Anybody have insights into how WB reacted, at the time and from a business perspective, w/Prince cutting the Revolution loose from the hit machine?

Were they concerned the team behind the hits and a proven "blue ocean strategy" would end? Or did they see it simply as "Gloria Estefan dumping MSM"?

[Edited 5/11/14 8:09am]

There was certainly no public reaction that I can recall.

Warner's deal was with Prince so it didn't appear as if they considered it an issue.

I read short blurb in the news paper that prince had let them go to take his music in a new direction. *it had a photo from the Prince album time period.

A few weeks later there was a blurb in Parade Magazine that said the word on the new album was it was great.

S3V3N said:

Anybody have insights into how WB reacted, at the time and from a business perspective, w/Prince cutting the Revolution loose from the hit machine?

Were they concerned the team behind the hits and a proven "blue ocean strategy" would end? Or did they see it simply as "Gloria Estefan dumping MSM"?

[Edited 5/11/14 8:09am]

There was no "team" behind the hits and they knew it perfectly. Their artist was Prince, they couldn't care what his band was.

I would imagine WB was more upset when Prince cut Cavallo, Ruffalo, and Fargnoli.

WB had Prince prior to the Revolution, and they got hits.

By ATWID and Parade WB probably had an idea not everything they did would be Purple Rain hitmaking caliber. There were abandoned projects by then.

Record labels don't give a shit who's in your band other the core songwriters/vocalists. ESPECIALLY if they've signed you as a solo artist and the other people are just "your band".

Case in point - we fired two people from our band when we signed to Sony/BMG. The initial pressing of that album has a photo on the inner sleeve that includes those two bandmembers. Needless to say we had that changed by the time of the second pressing. Sony weren't bothered at all. Those people weren't the primary songwriters or producers.

Aren't there stories in some of the bios from WB execs saying they were not pleased with it? I thought I read that somewhere. There was some negative public reaction. But keep in mind there was also negative reaction about Andre Cymone leaving before The Revolution. But since Andre, Vanity, Jam and Lewis, Morris and Jesse Johnson had all left before the Revolution broke up in general it was looking like Prince was fuckin up in some way. But Warner's, it was said, was not ok with losing so many familar faces.

funksterr said:

funksterr said:

Aren't there stories in some of the bios from WB execs saying they were not pleased with it? I thought I read that somewhere. There was some negative public reaction. But keep in mind there was also negative reaction about Andre Cymone leaving before The Revolution. But since Andre, Vanity, Jam and Lewis, Morris and Jesse Johnson had all left before the Revolution broke up in general it was looking like Prince was fuckin up in some way. But Warner's, it was said, was not ok with losing so many familar faces.

Said by whom?

KCOOLMUZIQ said:

If you have something constructive to contribute to a discussion, then please provide it..

Simply posting a rolling eyes emoticon, presumably to express disagreement to some element of someone else's contribution, does not help support meaningful discussion on a topic.

langebleu - moderator

Given what ATWIAD and Parade were like, from the commercial perspective, I suspect many must have been rather pleased by his decision to fire them.

novabrkr said:

Given what ATWIAD and Parade were like, from the commercial perspective, I suspect many must have been rather pleased by his decision to fire them.

The problem was not them and the music

The music obviously is great. The problem just like SOTT was the lack of promotion.

I suspect UTCM had a negative reaction, because 1.) Prince is not a strong actor 2.) I bet most were expecting (band) performances in the movie -which would have taken that movie to a high level 3.) ATWIAD Prince originally announced would be no videos no promo etc ie bad move

funksterr said:

Aren't there stories in some of the bios from WB execs saying they were not pleased with it? I thought I read that somewhere. There was some negative public reaction. But keep in mind there was also negative reaction about Andre Cymone leaving before The Revolution. But since Andre, Vanity, Jam and Lewis, Morris and Jesse Johnson had all left before the Revolution broke up in general it was looking like Prince was fuckin up in some way. But Warner's, it was said, was not ok with losing so many familar faces.

I created a thread some months ago asking to the fans who were there at the time how they'd reacted to the band being disbanded and what was the general fans' or even medias' reaction and most of the answers was that they didn't really give a shit nor did anybody at the time.

databank said:

funksterr said:

Aren't there stories in some of the bios from WB execs saying they were not pleased with it? I thought I read that somewhere. There was some negative public reaction. But keep in mind there was also negative reaction about Andre Cymone leaving before The Revolution. But since Andre, Vanity, Jam and Lewis, Morris and Jesse Johnson had all left before the Revolution broke up in general it was looking like Prince was fuckin up in some way. But Warner's, it was said, was not ok with losing so many familar faces.

I created a thread some months ago asking to the fans who were there at the time how they'd reacted to the band being disbanded and what was the general fans' or even medias' reaction and most of the answers was that they didn't really give a shit nor did anybody at the time.

I remember that thread, it was about 50% and of course we don't know who all were actually around at the time or serious fans. There are people here who've said they were into Prince but didn't become 'fans' till much later etc

KCOOLMUZIQ said:

The Revolution was just a stage band, more so 4 the look which was diverse. The line up only lasted two years. Before Prince expanded its look totally different from the Purple Rain movie, Tour/ATWIAD. UTCM/Parade featured a different expanded line up.

Then in a flash he disbanded them. I always felt the focus of his creativity was taken away during The Revolution short years and returned during the "MasterPiece" SOTT.

KCOOLMUZIQ said:

KCOOLMUZIQ said:

The Revolution was just a stage band, more so 4 the look which was diverse. The line up only lasted two years. Before Prince expanded its look totally different from the Purple Rain movie, Tour/ATWIAD. UTCM/Parade featured a different expanded line up.

Then in a flash he disbanded them. I always felt the focus of his creativity was taken away during The Revolution short years and returned during the "MasterPiece" SOTT.

according to a 1998 interview the Revolution was a kind of community 4 him. So it was much more than a stage name... that was already in use via 1999 the noituloveR

the Revoluton 1986 live only expanded, because Prince wanted to hold on to the Family members after St Pauls departure:Susannah Eric Leeds Jerome-Wally-Gregory Miko Weaver, he lost Jonathon Melvoin Jellybean and the other keyboardist and bass player... and then lost Jerome & Susannah

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again I know you know better. the 'masterpiece' SOTT comes from the Revolution years ie Dream Factory. And personally ATWIAD & Parade are much more creative that what became SOTT. I listen 2 those 2 album & Lovesexy way more the SOTT. SOTT at times doesn't sound finished.

There were a couple things going on for fans back then. We had already seen Prince in the LRC video with different bandmates, and if you cared, there was a revolving door of solo records, and we knew about Vanity. The PR movie itself introduces the idea of inner strife in the band, and all the press at the time talks about him playing all the instruments. As long as there was a guy in a surgical mask playing synths, we were cool.

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ATWID and Parade weren't exactly what people wanted The Revolution to sound like anyway (when in reality, that was closer to their sound, not PR) and Wendy & Lisa came out (no pun intended) with Waterfalls pretty quickly. Then the dirty not so secret is SOTT didn't really connect with a lot of people in America at the time. Remember, the biggest single was the Sheenah Easton song, and it was huge, but also kinda corny sounding. It wasn't Sugar Walls. I don't know how many older Prince fans will admit it, but SOTT was a weird time to be a Prince fan. A lot of people lost interest until the Black Album press.

OldFriends4Sale said:

KCOOLMUZIQ said:

The Revolution was just a stage band, more so 4 the look which was diverse. The line up only lasted two years. Before Prince expanded its look totally different from the Purple Rain movie, Tour/ATWIAD. UTCM/Parade featured a different expanded line up.

Then in a flash he disbanded them. I always felt the focus of his creativity was taken away during The Revolution short years and returned during the "MasterPiece" SOTT.

according to a 1998 interview the Revolution was a kind of community 4 him. So it was much more than a stage name... that was already in use via 1999 the noituloveR

the Revoluton 1986 live only expanded, because Prince wanted to hold on to the Family members after St Pauls departure:Susannah Eric Leeds Jerome-Wally-Gregory Miko Weaver, he lost Jonathon Melvoin Jellybean and the other keyboardist and bass player... and then lost Jerome & Susannah

.

again I know you know better. the 'masterpiece' SOTT comes from the Revolution years ie Dream Factory. And personally ATWIAD & Parade are much more creative that what became SOTT. I listen 2 those 2 album & Lovesexy way more the SOTT. SOTT at times doesn't sound finished.

Well everyone is entitled to their own opinion and I respect it. SOTT to me is Prince's crowning achievement. Yes some of the songs were written during the Revolution years, but they were mostly Prince on his own. I feel that Prince indeed had a whole bunch of great songs in 1984/85 that were even better than what appeared on ATWIAD or Parade. The Family album alone shows that.

joyinrepetition said:

OldFriends4Sale said:

according to a 1998 interview the Revolution was a kind of community 4 him. So it was much more than a stage name... that was already in use via 1999 the noituloveR

the Revoluton 1986 live only expanded, because Prince wanted to hold on to the Family members after St Pauls departure:Susannah Eric Leeds Jerome-Wally-Gregory Miko Weaver, he lost Jonathon Melvoin Jellybean and the other keyboardist and bass player... and then lost Jerome & Susannah

.

again I know you know better. the 'masterpiece' SOTT comes from the Revolution years ie Dream Factory. And personally ATWIAD & Parade are much more creative that what became SOTT. I listen 2 those 2 album & Lovesexy way more the SOTT. SOTT at times doesn't sound finished.

Well everyone is entitled to their own opinion and I respect it. SOTT to me is Prince's crowning achievement. Yes some of the songs were written during the Revolution years, but they were mostly Prince on his own. I feel that Prince indeed had a whole bunch of great songs in 1984/85 that were even better than what appeared on ATWIAD or Parade. The Family album alone shows that.

Don't get me wrong I love SOTT especially when I make my own playlist with Bsides / longversions. I always felt SOTT had 2 different sounding albums in it. And if you listen to other Dream Factory outtakes there are others that fit the stripped sounds of SOTT.It.Forever In My Life.the Cross etc and then listen to the Camille tracks seperate etc. I love the SOTT era, I just don't listen to the album as much as the others

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I think the 1984-1987 period was his crowning achievement.

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The issue is not who/how many songs were Prince vs Prince and the Revolution.

I was replying to a statement that insisted that SOTT music was some seperate thing from the Revolution. When all of the music was created during the Dream Factory sessions which is a part of his time with the Revolution.

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the whole Purple Rain music + ATWIAD + Parade are my top 3 favorites

Also remember that ATWIAD is more like Purple Rain than anything else. Especially since most of that music was made during the PR era

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But going back to what I was replying to is that ATWIAD & Parade showcased a whole different level of creativity. KCOOLMUZIQ said the focus of his creativity was taken away during The Revolution short years and returned during the "MasterPiece" SOTT. Which is a very contradictory statement since Purple Rain was also the Revolution and many of them didn't want to depart so quickly from that sound just yet. That statement is also contradictory because what became SOTT was the result of the Dream Factory project, the creative music that was solo Prince, full band and peices of the band. And KCOOLMUZIQ should know better

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I love the Family music, the original demos though sound/feel like Purple Rain music and when Prince wanted to expand the creativity the musics feel changed. I like both. I love the high energy Purple Rain touch. But I love that chic touch found in songs like Dear Michaelangelo, A Love Bizarre, Screams of Passion, Susannah's Pajamas, I Wonder U, Sometimes It Snows In April, Christopher Tracey's Parade, Girls & Boys, Alexa de Paris

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Joy In Repetion is also from the Dream Factory sessions

treehouse said:

There were a couple things going on for fans back then. We had already seen Prince in the LRC video with different bandmates, and if you cared, there was a revolving door of solo records, and we knew about Vanity. The PR movie itself introduces the idea of inner strife in the band, and all the press at the time talks about him playing all the instruments. As long as there was a guy in a surgical mask playing synths, we were cool.

.

ATWID and Parade weren't exactly what people wanted The Revolution to sound like anyway (when in reality, that was closer to their sound, not PR) and Wendy & Lisa came out (no pun intended) with Waterfalls pretty quickly. Then the dirty not so secret is SOTT didn't really connect with a lot of people in America at the time. Remember, the biggest single was the Sheenah Easton song, and it was huge, but also kinda corny sounding. It wasn't Sugar Walls. I don't know how many older Prince fans will admit it, but SOTT was a weird time to be a Prince fan. A lot of people lost interest until the Black Album press.

How was ATWIAD & Parade the Revolution sound when most of the people in the band were in the band since Controversy? ATWIAD to me thought feels/sounds like Purple Rain with some more instrumentation. Parade music almost stands on it's own, but with that protege music and a lot of the (other) songs created between 1985-1986 leads us into the Dream Factory/SOTT touch

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Waterfalls doesn't sound like ATWIAD or Parade directly but it does sound like Guitar, too me.

You are right, U Got the Look did get others attention. Maybe that it came with a video and SOTT(single) didn't? I mean, here is another example of Prince not promoting an album. Yeah we got the movie, (tricked again by the Rude boy, because most people were expecting a movie, not a concert film)

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I agree it was a bittersweet period, we in the States did not get to enjoy the SOTT/Madhouse shows that Europe received. Another downside was that the SOTT period only give us 2 Bsides and we had no more protege music (Even though Jill Jones had an album we didn't have Jill JOnes connected to SOTT/Madhouse) the protege scene dropped: 1982 we had [1999 What Times Is It Vanity 6] 1984 we had [Purple Rain Ice Cream Castles the Glamorous Life & Apollonia 6] 1985-1986 we had [ ATWIAD Romance 1600 the Family Parade Mazarati ]

When SOTT came out I was confused and excited, but Prince didn't care 4 it much, he wanted to move on as quickly as he could. And Yes I was very excited about the Black Album lol

OldFriends4Sale said:

ATWIAD to me thought feels/sounds like Purple Rain with some more instrumentation. Parade music almost stands on it's own, but with that protege music and a lot of the (other) songs created between 1985-1986 leads us into the Dream Factory/SOTT touch

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Waterfalls doesn't sound like ATWIAD or Parade directly but it does sound like Guitar, too me.

You are right, U Got the Look did get others attention. Maybe that it came with a video and SOTT(single) didn't? I mean, here is another example of Prince not promoting an album. Yeah we got the movie, (tricked again by the Rude boy, because most people were expecting a movie, not a concert film)

.

Purple Rain had all that minimalist new wave, and the standard rock n' roll blues stuff singing about heartbreak and sex, in it. ATWIAD was all poppy and psychedelic with more spiritualism, less growling. I don't think you can confuse the two as the same sound or feeling...but anyway, I still think Purple Rain was actually the least Revolution-esque of the era despite how we identify it as their signature. I didn't mean to imply that the history isn't more intertwined, and grey. Still, their influences were heard more on the next two records. And if you were a fan and wanted more Purple Rain sounding stuff, you were better off buying 1999. W & L's single sounded like something fans wanted to hear Prince come out with.

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SOTT was released as a video. There were two. One was just the lyrics over a broadcast test pattern thing, and the other was pretty much an excerpt from the concert film with an intro too long to get regular airplay. I also remember a parental advisory warning on MTV or something?

[Edited 5/12/14 13:33pm]

databank said:

funksterr said:

Aren't there stories in some of the bios from WB execs saying they were not pleased with it? I thought I read that somewhere. There was some negative public reaction. But keep in mind there was also negative reaction about Andre Cymone leaving before The Revolution. But since Andre, Vanity, Jam and Lewis, Morris and Jesse Johnson had all left before the Revolution broke up in general it was looking like Prince was fuckin up in some way. But Warner's, it was said, was not ok with losing so many familar faces.

I created a thread some months ago asking to the fans who were there at the time how they'd reacted to the band being disbanded and what was the general fans' or even medias' reaction and most of the answers was that they didn't really give a shit nor did anybody at the time.

I was 15 at the time of the breakup, I was a major Prince fan. Most kids in my high school were Prince fans. I worked at the mall and just in general interacted with a lot of people. All I ever talked about was music. I remember the media coverage at the time. My ears always perked up over anything Prince related and I remember the conversations people were having about Prince. Before the breakup, the general feeling I would hear was that The Revolution was holding Prince back. People forget that Prince was HIGHLY mocked for ATWIAD. A lot of the fan base blamed The Revolution and wanted them out all the way back then. Then came UTCM and Prince was pretty much looked at as a joke . Getting rid of The Revolution, if you listened to what people were saying, was supposed to get Prince back on track, lol. People blamed them for UTCM and all the other seemingly odd choices Prince made in the wake of Purple Rain. So shedding The Revolution was kind of the popular sentiment among the people that still did care. I believe that's the main reason why Prince did it. However the media covered it largely as a really bad thing. I was against it, just because I loved all those odd albums that so many others seemed to hate. My generation, as it turns out largely loved those records and when we became the majority of the music buying public Prince was back at the top of the charts. As for WB, if you read some of the interviews of former WB execs they say that firing The Revolution weakened the Prince brand and it's one of the reasons for the tensions that led to Prince leaving the company.

funksterr said:

People forget that Prince was HIGHLY mocked for ATWIAD.

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People really do forget, don't they? The album wasn't that accessible, and I remember feeling a mix of emotions, good and bad.

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I don't remember people blaming the Revolution, but I'm pretty sure any change was welcomed with an "oh good, maybe Prince will go back to being Prince now"....and here we are 25 years later, and people still react the exact same way after every lineup change!

treehouse said:

funksterr said:

People forget that Prince was HIGHLY mocked for ATWIAD.

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People really do forget, don't they? The album wasn't that accessible, and I remember feeling a mix of emotions, good and bad.

.

I don't remember people blaming the Revolution, but I'm pretty sure any change was welcomed with an "oh good, maybe Prince will go back to being Prince now"....and here we are 25 years later, and people still react the exact same way after every lineup change!

treehouse said:

Purple Rain had all that minimalist new wave, and the standard rock n' roll blues stuff singing about heartbreak and sex, in it. ATWIAD was all poppy and psychedelic with more spiritualism, less growling. I don't think you can confuse the two as the same sound or feeling..

[...]

You sort of can. They employ very similar production techniques and many of the songs on ATWIAD are almost like variations on the songs on PR (similar chord changes, structures and themes). I know it's not instantly evident to most due to ATWIAD's reputation as a "psychedelic" or "beatlesesque" record, but the musical forms and the delivery are still firmly rooted on the production standards of PR. The change from ATWIAD to Parade in that respect was a more drastic one.

novabrkr said:

many of the songs on ATWIAD are almost like variations on the songs on PR (similar chord changes, structures and themes).

.

Say what? In 1985, few people if anyone was intellectualizing ATWIAD to hear it as a perfect sister record to Purple Rain. I mean, I don't doubt you can sit and say Tamborine and The Beautiful Ones are the same song, or every song is Take me with U with different instrumentation, and we can argue about that, but it's kinda off topic. Whatever discussion we could have about it today in 2014 is not at all reflective of how people were receiving it back then. It was a huge departure for some fans, and that was part of te hype of the Black album, with Prince supposedly returning to really minimal provocative dance oriented songs.

Nobody's denying the public perception of the two albums being very different. Of course ATWIAD had tons of psychedelia and weirdness added to it and that's what dominated many listeners perception of it.

However, without even getting into the more technical comparisons between the compositions, you sure can't have that much trouble spotting the stylistic similarities between "Take Me With U" and "Raspberry Beret", or "Purple Rain" and "The Ladder". You don't think a track like "When Doves Cry" could seque perfectly into "Pop Life" on a record? (It did, on The Hits 1 compilation.)

Both albums also rely on heavy drum machine beats driving the music, synth riffs and breakdowns, reverberated guitar wails, use of flanger on elements that you wouldn't expect it on and so on... The recording sessions for the ATWIAD tracks started pretty much as soon as they had wrapped up PR, so that explains it in practical terms. Parade, however, is a whole lot different concoction altogether.

novabrkr said:

"Purple Rain" and "The Ladder". You don't think a track like "When Doves Cry" could seque perfectly into "Pop Life" on a record? (It did, on The Hits 1 compilation.)

Both albums also rely on heavy drum machine beats driving the music, synth riffs and breakdowns, reverberated guitar wails, use of flanger on elements that you wouldn't expect it on and so on... The recording sessions for the ATWIAD tracks started pretty much as soon as they had wrapped up PR, so that explains it in practical terms. Parade, however, is a whole lot different concoction altogether.

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Hmmm, no. Pop Life opens with a good seque from Doves Cry, but just because they sound good in sequence doesn't prove much. It's nothing alike... Not thematically.... Nor in instrumentation where the bass line is key. Backing vocals are approached very differently in the song's structure. Pop Life's random cut in of the boxing sample, and all around musicality is a huge difference... Doves is a darker new wave song with a rock guitars, and Pop Life lacks that same edge. To me that overshadows whatever the looping, or flanger effects or drum machine they have in common. Did you hear these records when they were released? These weren't subtle differences in 1985.

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I remember really wanting The Ladder to be the next Purple Rain when I first heard it, so I agree that you can make the comparison, but it just wasn't the same vibe. The instrumentation was not the same (horns!), nor were the technical aspects - it's recorded brighter. It's more gospel and soul than blues.

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I'm sure there are people who would side with you on this, and it's something that might be a good thread of it's own (if it hasn't already been), but again, this is all just an academic exercise anyway that kind of misses the larger point.

Fans weren't relating to AWIAD as a sequel to Purple Rain, so intellectualizing it today doesn't give much insight into how audiences reacted, and the perception of the Revolution.

[Edited 5/13/14 3:30am]