I've read biographies, seen and heard interviews about Prince. It's often said that Prince way of portraying pure sex through his music as well as style consepts and attitude on stage was clearly a statement thing, but also some sort of publicity stunt saying "here I am, and you won't ever forget this. I will force my persona on you wether you like it or not".

My question is. Would you say that this mostly did benefit him? Or did it scare away alot of listeners? Or was it something in between, a combination of the two?

Would Prince be bigger or smaller than he is if he was playing safe as other great musicans and artists like Bruce Springsteen or Michael Jackson did? MJ was heavily talented, and had enough of gimmicks, style and perfected dance routines to really gain some attention, while Bruce Springsteen also was one baddas as well as being the cool uncle type of guy. Prince was more of a mysterious sex freak female loving transvestite. Does many people connect with his persona?

Prince is/ was flamboyant, but I wonder:

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why did you write "transvestite"...??

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Replica said:

I've read biographies, seen and heard interviews about Prince. It's often said that Prince way of portraying pure sex through his music as well as style consepts and attitude on stage was clearly a statement thing, but also some sort of publicity stunt saying "here I am, and you won't ever forget this. I will force my persona on you wether you like it or not".

My question is. Would you say that this mostly did benefit him? Or did it scare away alot of listeners? Or was it something in between, a combination of the two?

Would Prince be bigger or smaller than he is if he was playing safe as other great musicans and artists like Bruce Springsteen or Michael Jackson did? MJ was heavily talented, and had enough of gimmicks, style and perfected dance routines to really gain some attention, while Bruce Springsteen also was one baddas as well as being the cool uncle type of guy. Prince was more of a mysterious sex freak female loving transvestite. Does many people connect with his persona?

I'm just saying it the way many people see it. I don't see him that way. But this is the way he is seen among MANY. I love it personally, but we live in this world of people who don't understand it.

don't you think "androgynous" is better, more suiting than "transvestite"..

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to answer the "?":

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it worked for David Bowie, his Ziggy Stardust alter ego in the 70s.

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In Prince's case I believe it scared some away, those subjects about oralsex and incest - and Prince's stageshow, yeah I bet the more conservative consumers did not like that, and went away.

Sometimes it worked, sometimes it did not.

I remember the reactions to the TMBGITW video very well. While the song was a big global hit and he's look in the video might have made it "memorable", it really did make a lot of people hate him. Then again, if some people are going hate someone based on them simply stretching gender boundaries their "love" isn't probably worth pursuing.

In overall, I think without the outfits his celebrity status would have remained rather modest. His music was weirder than the music by any other major pop star, so the looks had to complement that.

It totally worked for him, helping carve out a niche in the pop landscape. It works with him in a way that it seemed silly on some associated artists.

As to whether or not it works now, I'm not sure. But he is presenting a more masculine/natural image on this current tour.

purplethunder3121 said:

that front tooth tho....