This just occured to me as my wife and I were drinking wine and listening to classic music today, on a holiday. First we were chilling out to the box set Zep gift I bought her. But then I thought lets check out some other music that brings me back on youtube. We went from Michael Jackson to Bob Dylon, Garbage, Beatles, U2, Neneh Cherry, and on and on. Had a great time and that's why I'm writing you. And then I thought "youtube is a catologue of historic moments" and wished I could watch hours of classic Prince. I even mentioned to my wife that we would have hours to spend watching these classics and that people unfamilier with Prince and new fans would get a great deal of satisfaction from viewing his works. And then I thought even further and realized that Prince had wiped himself from the mainstream web probably because some cracker jack "web security co." talked him into thinking it was robbery or something.

Now I just feel sorry for Prince and every fan. Not only every fan, but potential fans who would learn about Prince from youtube. Its really a shame for something to happen to Prince like this when he was one of the first to get on the web and make his shit happen.
[Edited 12/25/07 22:11pm]

Rockability said:

I agree. Sometimes the delivery of material, takes away from a proper introduction of Prince...

Those of us that have been there from the beginning are blessed to have gone in succession with Prince's career.

Rockability said:

It's true. After the 02 concert, someone posted a cell video...just a small clip but it was really nice. If I only knew a little about Prince, I'd want to, at least, investigate after that. Unfortunately, it was removed soon after. This is the way the world communicates today...why remove yourself from it?

With the G-phone platform in the works and phones like this:

...YouTube videos will beamed everywhere, by everyone. You can't stop this...and why would you not want to be a part of it?

The only hopeful thing is that Prince seems to be inconsistent with some things. Maybe Google/YouTube will be one. Maybe in 08 we'll see a Prince channel on the Tube.

anon said:

I was thinking about that last night. I absolutely hate that Prince has taken himself away from youtube. I understand why he's doing it but I hate that he's doing it. I can get with eliminating the bootleg stuff but regular video and award show apperances? That's silly. Money isn't everything and I wish Prince would realize this. Maybe Prince can work something out that benefits all of us in 2008.

purplecam said:

I doubt it's a money thing as much as it's a thing of principle. Money just happens to be a part of that principle. It would be so easy to work this one out. He really should get new advisors, and do this.

yup.

Even the fan sites he sued back in the late 90s where doing one thing Warners and himself failed to do adequately--ADVERTISE!

How many folks here have read the posts on the Rock N Roll Hall of Fame guitar solo for While My Guitar Gently weeps? Folks who were not Prince fans absolutely were blown away for the most part.

You can't get advertisement like that if you pasted a 12 food poster smake dab in the entrance to Best Buy, or handed out free copies of , say--2 million CDs with a Sunday Newspaper.

anon said:

Amen to that.

Rockability said:

Of course we know this kind of thing has been going on for longer than youtube has been around.

I remember in the 90s Prince went out and hired a relatively unknown entertainment lawyer (who shall remain nameless). He could have had the full service of the cream-of-the-crop in New York City but he chose this one guy who was really known, amongst his fellow lawyers, for one thing: ruthlessly suing the pants off of people.

Prince's behavior with all of this is indicative of someone with "control issues." Unfortunately, its classic Abuser behavior. People who are abusive act out of an acute sense of lack of identity. This deep, painful conflict is dealt with, disfunctionally, through the need to control their spouse, their children, their employees, and in Prince's case his fans (and his employees, so I've heard).

Many of us mere mortals would scoff at the idea of a world famous rock star like Prince having "identity issues," but give it a thought... Think about Prince's life before and after he got famous, if you've read up on him.

>Prince's behavior with all of this is indicative of someone with "control issues." Unfortunately, its classic Abuser behavior. People who are abusive act out of an acute sense of lack of identity. This deep, painful conflict is dealt with, disfunctionally, through the need to control their spouse, their children, their employees, and in Prince's case his fans (and his employees, so I've heard).

>Many of us mere mortals would scoff at the idea of a world famous rock star like Prince having "identity issues," but give it a thought... Think about Prince's life before and after he got famous, if you've read up on him.



Well, for everything that has been said about Prince's identity issues and strange personal traits: I'm not sure what mortal/normal, healthy human being could reach the peak of stardom in his lifetime and emerge from this experience with his/her personality/sense of identity intact. If we agree that we are all shaped by our life experiences, this one must be an identity/personality-changing one on a revolutionary scale.

MisterTambourineMan said:

MisterTambourineMan said:

Yea, really well said, and a great thread overall. As much of a talent as he is musically, he's really fucking his legacy up big-time in this respect.

It is a terrible shame.

My mum often watches the videos of her teen and young adult years and it's introduced me to whole "new" eras I didn't even realise like Motown, glam rock etc

The thought that Prince is missing out on a whole new generation of fans is devastating.

He has that appeal, charisma and TALENT to still be HUGE today and he seems to do everything he can to make sure he's the exact opposite - unknown except for when he sues someone/thing which makes people angry and forget about the one thing he's trying to focus on :

THE MUSIC.
[Edited 12/29/07 3:54am]

I'm kinda like Prince, in that I should probably get me some new advisors.
My life is just absolute shit.

it makes me sad that music videos are getting smaller and more accessible though. everythings about access, and not about quality. unless it's your case and one wants to watch something older, most of the videos are junk and the arts not there.

Illustrator said:

It will get better