Not that any of us truely know, but he seems to be on a high of life and music nowdays.

Certainly no signs of his coke days..Again that is an assumption but he was wild back in the day and had to of been on something

But somewhere along the line he just quit it...Props to him..That is hard to do, let alone in that kinda business.

[Edited 7/31/11 15:59pm]

No I am comparing him to the man who went on stage with James Brown after Michael Jackson

kenkamken said:

Maybe you're confusing him with Rick James, or Sly Stone

no....hes right.

Prince used to drink gallons of the stuff. That double punch of caffiene/sugar was what helped him churn out all hits during his days of 24 hour recording seesions.

Its what he washed the pancakes down with, after basketball games too.

I don't think Prince ever snorted that stuff but he did have periods where he was either drunk or was on a trip from some hallucinogenic drug. I think the former could explain why he appeared to be "out of it" at the James Brown event.

and what were you on while watching it?

i'll say it looked like maybe he was trying ot be overly dramatic in his princely ways trying to upstage michael and fell (no pun intended) short. he should have just gone up there and had fun and he wouldve blown michael away. as for his exit from the stage, im sure he saw a pole and thought he would make a cool exit from the stage, in the moment he wouldnt even think about if it was secured to the stage or not. some drink in him or not, who knows. but coke habit? i dont think so.....

[Edited 7/31/11 17:01pm]

Wasn't so much the obvious things in that performance that made you think he was on something but more the subtle moments.

Again I stress none of us know and it's all speculative, but even the way he acknowleded james brown when he came up on stage and just his whole demenour that night tells me he wanted to just sit and chill on whatever it was that he was on.

He was in now way expecting to or want to go up on stage me thinks.

Whatever he was on back in the day, he not on no more I imagine..And that is a good thing because that means he is sitll here.

Onthe1jb said:

but even the way he acknowleded james brown when he came up on stage and just his whole demenour that night tells me he wanted to just sit and chill on whatever it was that he was on.

He was in now way expecting to or want to go up on stage me thinks.

there is a major error in your assumption. maybe he did want to just 'chill' and enjoy the show. maybe he didnt want a spot light thrown on him that night. doesnt mean he was HIGH. just means hes human. is so much of the world high now that you believe everyone has been at some point? some people are capable of being wild and weird, and having fun, without being high.

[Edited 7/31/11 17:29pm]

savagedreams said:

Onthe1jb said:

but even the way he acknowleded james brown when he came up on stage and just his whole demenour that night tells me he wanted to just sit and chill on whatever it was that he was on.

He was in now way expecting to or want to go up on stage me thinks.

there is a major error in your assumption. maybe he did want to just 'chill' and enjoy the show. maybe he didnt want a spot light thrown on him that night. doesnt mean he was HIGH. just means hes human. is so much of the world high now that you believe everyone has been at some point? some people are capable of being wild and weird, and having fun, without being high.

[Edited 7/31/11 17:29pm]

Prince should have declined that offer. Plus I still think MJ's portion was rehearsed to make Prince look bad.MJ knew exactly what he was doing.

I have always wondered if it was rehearsed...It seems very un james brown..I know he rehearsed more than prince or mj I imagine but on stage he loves improvising and ad libbing.

I think it was just a moment where they flowed on stage and everything came together in terms of when to play there was a time.

Of course you can not necessarily be high and still have a good time...But you can also be high and have your own shit down to a t , just like james brown did in the 80's and still be high.

Likewise you can still go to a show to see a performer you love, get drunk off your face or stoned or whatever and think you gonna just chill.

I doubt jackson asked prince if he wanted to come up, so he might of seen how fucked he was that night and decided to call him up..or just knew prince was there and wanted to give him a spot too.

But to say his behaviour is normal prince that night is wrong imo, he is on another level..He can still be on that level doin his own shows but because he is so rehearsed and practised at his own show, the two things blend together...Here is pure improvising.

Onthe1jb said:

Wasn't so much the obvious things in that performance that made you think he was on something but more the subtle moments.

Again I stress none of us know and it's all speculative, but even the way he acknowleded james brown when he came up on stage and just his whole demenour that night tells me he wanted to just sit and chill on whatever it was that he was on.

He was in now way expecting to or want to go up on stage me thinks.

Whatever he was on back in the day, he not on no more I imagine..And that is a good thing because that means he is sitll here.

Chilling is the last thing you want to do when you're on coke.

Onthe1jb said:

But to say his behaviour is normal prince that night is wrong imo, he is on another level..

i didnt say he was being normal prince. i said he was maybe trying to be overly dramatic in his princely ways, the key words being 'maybe' & 'overly dramatic'. he then possibly overshot his goal. and just so you didnt miss it, the key word there being 'possibly'. on another side of it, this was prince before purple rain. yes he was popular but he wasnt the hugest thing quite yet. he could have flat out been nervous being called out by james brown, and being onstage with him and MJ. i dont care how big you get, your heroes can still make you feel like a nervous little fan. no matter what the issue was, there is just really no evidence there to claim he was coked out. have you ever been around drugged out people?

KCOOLMUZIQ said:

savagedreams said:

there is a major error in your assumption. maybe he did want to just 'chill' and enjoy the show. maybe he didnt want a spot light thrown on him that night. doesnt mean he was HIGH. just means hes human. is so much of the world high now that you believe everyone has been at some point? some people are capable of being wild and weird, and having fun, without being high.

[Edited 7/31/11 17:29pm]

Prince should have declined that offer. Plus I still think MJ's portion was rehearsed to make Prince look bad.MJ knew exactly what he was doing.

Honestly, yeah - I think Michael kinda set Prince up that night, too. I don't think MJ's part was rehearsed, I think James spontaneously called him up there...and I think Michael had already noticed by that point that Prince wasn't really himself that night and probably wouldn't do well up there...so then he whispers to James Brown to call Prince up. He took advantage of that to try and make himself look good.

To me the fact that MJ did that says everything about just how intimidated and threatened he felt by Prince's talent and his success at that time. Don't get me wrong, I'm a fan of MJ too, but it was a really fucked-up, underhanded move on MJ's part.

[Edited 7/31/11 19:28pm]

armpit said:

KCOOLMUZIQ said:

Prince should have declined that offer. Plus I still think MJ's portion was rehearsed to make Prince look bad.MJ knew exactly what he was doing.

Honestly, yeah - I think Michael kinda set Prince up that night, too. I don't think MJ's part was rehearsed, I think James spontaneously called him up there...and I think Michael had already noticed by that point that Prince wasn't really himself that night and probably wouldn't do well up there...so then he whispers to James Brown to call Prince up. He took advantage of that to try and make himself look good.

To me the fact that MJ did that says everything about just how intimidated and threatened he felt by Prince's talent and his success at that time. Don't get me wrong, I'm a fan of MJ too, but it was a really fucked-up, underhanded move on MJ's part.

[Edited 7/31/11 19:28pm]

It seemed like a harmless joke to me, it didnt fuck with Princes career just a little laugh at his expense. MJ didnt really gain anything and Prince didnt lose anything, it was just a practical joke.

I always thought that the night of the BMI awards in England that he was high on cocaine. His facial expressions, his glazed eyes and that strange request of having his management tell people not to "look" at him. Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm...

Where do you nutjobs come from?

ManlyMoose said:

armpit said:

Honestly, yeah - I think Michael kinda set Prince up that night, too. I don't think MJ's part was rehearsed, I think James spontaneously called him up there...and I think Michael had already noticed by that point that Prince wasn't really himself that night and probably wouldn't do well up there...so then he whispers to James Brown to call Prince up. He took advantage of that to try and make himself look good.

To me the fact that MJ did that says everything about just how intimidated and threatened he felt by Prince's talent and his success at that time. Don't get me wrong, I'm a fan of MJ too, but it was a really fucked-up, underhanded move on MJ's part.

[Edited 7/31/11 19:28pm]

It seemed like a harmless joke to me, it didnt fuck with Princes career just a little laugh at his expense. MJ didnt really gain anything and Prince didnt lose anything, it was just a practical joke.

I bet that if it were reversed and Prince did that to MJ, MJ wouldn'tve thought it was just a 'harmless joke'.

I'm always gonna be an MJ fan, but the man showed his ugly side that night.

I actually did feel bad for Prince that night. I don't think it was drunkenness. Prince just didn't know how to respond I guess.

armpit said:

ManlyMoose said:

It seemed like a harmless joke to me, it didnt fuck with Princes career just a little laugh at his expense. MJ didnt really gain anything and Prince didnt lose anything, it was just a practical joke.

I bet that if it were reversed and Prince did that to MJ, MJ wouldn'tve thought it was just a 'harmless joke'.

I'm always gonna be an MJ fan, but the man showed his ugly side that night.

What makes you think MJ did that on purpose? From what James said on stage, Michael heard that Prince was in the audience and wanted to give him a chance to do something on stage. Calling Prince up didn't seem premeditated, and why, after doing well on stage, would MJ feel the need to embarass P, or let P embarass himself? MJ's career was established and P's wasn't, so I don't see where he should feel threatened in all this.

Uh...Prince may have experimented with chemical substances in the distant past (as many have in their youth) but he never developed a habit nor was he ever addicted to anything but music.

purplethunder3121 said:

Uh...Prince may have experimented with chemical substances in the distant past (as many have in their youth) but he never developed a habit nor was he ever addicted to anything but music.

Exactly. I can't even buy that rumor that Prince did that shit.

The rumors of Prince drug use (at least well into the 90's) are really common. He's been known to keep impossible hours, and it would explain the productivity to some degree (until you crash from it).

We also know of a few close Prince confidantes who have openy admitted to drug problems.

What's unlikely is that he's still going the same pace and doing the same substance in question for that long, and at that age, without showing any physical signs of the partying.

Onthe1jb said:

Not that any of us truely know,

stop right there ^ .......why would you state an assumption (on your part) as fact? Prince did not look like he was wired on drugs...he looked like he was on an adrenalin rush, caught off-guard, didn't know exactly what to do, period.

[Edited 8/1/11 0:10am]

treehouse said:

The rumors of Prince drug use (at least well into the 90's) are really common. He's been known to keep impossible hours, and it would explain the productivity to some degree (until you crash from it).

We also know of a few close Prince confidantes who have openy admitted to drug problems.

What's unlikely is that he's still going the same pace and doing the same substance in question for that long, and at that age, without showing any physical signs of the partying.

We also know that his engineers that he worked with on a daily basis insist that he never had any drug problems himself despite some of the people around him doing them.

OP disappoints, thought this was gonna be about '95 era rumours, not going all the way back to 1983 as evidence of a coke 'habit'

NouveauDance said:

OP disappoints, thought this was gonna be about '95 era rumours, not going all the way back to 1983 as evidence of a coke 'habit'

treehouse said:

The rumors of Prince drug use (at least well into the 90's) are really common. He's been known to keep impossible hours, and it would explain the productivity to some degree (until you crash from it).

We also know of a few close Prince confidantes who have openy admitted to drug problems.

What's unlikely is that he's still going the same pace and doing the same substance in question for that long, and at that age, without showing any physical signs of the partying.

Exactly..This is what I feel, I am in the camp that he did drugs in his youth to a degree but now days I imagine it is limited or even non existent.

Point is none of us know but no one should knock the other for speculating..I for instance never knew the extent of james brown' problems up until his death. I wont go into that but it just shows you never know the situation of anyone based upon their stage performance or studio work.

savagedreams said:

Onthe1jb said:

But to say his behaviour is normal prince that night is wrong imo, he is on another level..

i didnt say he was being normal prince. i said he was maybe trying to be overly dramatic in his princely ways, the key words being 'maybe' & 'overly dramatic'. he then possibly overshot his goal. and just so you didnt miss it, the key word there being 'possibly'. on another side of it, this was prince before purple rain. yes he was popular but he wasnt the hugest thing quite yet. he could have flat out been nervous being called out by james brown, and being onstage with him and MJ. i dont care how big you get, your heroes can still make you feel like a nervous little fan. no matter what the issue was, there is just really no evidence there to claim he was coked out. have you ever been around drugged out people?

Patrionising makes you sound like a fool..Just a heads up..So please have constructive responses instead of trying to push your view down someone's throat.

I understand your point but from my point of view I see the opposite..Neither of us will be proved right or wrong necessarily but each view is justified imo. Yes he could have been nervous.completely valid, He looked nervous wen he hugged jb.It was awkward none the less but I still stand by the fact that Prince didn't wana be up there.For whatever reason.

There is no evidence to claim he was or wasn't on drugs obviously..And yes I have been around drugged up people..And they all vary in their actions

Timmy84 said:

NouveauDance said:

OP disappoints, thought this was gonna be about '95 era rumours, not going all the way back to 1983 as evidence of a coke 'habit'

I am only am the beginning of true Prince discovery..But if you could elaborate that would be cool

sweething said:

Onthe1jb said:

Not that any of us truely know,

stop right there ^ .......why would you state an assumption (on your part) as fact? Prince did not look like he was wired on drugs...he looked like he was on an adrenalin rush, caught off-guard, didn't know exactly what to do, period.

[Edited 8/1/11 0:10am]