Back in the day, Prince used to always release some kind of 'home-video' every couple of years, whether it be a movie, concert film, video collection or whatever:

1984 Purple Rain
1985 Prince & The Revolution Live
1986 Under The Cherry Moon
1987 Sign O The Times
1989 Lovesexy Live
1990 Graffiti Bridge
1992 Diamonds & Pearls / Gett Off Video Collections
1994 3 Chains O' Gold Video Collection
1994 The Undertaker
1995 The Sacrifice Of Victor
1998 Beautiful Strange
2000 Rave Un2 The Year 2000
2003 Live At The Aladdin, Las Vegas

We've gone almost 7 whole years now without one

And it's not like he hasn't had the opportunity to cash-in: The Musicology tour and the London O2 shows were some of the biggest grossing tours of the decade. DVD releases of one of those soon after would have sold like hot cakes!

And now more recently, we've had the Montreux Jazz Festival appearance in August last year. And of course, anyone who knows anything about the festival knows that there's a whole series of 'Live In Montreux' DVDs that spans some of the most ecclectic and respected artists of our generation (see http://astore.amazon.com/...TF8&node=2 for a list of artists who have gone the 'Live In Montreux' route).

Yet here we are. Five months after the event and not even a peep about a possible upcoming release of that show. Hmmmm.

So my question is: Why do you think Prince is so reluctant to release DVDs nowdays? Do you think he doesn't see it as a profitable venture anymore? Has he not been happy with his performances? Does he not want to overexpose himself? Is there some kind of contract dispute? What's up Prince?!!

It would be cool if Prince sat down at his home piano belted out two or three songs and posted it on Lotusflow3r. Heck, he could just post it for a week and take it down if he wanted to. It wouldn't cost much. Or perhaps just sat down with his guitar played a jam or two for the site. We fams don't ask much. Do we?
[Edited 1/7/10 22:21pm]

Well, I don't know about official releases but there are plenty of his 2009 performances on video in circulation!

poetcorner61 said:

don't tease me. I hate when people do this. I'm clueless cuz I don't know where to find these things.

NONSENSE said:

It's not a matter of asking for it, it's more a curiosity as why he doesn't do it any more.

(My first post here)


Well, I'd speculate, that since Prince doesn't have a big company like Warners behind him to do marketing, pressing and distribution, he would probably have to go out and find himself some unique, individual business deal for the release of a DVD.
And I gather, that Prince's heart lies with his music, and he only cares about that enough to be bothered to involve the likes of Columbia and Sony in order to get it out to the general public, whereas I think he these days probably thinks to himself that his live shows are for the attendancees at the venues exclusively..

Cravens said:

exactly!!
This is why we don't get a proper jewel case when he releases an album now too.

Cravens said:

That's a logical explanation for the most part.

squirrelgrease said:

Yeah I agree. He wanted to be "free" from record company contractual obligations and record companies are always looking for ways to cross sell. Warner would have had a product roadmap of home videos/dvds. (Warner Home Division). Also they have budget for these things and I am guessing Warners put up money for video productions at a set marketing percentage and part of that can be recouped via home videos and DVDs. I think alot of its about money and its probably hard to make money on music/concert DVDs these days unless you are a major record company who can afford to produce them as they produce them in quantity. As a one off, they can be very expensive to produce and now Prince has to either fork out the cost himself and try to recoup it himself, or do a zero risk up front deal where he gets an advance, makes his money up front, and sells the rights. I do agree though Montreux would have been a perfect choice, they recorded it, it seems they could have organized the production and manufacturing and distributing/publishing. It doesn't look like its going to happen though.

funkylust said:

Prince could always package a DVD with a CD release as many other artists do these days, though mostly done in limited editions and there usually is some kind of tie-in with the CD theme itself. He does seem to have many professionally filmed concerts just sitting on the Vault shelves, since we've all seen the multi-angle camera set-ups at his shows. But yeah, a stand-alone DVD might incur a cost that Prince and any potential distributors might balk at.

Anthony Malzone(sp?) did mention that he created a design for a Prince DVD recently, probably the Montreux gigs.

Even most low budget standup comedians these days sell a DVD at their merchandise stands after their shows.I don´t think it is based on commercial decisions. The Alladdin Las Vegas DVD was released post WB .
My main worry with new DVD releases is the editing. The Rave and the Alladdin DVDs were horrible releases compared to any of the WB related releases.I would appreciate a down to earth, simple, straight up release like the Undertaker, just Prince and his band in action, no gimmicks, no cheesiness, no corny audience shots like in the Rave release, just straight music, no guest stars like Nikka Costa on Alladdin, just Prince and his band, preferrably Sonny and Mike B.

With Prince its not about releasing music anymore. Its about getting a phat advance.

poetcorner61 said:

Which is probably why he doesn't waste his time putting out DVDs of his performances because he knows the boots will be out faster than he could have his own DVDs pressed.

I will never forget that at the June 16, 2006 Bryant Park show, while many of us were on line waiting to go in around 7:30am in the morning for that concert, some guys were going around trying to sell boots of the NYC Nokia 2006 performance with Tamar and Prince.
[Edited 1/8/10 8:45am]

IF Prince ever fucks another fan (ie: Mani) then he will be successful again! The first time he did, she who was supposed to have been on these Prince boards before she met him.

She told him what to do and settle down with this "Prince BS" and what happened he made $89 Million in 1 year with a tour, did tv performances every couple months in 2004.

Sooo if he ever fucks another fan, he will make some serious money again and we will get product!

Hottest Chick on here start showing up at clubs he is at in LA & Vegas and help us all out.

Who owns the old music videos like "Let's Pretend We're Married" and "Automatic"? Is that Warner Brothers? If so, they should just say "fuck Prince" and go ahead and release DVDs without his permission.

vainandy said:

Yeah, makes me wonder if he truly has say so over EVERYTHING that WB wants to put out. And what repercussions could they face from him if they did just release a comprehensive DVD set (like George's TwentyFive). They really should have done that with The Hits. That DVD was ridiculous.

Remember the greatest hits CD that came out right before "The Rainbow Children"? Didn't they release that one without his permission? If they did, then it seems like they could do the same thing with the music videos. If they wait around for Prince to give permission with his goofy so-called "religious" state of mind, they'll never be released on DVD. Just give him the finger and release them anyway.

vainandy said:

Well I would think they would have had permission based on the fact that he had final say so with Ultimate, because we know the story on that one. Very Best Of was pretty generic. Ultimate he had more input on. There's a Wikipedia page on that. I'm with you.....just fuck him and release that shit.

But I'll say it again, it will take Prince dying before we see that stuff, if at all. WB might still have the mentality to not touch his stuff and let it rot for the sake of sticking it to him forever. However, he could also have the same mentality with his whole "I don't think about the past" bullshit, and will forever refuse to put anything out like that.

Doesn't it dawn on Prince that - well....he obviously keeps tabs on what people say about him, because he addresses it on TV shows and in interviews. So he knows when people poo poo on his music, or his protege/fuck buddies/bracelets with a vagina. That being said, he also has to hear when we're pleading for stuff to be released, yet he ignores that, knowing he could make some easy cash from it (hello Mr. Lion's Share), but he'd rather hock some mediocre Jehovah's Witness nonsense that people would rather use as toilet paper than really dig into and enjoy.

It's like sending a kid to camp. The kid throws a fit because he doesn't want to go there. Yet once he gets there, he fully enjoys it. That's like Prince and the past. He claims he doesn't want to go there, yet when he does (by playing the same old songs over and over), he has fun with it, so why not have fun and release that shizness.

because, as it has been said many times before, prince is a very bad business decision maker.

cborgman said:

I wouldn't say P is a bad business decision maker. Because what he's doing obviously works. Perhaps his thoughts are "less is more." To give the fans and general public just enough so they'll want more. He seems content with his level of success. IMHO, Prince never felt comfortable with the "Purple Rain" megastar. No doubt he still wants to be a successful artist but he doesn't want the craziness that comes with it.
[Edited 1/10/10 4:51am]

NONSENSE said:

Well, he never thinks 'less is more' with his output of cd's and i don't think putting out a dvd will bring him Purple Rain popularity again....but i don't know either. Think it's a shame. Would love to see a Parade- of Lovesexyshow in good quality. Maybe he just wants to forget about the past?

robertlove said:

the amount of production has nothing to do with it because his sound changes. Prince could have released 5 similiar sounding follow ups to Purple Rain. But then again he didn't. Why? There are always b sides and quality album songs that could have been hits but were never released. Why? The way he picks and chooses when and where he performs isn't a fluke. Some say it's because he's a bad business person. I say it's because it's how he does things partially because he never wanted the megafame of an Elvis or MJ. He's still huge but he still has some kind of privacy, normalcy.
[Edited 1/10/10 7:08am]

NONSENSE said:

he never leaves 'em wanting more. he floods the market with cds. he releases more than a cd a year.

and he makes terrible business choice. he has for years.

cborgman said:

Prince perplexes me.
For someone who emerged in the 90s as what looked to be an Internet pioneer, he's fucked so many things up it's astounding.

He's problem is much more in his regular 'management' and execution than it is in vision. It still blows my mind the guy can not create a website which makes his music available to the world, or he can not set up a distribution deal with 'iTunes'--now the one of the world's biggest (if not THE biggest) music retailer.

For such a creative guy he ota ass FAILs sometimes.

cborgman said:

Well, in this particular case, with the DVD's, I'm not so sure it's necessarily a bad decision to not release live stuff (or just his post-Warner video's, which even I would buy). Is he that big in this day and age, that a world wide DVD release could possibly be worth the expenses? Is his fanbase really big enough by now? Look at how many DVD's other artists are able to pull (I think Madonna's Celebration-thingie moved like some 100.000 items, and she of all people have promotion in her back hand and the advantage of using her past 80's hits to push current sales).

Although, yes, I admit, I have no idea, how the economy is behind a DVD release.

He could however easily open up a virtual shop on his lotusflow3r.com and sell directly to his fans.. but then again, lacking to do that, and do it successfully, only proves your point.

Cravens said:

given that he released a few dvds post-WB and has made the fan sites and youtube pull all videos, i think it's safe to assume he has an interest in them.

and it isn't expensive to make dvds. my computer makes them and they can be bought for VERY cheap, particularly in bulk, meaning almost nothing but profit. celebration even if it only sold 100,000 probably made them a million or more.

and his fans are very very VERY dedicated to giving him money for little to nothing. look at the lotusflower.com fiasco in which he charged fans 8 times the amount to get the album, a t-shirt many didn't even get, and streaming videas, and don't even get the physical album.

someone making that cut throat of a business decision and bleeding the fans for money knows he could be releasing dvds.

Cravens said:

Yeah, there are no companies that'll gladly do that for an artist. Sheesh... Amazingly, dozens/hundreds of artists do just that: hook up with a company that takes care of all the administration (for a fee).

For fuck's sake, Prince used to have a built-in sales base of hundreds of thousands. The only reason a company would refuse to handle such a task is because a) they're not up to it or b) because PRINCE is impossible to work with.

As for marketing: that's HIS part of the deal. In the past he's always worked against the marketing wishes of the companies he was working with, so if that fails, it's HIS OWN fault.

Then again, we're talking here about an idiot who a) still isn't making money from his back catalogue like he should be (*) and b) manages to kill his own website every other year and replace it by something WORSE.

(*)seriously, if I was running the show you lot would have at least three copies of each of his prime time albums at home, simply because I'd make sure to have an upgraded & improved remaster every couple of years. By now you'd be listening to an edition of Purple Rain which would contain FULL LENGTH versions, an alternate track list, remixed songs (because the original album mix was done for vinyl which imposed some limitations), high-def audio on blu-ray,... Trust me, you guys would be BUSY listening to new/unreleased music instead of talking about how great it would be to get crumbs.

Cravens said:

Yeah, his heart lies so much with his music, he can't be arsed top promote his latest release, can't be arsed to play the songs live,...

2elijah said:

So? What kind of idiot would spend money of a crappy boot but not of an OFFICIAL product?

Moreover, if people KNOW that there's gonna be a soundboard recording available afterwards, and/or a DVD/video download, they're not even going to bother with the boot. (Of course, that would only be the case if Prince didn't have a history of "improving" live recordings and/or editing them to bits.)