sro100 said:

dseann said:

sro100 said:

dseann said:

sro100 said:

For me, going by a symbol was probably the coolest, most DEFIANT thing Prince did. He basically purposely, sabotaged his own career. It was like the inside of cool. A man so hip he need not even a name. Now, we alll know his name was never LEGALLY changed, but it was his "name." I guess it was inevitable that he go back to "Prince." But it seemed for a time, he just didn't care, at all, about fitting in to society's standards. Then he became a bit more conventional in many ways. ???

Black people and genuine Prince fans,never stopped calling him Prince.

I did not know that.

Well white folks didn't start calling him TAFKAP either. hahaa, but I get the point.

Even Mavis said, "He'll always be Prince to me." Prince used to say that his had no pronounciation, yet later on in his years, he had started to say that one day he'd know how to pronounce it, and that maybe it would be "Prince" after all.

I think everyone was still calling him Prince apart from Prince himself

ernestsewell said:

sro100 said:

dseann said:

sro100 said:

For me, going by a symbol was probably the coolest, most DEFIANT thing Prince did. He basically purposely, sabotaged his own career. It was like the inside of cool. A man so hip he need not even a name. Now, we alll know his name was never LEGALLY changed, but it was his "name." I guess it was inevitable that he go back to "Prince." But it seemed for a time, he just didn't care, at all, about fitting in to society's standards. Then he became a bit more conventional in many ways. ???

Black people and genuine Prince fans,never stopped calling him Prince.

I did not know that.

Well white folks didn't start calling him TAFKAP either. hahaa, but I get the point.

Even Mavis said, "He'll always be Prince to me." Prince used to say that his had no pronounciation, yet later on in his years, he had started to say that one day he'd know how to pronounce it, and that maybe it would be "Prince" after all.

I remembered him saying in an interview back in the late 90's that "black folks still call me Prince anyway."

dseann said:

ernestsewell said:

Well white folks didn't start calling him TAFKAP either. hahaa, but I get the point.

Even Mavis said, "He'll always be Prince to me." Prince used to say that his had no pronounciation, yet later on in his years, he had started to say that one day he'd know how to pronounce it, and that maybe it would be "Prince" after all.

I remembered him saying in an interview back in the late 90's that "black folks still call me Prince anyway."

http://princetext.tripod.com/i_stone96.html

ROLLING STONE (1996)

With a loving wife and a baby on the way,
and a "slave" to Warner Bros. Records no more,
0{+> is feeling downright giddy about his new, three-disc long Emancipation

by Anthony DeCurtis

"We still all right?" asks 0{+>, with a maniacal grin on his face. "Let me know when I start boring you."

Not any time soon. 0{+> leaps off the arm of the couch where he had perched and bolts across the room to his CD player. He presses a button to interrupt his lovely version of the Stylistics' 1972 hit Betcha By Golly Wow!, and then selects a fiercer, guitar-charged track called Damned If I Do.

It's the sort of scene you've been in a hundred times: A music-crazed friend ricochets between his seat and the stereo, torn between the song he's playing and the greater one you've just got to hear, between explaining what you're listening to and just letting you listen to it. Two exceptions distinguish this situation: First, this isn't one of my friends, this is 0{+>; second, the songs he's playing are amazing.

Of course, no such scenario would be complete without someone in the role of the indulgent girlfriend. Cast in that spot is 0{+>'s gorgeous and very pregnant wife, Mayte, 22. Wearing a short black dress with white trim, the word baby stitched across her chest in white above an arrow pointing to her stomach, Mayte sits quietly and smiles, shaking her head fondly at 0{+>'s uncontrolled enthusiasm.

"I'm bouncing off the walls playing this," 0{+> says, acknowledging the obvious. His sheer white shirt, lined with pastel stripes, is open to the middle of his chest and extends to his knees. The shirt, open below his waist as well, contrasts starkly with 0{+>'s tight flared trousers. Black-mesh high-heeled boots complete the ensemble.

0{+>, who is now 38, is previewing tracks from his upcoming triple CD, Emancipation, which is set for release on November 19. We're in the comfortable apartment-style office quarters within 0{+>'s Paisley Park studio complex, in Chanhassen, Minnesota, just outside Minneapolis, his hometown.

Eager to reassert his status as hitmaker, 0{+> is verbally riffing in a style that recalls one of his heroes, the young Muhammad Ali. "I ain't scared of nobody," he exclaims at one point, laughing. "I wanna play you the bomb. You tell me how many singles you hear -- I wanna read that. The only person who kept me down is R. Kelly, and when I see him, he's gonna pay a price for that!"

Producer and songwriter Jimmy Jam, whom 0{+> fired from the funk band The Time, in 1983, also comes in for some of 0{+>'s good-natured rivalry. Jam, along with his partner, Terry Lewis, has produced gigantic hits for both Michael and Janet Jackson, as well as many other artists. Like 0{+>, Jam has remained based in Minneapolis. But the town isn't big enough for both of them: 0{+> sees the days of Jam's chart reign as numbered.

As Get Yo Groove On booms out of the speakers, 0{+> screams over the sound: "You can tell Jimmy Jam I'm going to roll up to his driveway with this playing real loud! Honk! Honk! What do you think he's gonna say about that?"

0{+>'s energy is so high because he is finally negotiated his way out of his contract with Warner Bros., for which he had recorded with since his debut album, For You, was released, in 1978. In his view, he is now free at last -- hence the title of his new album. When I comment on the relaxed, easygoing groove of the new song Jam of the Year, 0{+> smiles and says simply, "A free man wrote that."

"When I'm reading a review of my work," he adds, referring to some of the negative comments garnered by his previous album, Chaos And Disorder, this is what I'm listening to. They're always a year late."

0{+>'s struggles with Warner Bros. have wreaked havoc on his career in recent years. He could see no reason why the company could not release his albums at the relentless pace at which he recorded them. Meanwhile, Warner Bros., which had signed 0{+> to a hugely lucrative new deal in 1992, believed the singer should put out new material only every year or two, thus allowing the company to promote his albums more effectively and, it hoped, to recoup it's enormous investment.

Matters deteriorated to the point where, in 1993, 0{+> disowned the work he had recorded for Warner Bros. as Prince and adopted his new, unpronounceable name. He later scrawled the word slave across his cheek in frustration over his inability to end his relationship with the company and to put out his music the way he wanted to. Such moves have caused many to question not only 0{+>'s marketing instincts -- his album sales have plummeted -- but his sanity.

For Emancipation, which will be released on his own NPG Records, 0{+> has signed a worldwide manufacturing and distribution agreement with Capitol-EMI. While neither he nor Capitol-EMI would disclose financial terms, such an arrangement typically means that the artist delivers a completed album to the company and assumes the cost of recording it. For 0{+>, those costs are relatively minimal, since he plays virtually all the instruments on his albums and owns Paisley Park, the studio where he records.

Capitol-EMI receives a fee for every copy of the album it manufactures, with the costs of the initial pressing possibly absorbed by the company in lieu of an advance to . In addition, the company will assist in promoting and publicizing the album, which should retail for between $20 and $25. If Emancipation sells well -- mind you, a triple album is a risky commercial proposition -- 0{+> will make a great deal of money. There can be no question that he is determined to do all he can to make sure that the album finds it's audience: 0{+> is abandoning his reclusive ways and planning a live global simulcast from Paisley Park and a November 21 appearance on The Oprah Winfrey Show. He will also launch a two-year world tour early in 1997.

0{+> is clearly stung by the skeptics who believe that he will never again achieve the aesthetic and commercial heights he scaled with such albums as Dirty Mind (1980), 1999 (1982), Purple Rain (1984) and Sign 0' The Times (1987). At one point, as we stroll through Paisley Park, he gestures toward a wall of gold and platinum records.

"Everything you see here is not why I created music," 0{+> says. Every human being wants to achieve clarity so that people will understand you. But when the media tell somebody what success is -- #1 records, awards -- there's no room for intuition. You've put words in their heads. For me, the album is already a success when I have a copy. Lovesexy is supposed to be a failure, but I go on the Internet and someone says, 'Lovesexy saved my life.'"

As for people making fun of his name change -- "The Artist People Formerly Cared About," in Howard Stern's priceless slag -- and his branding himself a slave says, "The people who really know the music don't joke about it. A lot of black people don't joke about it because they understand wanting to change a situation that you find yourself in."

0{+> has erased "slave" from his face, and he now sports a neat, carefully trimmed goatee. Blond streaks highlight his brown hair, which is slicked back. He is delicate, thin and slight, almost spritelike -- you feel as if a strong gust of wind would carry him across the room. But far from seeming shy or skittish, as he's often portrayed, he burns with a palpable intensity. He looks me in the eyes when he speaks, and his thoughts tumble out rapidly.

It is indicative of the idiosyncratic way 0{+>'s mind works that he does not permit journalists to record interviews with him because he is afraid of being misrepresented. His fear isn't so much that he will be misquoted as that he will be trapped within the prison house of his own language, frozen in his own characterization of himself. For an artist who has built his career -- and, to some degree, unraveled a career -- by doing whatever he felt like doing at any particular moment and not looking back, that fear is deep.

Still, 0{+> is sufficiently concerned about saying something that will damage the truce he's struck with Warner Bros. that he initially requested that a court stenographer be present during our interview. Sure enough, when I arrived at Paisley Park, the stenographer was sitting in the reception area, transcription machine at the ready. But after 0{+> came out to greet me and took me on a tour of the studio, he felt comfortable enough to abandon the idea. The stenographer was sent away.

"It's hard for me to talk about the Warner Brothers stuff because I start getting angry and bitter," 0{+> explains before beginning to play some of the songs from Emancipation. "It's like, to talk about it, I have to get back into the mind state I was in then. It's frightening."

Making a triple-album set, it turns out, was one of 0{+>'s long-standing ambitions -- and one of his difficulties with Warner Bros. "Sign O' The Times was originally called Crystal Ball and was supposed to be three albums," says 0{+> of the double album he released in 1987. 'You'll overwhelm the market,' I was told. 'You can't do that.'"

"Then people say I'm a crazy fool for writing on my face," he continues. "But if I can't do what I want to do, what am I? When you stop a man from dreaming, he becomes a slave. That's where I was. I don't own Prince's music. If you don't own your masters, your master owns you."

As part of the deal to end 0{+>'s relationship with the company, Warner Bros. retains the right to release two compilations of the music that the singer recorded while under his contract with the label. In addition, 0{+> has provided Warner Bros. with an additional album of music from the thousands of hours he has in his own vaults; this album would be released under the name Prince. "The compilations don't concern me," says 0{+> dismissively. "They're some songs from a long time ago -- that's not who I am."

Despite all the bad blood that has flowed between them, 0{+> insists he bears no grudge toward his former label. He views his battles with the company as part of a spiritual journey to self-awareness "What strengthens is what I know," he says. "It was one experience -- and it was my experience. I wouldn't be as clear as I am today without it. I don't believe in darkness. Everything was there for me to get to this place. I've evolved to something -- and I needed to go through everything I went through.

"And that's why I love the folks at Warner Bros. now," he says with a laugh. "You know that Budweiser ad -- 'I love you, man'? I just want to go there with them!"

Asked about the concept behind Emancipation, 0{+> says, "It's hard to explain in sentences." The album is based on complicated -- not to say incomprehensible -- sense of the relationship among the pyramids of Egypt, the constellations and the dawn of civilization. Each CD is exactly an hour long and contains 12 songs.

"Recently I thought about my whole career, my whole life leading up to this point -- having a child helps you do that -- and I thought about what would be the perfect album for me to do," 0{+> says. "People design their own plans. That's when The Dawn takes place. The Dawn is an awakening of the mind, when I can see best how to accomplish the tasks I'm supposed to do. I feel completely clear,"

0{+>'s marriage to Mayte and the impending birth of their child were two of the important inspirations. for Emancipation. It's no coincidence that what 0{+> describes as his "divorce" from Warner Bros. has occurred right around the time of his marriage and Mayte's pregnancy. "I don't believe in coincidence," he says flatly.

Along with covers of such smoochy ballads as Betcha by Golly Wow! and the Delfonics' La, La, La, Means I Love You, Emancipation is filled with what 0{+> sheepishly calls "sentimental stuff." Discussing how he has been affected by the prospect of fatherhood, he says, "You'll definitely hear it in my music." For the song Sex in the Summer, which was originally titled "Conception", 0{+> sampled his unborn baby's heartbeat. "Of course, that's a tempo," he says. "The nothing baby set the groove for this song. Mayte always smiles when she hears it."

0{+> may have used his baby's ultrasound as a rhythm sample, but he and Mayte did not ask to know which sex their child is. "It doesn't matter, " says. "We all have the male and female with us, anyway. We'll be happy with whatever God chooses to give us." And just as 0{+> has no intention of once again taking the name Prince -- the people around him refer to him simply as "The Artist" -- he says, "The baby will name itself." As he prepares to preview a song called Let's Have A Baby, 0{+> turns to Mayte and says, "You're gonna start crying -- you better leave." Then he explains to me, "I got my house fixed up and put a crib in it. Then I played this song for her, and she started crying. She had never seen my house with a crib in it before." Let's Have A Baby, the lyrics run. "What are we living for?/Let's make love." As for the song's sparse arrangement, described by 0{+> as "bass, piano and silence," he says, "Joni Mitchell taught me that. If you listen to her early stuff, she really understands that."

He points to a portrait of Mayte that is framed in gold. "I can't wait for my baby to look up and see Mayte's eyes," he says, his voice filled with wonder. "Look at those eyes. That's the first thing the baby is going to see in this world."

0{+> has transformed Paisley Park in anticipation of the birth of his child. What had been a modern industrial park has become more playful and vibrant, like the psychedelic wonderland implied by its name. And it would warm the heart of Tipper Gore, who was inspired to found the Parents Music Resource Center when she overheard one of her daughters listening to the masturbatory imagery in the Prince song "Darling Nikki", to hear the singer talk about how he now sees things through the eyes of a child.

"When I looked at some of the artwork around here from that perspective, pfft, it was out of here: 'Those pictures got to go,'" 0{+> says. "I also wanted to make this place more colorful, more alive. This place was antiseptic -- there's life here now."

The memory of the violence that his father introduced into the household when 0{+> was young preys on his mind. "How do you discipline a child?" he asks. "You have to imagine yourself as one of them. Would you hit yourself? You remember the trauma you suffered when you suffered that."

For all of the drama he has created around himself, 0{+> is about music. The only time he seems completely relaxed is when he is jamming with his band, the New Power Generation, in a rehearsal space at Paisley Park. The band, including Kathleen Dyson on guitar, Rhonda Smith on bass, Eric Leeds on saxophone and Kirk Johnson on percussion -- sets up in a circle, with 0{+> facing the indomitable Sheila E., who is sitting in on drums.

Playing his 0{+> - shaped guitar, the singer smiles and leads his crew through a series of rock-funk improvisations. He roams the room calling for solos, pointing at whichever player is taking the music to a higher plane so everyone can follow on that journey. They goof around with a James Brown riff. Then, when Sheila E. introduces a syncopated Latin groove, 0{+> blasts off on guitar in the roaring style of Carlos Santana.

"We don't really know any songs yet; we're just recording everything," 0{+> explains to me at one point, nearly apologizing. But the music just seems to course through him, and he fairly shimmers with happiness as he drifts from guitar to bass to keyboards as his mood dictates.

During a short break, 0{+> asks Leeds to play the theme of John Coltrane's immortal "A Love Supreme." As Leeds articulates the line, 0{+>, sitting at the keyboards, crumples with joy. "It's that one note," he says, laughing, isolating the highest-pitched tone in the sequence. "That's what tells you a madman wrote it."

0{+>'s identification with Coltrane -- a driven musical genius and spiritual quester who seemed intent on playing himself out of his skin -- is plain. 0{+> had spoken about the saxophonist earlier in the day. "John Coltrane's wife said that he played 12 hours a day," he had said. "I could never do that, play one instrument for that long. Can you imagine a spirit that would drive a body that hard? The music business is not set up to nurture that sort of spirit."

"Let's see," he continued "According to some people, I'm bankrupt and crazy. I woke up one day, and the radio said I was dead. People say, 'He changed his name; he doesn't even know who he is.'"

The very notion that 0{+> could be perceived that way seemed painful to him. But then his spirit ascended. "I may not be like Muhammad Ali -- I ain't predictin' no rounds," he said, looking at me directly in the eyes. "But I'm pretty well-focused. I know exactly who I am."

ROLLING STONE MAGAZINE, NOVEMBER 28, 1996

(RS 748)

INTERVIEW * MAY 1997

THE ARTIST
By Spike Lee

THOUGH THE BUZZING of the talk around him threatened to drown out the music that made him a cultural landmark, the Artist Formerly Known as Prince is once again writing and performing his trademark sexually potent pop. His newest album, Emancipation (NPG Records), marks an important turning point in a career peppered with (as he once sang) controversy. Most recently, his battle to break free of his former record label, Warner Bros., led to speculation that he was withholding Grade A material until he had a more satisfactory deal elsewhere. Whether or not that was the case, the double-platinum and counting Emancipation is a three-disc dish of classic funk, pearly ballads, pastel-hued jams, and even a creamy cover of the Joan Osborne hit, "One of Us." It is a romantic, emotional record, and one that is also powered by the Artist's (as he is now called) faith in God and love for his wife, Mayte Garcia. Here he sits down in New York with writer and director Spike Lee, whose 1996 film Girl 6 featured on its soundtrack songs by the man record sellers now "file under Prince."

SPIKE LEE: It is February 7, in the year of our Lord 1997, St. Moritz Hotel, New York, and I am here with the Artist Formerly Known as Prince. To start, there's something that we need to get out of the way. I really feel awkward asking you this, but I just have to. Will you say anything about your child [who, it has been widely reported, died shortly after his birth last fall]?

THE ARTIST: I have written a song that says: If you ever lose someone dear to you, never say the words, "They're gone," and they'll come back.

SL: That will be a highly anticipated song. Before we drove down to The Chris Rock Show, where you were taping a segment, I asked you about the title of your multi-platinum album Emancipation. I said, "Do you feel free?" and you gave a great response.

TA: There is something that happens when you get emancipated. You approach life differently. You eat differently. You respect yourself more. You respect the gift you have been given. Everything has changed for me since I changed my name. It's one thing to be called Prince but it's another thing to actually be one. I have such a reverence for life now. And I have stopped eating all animal products.

SL: So, when you look back, do you see periods in your life when you did not like your Prince persona?

TA: Toward the end I was a little ashamed of what Prince had become. I really felt like a product, and then I started turning in work that reflected that. I had no problem with people saying I was repeating myself. I knew where I was headed and I just needed direction. I looked up and L. Londell McMillan was there.

SL: You mean your new lawyer?

TA: Yes. He also has a reverence for life. He seems to be a righteous soul and is focused as to what he is on earth for. Those are some of the things we talked about -- what we as black people are supposed to represent during this time period.

SL: Six or seven years ago I had the audacity to write you a letter about your choice of women used in music and music videos. Do you remember that?

TA: Yes.

SL: Let's talk about it. I think it was very rude on my part. I'll be forty on March 20th and in a lot of ways back then I was too righteous about that type of stuff. Tell the audience what was in the letter I wrote you.

TA: I don't remember exactly. It's really vague to me.

SL: I wrote, Are there going to be any women of dark complexion in your music videos and your films? You had only white women in your stuff. Do you recall what you wrote back to me? You set me straight there?

TA: I probably said, One had to look at everything I had done, not just the most successful pieces. But I have to be honest, I know you as a different person now, too. We met under different circumstances back then, and I have grown and so have you.

SL: Do you remember the first time we met?

TA: Graffiti Bridge [the Artist's 1990 dramatic film]?

SL: Yes, you invited me and my producer Monty Ross up to the shoot. Now I'd like to ask you, how has marriage changed you?

TA: It is ever-evolving every day. It is not a subject I like discussing, but my wife's pregnancy made me an adult four times over. Kids will do that. Just dealing with every circumstance is an emotional roller coaster, but nevertheless I have grown so much as a soul. I can see the light at the end of the tunnel a lot better now.

SL: Let's talk about your last couple of years at [your former label] Warner Bros. records. Would it be safe to say that the music you were putting out was just fulfilling a contract, or were you giving the best you had to offer at that time?

TA: I was doing my best to fulfill my contract. You can now hear that my soul has been in love with [my wife] Mayte for thousands of years. I believe that I was just trying to express it in a simple record. I wanted to say friend, lover, sister, mother, wife back then, but it wasn't the time. If you check the video for the song "Seven," you will see Mayte and I walking through the doors hand-in-hand and the dove exploding. That was when I spiritually checked out of the situation; but I did what I had to do.

SL: Right now I have a copy of your Emancipation CD and my wife wanted to kill me because I had "Soul Sanctuary" on repeat. I played that song for two hours straight. It's four minutes long. Divide that into two hours. She was about to go upside my head. But tell me about that song. I love it!

TA: Sandra St. Victor helped with that one. The melody is basically mine, but the lyrics were inspired by verses that Sandra wrote. I love the idea of an ex-lover leaving her reflection in the mirror after she's gone. You know, I just hope to see the day when all artists, no matter what color they are, own their masters [tapes].

SL: Let me ask you this: Why don't African-American artists own their own masters? Is it because we don't have the right lawyers?

TA: I think we can get the right lawyers, but I think we all need to change our mind-set and go in specifically after that [ownership of master recordings] and not just take the pink Cadillac. Then you will see change. It is befuddling how other people own their masters. I guess it's who you know and what deal you make.

SL: It's about ownership, isn't it?

TA: Ownership, that's what you give your kids. That's your legacy. Every one of those songs!

SL: And what about your name?

TA: You know, black people still call me Prince. Sometimes I ask them, "Why do you call me Prince?" And people say, "Because you are a prince to us." Usually when they say that, you know my heart goes out and I say, "I don't mind your calling me that." If there is a pronunciation to my name in the future, I hope it will be "Prince." That's my dream. But until that day, I'll just go by this. [Holds up a necklace with his symbol on it] This is my "X."

SL: You said that a lot of people were confused when you wrote "slave" on your face. People said they didn't know what to call you, but you got it all worked out now?

TA: We got it all worked out! My worth went down a little bit during that period. [laughs] I'm sure there will be a few doors closed to me now because of my emancipation.

SL: Yeah, well that's the mentality of a runaway slave. You're no longer a house-negro. The millennium is coming up. Everybody knows what song is going to be played on New Year's Eve 1999.[laughs] Can you talk about any of your plans? When will we see another album?

TA: To be honest, I thought I had emptied the gun with this one [Emancipation] and I wouldn't have to record for awhile, but some new things came up that are all acoustic.

SL: Acoustic?

TA: Yeah, just me and a guitar in a room. One song is called "The Truth" and one is called "Don't Play Me." There is a line about ebonics in it but I won't get into that. [both laugh]

SL: No, let's get into that. What do you think about ebonics? I think it's a plot! And there's black people behind that plot.

TA: Comedian Chris Rock said it best: There is language that will get you a job and there is language that won't. Make that choice as an American. This is where you live now.

SL: Tell me honestly, and you can answer this any way you want: How did you like the way we used your songs in Girl 6? Talk about that process, because the way we did it I had already cut the film before adding your songs. You were also generous enough to give us three new songs. Tell me which songs worked for you in the movie and which ones didn't?

TA: Some worked stronger than others, but overall, musically, I didn't know what to expect. I was pleasantly surprised and I like the film for the style in which you did it. I'd never seen that done before. The scene at Coney Island, where you used "How Come U Don't Call Me Any More" is my favorite scene. In fact it forced me to put that song back into our set. I said I would never play it again because I used to think I couldn't do it better than I did with my band, the Revolution. But your film gave me newfound respect for the music.

SL: When you came up with that song, "Sexy Mother Fucker," I said, "My man is losing his mind." But I liked it.

TA: The chorus was a little "different" for you, huh? [SL in background singing, "shakin' that ass, shakin' that ass"] I was talking to Chris Rock and he said the same thing. "Every time you put out an album, I think you've lost your mind!" The music I make a lot of the time is reflective of the life I am leading, and "Sexy MF" came during the period I had the Glam Slam disco [in Minneapolis] and I was hanging out there a lot. There was a dance troupe there, and the sexier the dancers, the bigger the revenues and the noisier the crowd. It's funny, but you have to remember that was during the time when the biggest club song was "Bitch Betta Have My Money." When you hear something constantly, you can get swayed by the current. I was swayed by hip-hop at the time.

SL: Do you feel that you successfully incorporated rap into your music. Sometimes it felt like it was just stuck on.

TA: I've gotten some criticism for the rap I've chosen to put in my past work. But there again, it came during my friction years. If you notice, not a lot of that stuff is incorporated into my sets now. I think you'll be pleasantly surprised when you hear the new remixes we are working on. On the rap tip though, it is an old style and I have always done it kind of differently -- half sung, you know, like "Irresistible Bitch" and some of the other things I use to do.

SL: Do you ever think that you have been cursed? That you can't stop the music in your head?

TA: Sometimes it is a curse, but it's also a blessing. It's a gift that I am completely grateful for. That's why I keep [making music], because I don't want to be ungrateful for the gift.

SL: I know you guys like to keep it all mysterious, but I know there is a creative process to how you write a song. It might now be the same thing all the time, though.

TA: Yes, it is different all the time. The main way that something comes is fully completed. And the fun part is just listening. When I'm writing, sometimes the pen just goes. I'm not in charge and I'm almost listening outside of it. That's when I realize that we all have to start looking at life as a gift. It's like listening to a color and believing that these colors have soulmates and once you get them all together the painting is complete.

SL: What is Cat [a former dancer with the Artist] doing now?

TA: Last time I spoke with her she walked up to Mayte and me and said to us, "I like you two dancing together, but she'll never be what I was with you." The very last time we spoke. [laughs]

SL: And Apollonia?

TA: To be honest, I haven't really spoken to anybody. Once I got married, the phone stopped ringing.

SL: You said earlier that you have been in love with Mayte for one thousand years. Can you elaborate on that?

TA: I am a firm believer in reincarnation for people who either have more work to do or have so much debt to pay back that they have to be here. I hope for me it is the former, and my work was finding Mayte and having a child, which we will continue on until there are several here.

SL: Would you like to comment on how the media attempted to make a circus out of that particular episode?

TA: What people have to realize is that if one has a firm belief in God and the spirit, then one does not make statements that are negative and untrue. I would have been lying to myself and the spirit of the child. I have a very thick skin. I take everything that comes and let it bounce right off of me because I know the time will come when nobody will be able to speak falsely. Mankind doesn't understand the whole process yet; that we have to ask for ownership of our masters, instead of taking the Cadillac, so to speak.

SL: Quick music question: Why did you decide to make "Betcha By Golly Wow!" the first single fromEmancipation? Why did you want to do a cover?

TA: I don't believe in singles. The singles market has changed. I am trying to get to the old days of releasing albums at will, like Star Wars coming out again.

SL: I want to ask you about how you pick your bands. You've had several. Can you tell me about the whole process? Is it the same way a general manager would pick a team?

TA: I have been blessed with having these people come to me. I don't want to sound cosmic or anything, but it really seems magical because in this case I was looking for a group of four vegetarians.

SL: Was that actually a criterion, that they have to be totally vegetarian? Do you think that meat and stuff clogs up your brain?

TA: Our people have the worst diet of anybody. I'm ready to put a farmer on my payroll. We've got to get back to growing our own food. You are what you eat!

SL: For our audience, I want to present this question to you: How is it that Geffen, Spielberg, and Katzenberg got together? How was it that these three giants put aside their egos and came together for the whole? What would stop African-American artists like me, yourself, Michael Jordan, Bill Cosby...

TA: My hat goes off to anyone who can sit down and put their heads together. I am ready for something like that because I am free and I am happy and I have time. There were a lot of things in the way before. I have nothing put time now, and I love getting older.

SL: We've got to do a musical together.

TA: We have to do several. Some will hit and some won't, but hey, we have the time.

so good point .. i just skimmed the hightlighted part but never really thought about the

mohammed ali

or

malcom x

dynamic of his name change

i am more recently understanding the separation between NAME and Person or human individual. In many cases your NAME binds you to CONTRACT or infact enslaves you. We all enter into these CONtracts often at birth with our social security numbers and further down the line as we use our NAME to bind us to other obligations often unconstitutional. I bring up the constitution because it originally contained many provisions that protect citizens as individuals and allows freedom regardless of CONtracts. however clearly prince saw his CONtract as a form of slavery and in many ways it its true. Much like the prostittute joke in which a woman agrees to have sex for a million dollars so the man offers her 10 dollars instead and she says "what do you think i am a prostitute?" and the man says "we've already established that now we are just negotiating price."

well prince may have recieved a lot of money but it is clear that he finally had an awakening to what the CONtract truley meant and felt that it embodied slavery. and it does in many ways. as do many of the business, taxation practices once you truly understand your constitutional rights and what freedom truly is.

so in that sense prince felt that PRINCE in name was his slave name and no longer wished to be recognized by the slave name the name subjected to CONtract. and in turn mentioned that one day he hoped to return to using his name but clearly he felt that the name PRINCE needed to be wrangled free from the CONtract before he could feel good again using that identity.

big move big meaning .. and of course the public mocks him ... because he is wrong? no because people are not self educated enough to understand prince very logical and intelligent reasoning.

so i change my answer ... i was disappointed from a musical standard that he changed his name back because all of the PRINCE catalog is still very very listenable and the post prince work was unfortunately very bad and i wanted any new PRINCE music to at least live up to that standard

but i also feel happy for prince that he reached a place where he felt his name had been freed enough that he could reidentify himself and not feel disempowered. so in that sense i am happy that he was able to achieve his goals and reclaim his identity as a free person.

I loved the act of the name-change at the time, but it got annoying as the years wore on, I agree (maybe because of the material - if there'd been more like The Truth and War it mighta worked...).

As for the contract issue, I think most are missing the point. The name-change was fascinating spin - it was about image and branding. prince couldn't get out of his contract, but he could try to reduce the value of the Prince brand which WB continued to control by re-branding to one which he controlled. I think he aimed for people to place more value on Symbol metrial than Prince material, or at the very least to enable himself to keep working and promoting his stuff without overtly promotiing the WB controlled material.

When control reverted to himself, it didn;t matter. this would explain why he continues to use both brands. He doesn't want the symbol to fall out of consciousness altogether because he wants to maintain the brand-vlaue of the products he created under that name.

(The problem with this theory of course is the complete mismanagement of te back catalogue...)

i think prince blew it with all the muther fuck this muther fuck that all over the gold experience ... with the most beautiful girl in the world at the top of the charts he could have really secured his throne as u might say ... with diamonds and pearls he was just clean enough to garner mass lite rock appeal from the lite pop and record buying audience ... the fact is a lot of prince best work is laced with adult themes that are great when ur hormonal but when ur some soccer mom u want something u can play in yer car ...

so diamonds and pearls made it and he was respected and supported for it ..

tmbgitw had the same appeal .. the same support even without his actual name went number one ... but because the gold record was so full of adult language and drug references and some pretty intense sexuality and on top of it .. nothing else on the record even resembled the quality and vibe of tmbgitw .

i dont think he really understood the potential of that moment to put him over in a huge way .. and he kinda blew it be sounding more juvenile and less artistic or erotic. he could have pulled off adult themes and had dnp appeal if it hadnt sounded so 2live crew .. i guess thats always been his downfall ... tripping over the thin line between sounding seductive and just desparate and immature.

so if the name change was spiritual .. i think emancipation was more representative of the positive vibe he could have surrounded the symbol name with ... but all that anger energy of gold experience i think messed that up .. for the public anyway

i love that lovesign song ... if that was on the record with say slave, days of wild, dig u better dead ... count the days (no swear mix) come on, the one, right back here in my arms, jam of the year, tmbgitw (mustang), space, dark, let it go, papa, i love u but i dont trust you anymore, man o war remix.

i bet if he put that out people would have shit ther pants

sro100 said:

For me, going by a symbol was probably the coolest, most DEFIANT thing Prince did. He basically purposely, sabotaged his own career. It was like the inside of cool. A man so hip he need not even a name. Now, we alll know his name was never LEGALLY changed, but it was his "name." I guess it was inevitable that he go back to "Prince." But it seemed for a time, he just didn't care, at all, about fitting in to society's standards. Then he became a bit more conventional in many ways. ???

I was NOT disappointed.

As a 14-15 year old Prince fan at the time of the name change, I had already had to listen to so much crap about Prince and so many people laughing that even listened to his music let alone be a big fan. The name change gave people an even bigger reason to laugh at him and think he was a total dick. And they did - people I knew at the time anyway - think he was being a total dick.

I still loved him regardless of what peope said, but calling himself Prince again was long overdue I think.

BorisFishpaw said:

TrevorAyer said:

just curious ... why was chaos released under that symbol name and vault released under the prince name?

They were released that way because that's how Prince wanted it. Prince gave 'Chaos and Disorder' and 'The Vault... Old Friends 4 Sale' to WB complete with all the artwork in April 1996 as contract fillers. It was then up to WB to decide when to actually release them. So they released 'Chaos and Disorder' that year and hung onto 'The Vault... Old Friends 4 Sale' until 1999. Technically, he also owed them one more album, but managed during the April 1996 talks to get an agreement that WB could release another 'Best Of' instead at some point in the future (hence 'Ultimate'). Prince decided what was credited to "Prince" and what was credited to "". Though his decisions were kinda arbitrary, especially when it came to 'Come' and 'The Gold Experience' as a lot of the tracks for both albums were recorded around the same time. Almost all of the songs on 'Come' were technically "" tracks, and had already been credited as such before finally getting released under the name "Prince". [Edited 5/29/10 16:32pm]

Wasn't the 'Best Of' that was released in 2001 included in the albums owed?

chocolate1 said:

No. His Mama named him Prince.