, but i personally heard a lot of negative reactions from the 'newer' fans who were attending these concerts.

So, Lovesexy sold less then Sign, gold instead of platinum, Batman sold about as much as Lovesexy, but since then it slowly went downhill. Most albums untill The Gold Experience, did sell gold, but never reached the popularity peak he had during Sign.

Since 1996 his fanbase has shrunken further in the Netherlands, but i think there still remains a solid fanbase of about 20.000 people (on a population of 17 million) who buy almost all of his albums and download outtakes etc.

prince was big in the uk until id say 95

'88 he was bloody GOD in europe-and the NUDE tour sold out a record run of dates

tehn diamonds and pearls was massive.

of course i live in nz now(damn!) and i hear hes pretty big now-i heard a rumour hes playing a handful of gigs next month

USA -- Purple Rain

Never as big before or since.

durham city-89-me mam heard someone at the bus station blaring out BATDANCE and imtimidating old folk.

i would say from 1999-sign of the times

ECLECTIC said:

usa

new power soul was probably princes biggest seller in the uk-number one(with a bullet naturally) for roughly 7 weeks.

COME ON as i recall knocked boyzone off the singles chart

the wembley stadium-new power gigs with larry graham were amazing-i went to all four stadium shows!

I'd say in the UK around 1989-90 he was most popular too , Batdance was damn nearly a number 1 single ( if sufficient copies of the single had been distributed it would've topped the charts I seem to recall ) and the Nude tour broke records .

do you remeber when batdance got to no.1 on the"network" chart