Prince left Warner Bros and went down a new path as an independent artist who owns the rights to his own work. I support that. But couldn't one reason for the sparse airplay of his songs since the mid 90s be that no record company wants to fully market an artist who wants to own the rights to his own work?

Since the record companies don't get to own the recordings for the future they will make less money and so they will not market that artist enough, instead prioritizing other artists. Of course this lack of commitment towards a particular artist would end if all artists had fair deals with ownership of their own works. But that's not the case today.

Couldn't it be that Prince's music has been seldom on the radio partly because record companies don't want to fully commit to an artist who insists on owning his work?
[Edited 12/8/09 16:35pm]

That's nonsense. Arista, EMI, and Sony all promoted Prince's work when he had a deal with them. Part of the deal IS promotion. If they didn't fulfill that, it'd be a breach of contract, and he could sue them. He blamed Clive Davis for the failure of Rave Un2 The Joy Fantastic, yet he wouldn't listen to Clive when Clive tried to tell him (and rightly so) that "The Greatest Romance Ever Sold" was a HORRIBLE first single, and it should have been something else. He spent most of 1999 ignoring the album after a few appearances on TV early in the year. Who is Prince to tell Clive fucking Davis what's good? It's a battle of egos there, but Clive knows how to drive an album into people's homes, and promote the fuck out of it. His record is good, yet Prince and his know it all attitude got in the way of a good thing. "Baby Knows", "So Far So Pleased" should have been the first two singles, then "Man O War" as a 3rd single. But no...he releases that trashy "TGRES", then waits MONTHS to release a video. Who's not promoting at that point? PRINCE.

And how much detail has he given to LotusFlow3r since May? Little to none, other than pulling a few random songs here and there at one off appearances. The website is dead, and a total rip off (see here: http://prince.org/msg/13/324961) Half of Prince's problems with album sales isn't the material, or the record company....it's HIM, and his lack of interest in a project just a few months after it hits the streets. The list is endless, during and after the WB years.

The element with the lack of commitment is Prince. He's his own worst enemy.

Yes, WB had more interest in build up P's career. As far as long term goals, Prince has to look out for Prince now.

Taking more of a guess than a true learning experience...I believe that Prince has been an entrepeneur in his own field. Musically, Prince is a genius at his art, however the business and it's risk taking has cost him money and learning lessons. Prince appears to be generous with his knowlege and in turn mentors the newer artists to support the field of independent marketing.

In some cases for some people...The middleman may be a proper resource for airplay.

ernestsewell said:

As for the single choice for Rave I agree, it was bad.

The question concerning his projects is if it was always Prince who wasn't fully committed. Lack of good promotion, appearances etc. might be because of Prince, but it might also in some cases be because of the record company. Yes, they are obligated to promote, but that doesn't necessarily mean that their whole heart is in the project.

Perhaps Prince hasn't always been fully committed. But let's take a hypothetical example. I'm interested in the principle: Let's think of an artist who is really committed to a project and who wants to own the rights to his own work. Would a record company be equally committed to him as to another artist who didn't insist on owning the rights to his own work?
[Edited 12/8/09 19:03pm]

peter430044 said:

Those minute details are outlined in agreements and contracts. How much they'll put out, where, how big, how many of each...all that stuff. I saw Rave plackards all over FYE/Record Town, and a good deal at Best Buy. "Whole heart" doesn't feed or read into a contract full of specific terms.


Your first statement in this paragraph already gives Prince an excuse to be a lazy ass with stuff. "BUT" usually means "ignore everything I just said, here's what I REALLY mean". Not attacking you, just making note in general.

Any record company has a major stake in promoting an artist because they, as much as the artist, want to recoup their monies put into the project. It's business to them, but it's art to the artist. "Money and art don't mix" Prince once said. A year earlier he said, "Record companies work hard, and it shows. They know how to do their job and they do it well." (paraphrase) Even Prince knows the record companies do their job. However, you're right in that if Prince isn't into a project, why should the record company give a shit? If those are the rules we're playing by, then Prince has no right to blame Clive Davis, or whoever, for the failure of his album with the public. The record company can only work with what an artist gives them, either in product or effort after the fact.

There's a quite new dynamic when you have a distribution deal as Prince did w/ Arista. Clive wasn't there to produce or give advice on the music, especially not to a 40 year old artist who knows how to make music in his fucking sleep. So there's a line between pushing creativity and massaging an artist to get the best product, and bruising egos. Prince blames the man all the time, instead of taking responsibility for a crappy product, OR the efforts behind the project once it's released. LotusFlow3r is such a perfect example. SOTT is too.

ernestsewell said:

Some artists are thought of as more lucrative than others and get better contracts. The theory struck me that if the artist is not willing to let the company get the song rights, that also affects the contract and how much resources the company is willing to use. But someday probably all artists will own their work, I heard Prince talk about that, and I hope so too.

I didn't mean that it's excusable for Prince to lack commitment. I don't know if he's been fully committed or not, I wrote that to indicate that you might be right.

Prince's music is dated. He recycles the same beats and arrangements time and time again.
Who wants to hear a reworking of Gett Off.
The music is not 'airplayable'.
Seriously.

skoolteecher said:

Even without the recycling argument, it's true that a lot of his music isn't radio friendly. It doesn't mean he has to make bland (which he already does) music, but when he sets his mind to it, he can have a "Prince" song that is radio friendly. "Cream" is a great example of that, especially when his music was starting to waver. "Thieves In The Temple" is another. He NEEDED "Cream", because after the dismal failure of Graffiti Bridge, he wasn't being looked at as radio worthy.

It kind of relates to that Nelson George comment about, when Prince does a song, even for others, you know "you're getting a Prince record". It's a PRINCE production. That works sometimes, for radio, but most times it doesn't. His music tends to stick out like a sore thumb on radio, whether that's good or bad. While we all agree that radio could due with a shot of new spunk...it's unfortunate that people don't always see Prince as that syringe.

ernestsewell said:

To be extra clear, I didn't mean that a record company can be half-hearted about following a contract. Of course they have to follow specific terms completely. With whole heart I meant that perhaps the company is not willing to sign terms that are equally generous if they don't get the song rights? Seems to me that the promotion budget will be smaller, or at least the artist will get payed less.

But my thread deals with airplay so the main question is: how do radio stations decide which songs to play? Do the record companies give them better economic deals when they play certain songs, or do the stations decide all by themselves what to play?
[Edited 12/10/09 18:38pm]

peter430044 said:

I think its more complex than what most people think.

I remember when downloading started to cut into profits. The recording industry wanted a much larger cut from radio for spins. Radio countered that they would start to play local/regional independent artists!

You go to most alt/hard rock stations web sites and you will still find areas for local musicians to upload music and then a database of all the underground music from everywhere. They were threatening they would take the best of the best from the underground and spin them.

realm said:

Found an article that answered my own question. Apparently radio in the US doesn't pay labels or recording artists for playing their songs. Radio pays songwriters and music publishers. The article also deals with what you wrote about that the recording industry wants a bigger cut. http://www.wired.com/epic...organ-rad/

peter430044 said:

Found an article that answered my own question. Apparently radio in the US doesn't pay labels or recording artists for playing their songs. Radio pays songwriters and music publishers: http://www.wired.com/epic...organ-rad/

So record companies don't make any deals with radio stations who play certain songs. So record companies have no direct influence on airplay, in that way it doesn't matter wether an artist wants to keep the master recording rights or not.

What remains then is the indirect influence a record company may have on airplay. If the artist won't give away the master recording rights, the record company may only agree to a slightly smaller promotion budget. The smaller promotion budget then leads to smaller album sales which leads to less airplay.