Being inspired by the thread:

http://www.prince.org/msg...&tid=34805

I thought it would be interesting to see what you might think about the reasons the year 1999 (because of the obvoius link to the song of the same name) did not become a Prince momentum, his huge return to the charts:

My guesses are:

- it was a part of the fight with Warner Bros. Records-there was a re-release of 1999 (a single) by Warner Bros.
- the poor quality of 1999 The New Master
- the flop of Rave Un2 the Joy Fantastic
- Prince wasn't interested (hard to believe this though since he released the single 1999 himself)

Maybe you've got other thoughts

I think part of it was the whole Y2k shite. Factor that into everything you listed agarze and 1999 was nothing but a fizzle.

maybe it's cuz he wuz bettin that the song would be worn down 2 the nub cuz of the millenium b.s. that went on...

...and it indeed did get worn out a bit. hell, "1999" wuz the theme song 4 my senior prom (and every other hi school's senior prom 4 '99)...


mine!

I think writing the song 1999 in 1982 was the most genius thing Prince has ever done. I mean, on New Years Eve 1999, it would have been the most played song on the planet!
He virtually guaranteed himself a hit 17 years down the track...nice move.

well i shouid have known how the year 1999 entered that it was going to be rocky and unfeeling.

I got moded because I said he would end up brngin back his old mates for a final jam of the old stuff etc etc. For a year that was supposedly his year with so much possibility, .."man did he ever mess his career up"-Morris

and yeah I realize that maybe he did the right thing in not going overboard etc..but then again he did..Rave cable performance, new cd etc

but it just struck me as a fucked up vibe..a whole lot was missing..juxtaposed with my own feelings of what 1999 the event of Prince could have been, what was, and what it wasnt. It was overall very very empty feeling. IMHO

I think Prince didn't want to promote a 17-year old song, especially since the media and general public have abandoned him in recent years.

If Prince was still a chart-topper in the late '90's, and didn't have any record label battles, I'm sure he would've promoted the shit out of that song!

I don't think Prince was even feeling music itself that year. It wouldn't be until a year later when he found some new band members to get him musically inspired again.

His lack of enthusiasm and lack of "giving a shit" is what did it...

Prince wasn't with it&the Song got overplayed so much.alot of things factor into it.different Musical Climate&Acceptance plays a part as well IMHO.

he just wasn't into it.










Who cares anyway? Now I love "1999", but it's overplayed as hell, I swear, I hear this song everyday.

I THINK HE SHOULD HAVE LET 1999 PASS COMPLETLY... that woulda SHOCKED alot of PPL... But he DID pretty Much what I thought he would do 1 of the few times I guessed his next move ... Hmmm ?

I guess Prince knew that the song would be played everywhere that year and felt that he should be getting a cut somehow. It was a tacky concession to commercialism by re-releasing the single, and I think he should have just let the event pass.

But yeah, Rave was hopeless, TNM was awful and was hard to find in the stores, and frankly I think it would have taken more than a revival of 1999 (which most kids buying singles won't have heard of anyway) to get the man back into the top 20.