violectrica said:

panpac777 said:

Assessing the potential value of the vault is impossible.

First of all: I'm sure that not everything is physically inside that vault. Recordings could be on his laptop (even if he was just fooling around with any music software and saved the file it could be a valuable recording), on hard drives in his offices, his home, in his car etc.

Even if he just wrote a song on a napkin or on a post-it note it could have the potential of becoming one of his biggest sellers.

So if I were Tyka I would work extremely hard to make sure that no-one removes anything, not even a single piece of paper from any of his properties.

But assessing the value of it all? It's absolutely impossible.

So sad that it already has come to this...
1. The combination to the vault and the sets of keys were accessible to a couple of engineers and associates...
2. Almost everything in the vault has already been archived chronologically and the majority is "ready for release"...

Let his (former) engineers go over everything and in less than a year everything will be catalogued and sorted...
Have former bandmembers and engineers go through the specific periods they were involved and have them present this to his estate to decide what to do with it...

Neversin.

[Edited 4/28/16 3:36am]

Neversin said:

So sad that it already has come to this...
1. The combination to the vault and the sets of keys were accessible to a couple of engineers and associates...
2. Almost everything in the vault has already been archived chronologically and the majority is "ready for release"...

Let his (former) engineers go over everything and in less than a year everything will be catalogued and sorted...
Have former bandmembers and engineers go through the specific periods they were involved and have them present this to his estate to decide what to do with it...

Neversin.

[Edited 4/28/16 3:36am]

How do we know anyone other than P had the code for the vault?

Putting tapes in chronological order might not be that easy when you're dealing with a creative artist like Prince. He has often recycled his old recordings and I guess sometimes he simply taped over some tracks on a multitrack reel instead of creating dubs and reworking those.

Frank Zappa's vault comes to my mind: his family is facing very similar difficulties in trying to preserve everything and the same time trying to maintain a steady flow of new releases. So far they are doing the right thing and I believe Zappa's vault is in good hands.
But they have been much closer to Frank Zappa (after all, they are his family and they are living in the house with the vault inside) than Tyka or any other siblings are to Prince.

Didn't he sign an equity release type deal about a year ago regarding the unreleased stuff from the vault being able to be released after his death?

KaresB said:

How do we know anyone other than P had the code for the vault?

Because his engineers needed access to it the thousnads of times Prince requested to have them bring him, for example, 549.01 or tape 238 or whatever...
Prince knew his vault and its contents by heart, which baffled engineers when he asked them to get him a specific song or recording... I've seen him do it a couple of times and two engineers were given the keys and the combination to open the vault...

Neversin.

I wonder if they found Tutankhamun in there.

Just a thought, but did anyone try 3121 as the combination before breaking in?

Neversin said:

KaresB said:

How do we know anyone other than P had the code for the vault?

Because his engineers needed access to it the thousnads of times Prince requested to have them bring him, for example, 549.01 or tape 238 or whatever...
Prince knew his vault and its contents by heart, which baffled engineers when he asked them to get him a specific song or recording... I've seen him do it a couple of times and two engineers were given the keys and the combination to open the vault...

Neversin.

I hear you, but giving engineers the keys and code to get something to work on does not mean that those engineers took those keys home nor that the code has not been changed regularly.

KaresB said:

I hear you, but giving engineers the keys and code to get something to work on does not mean that those engineers took those keys home nor that the code has not been changed regularly.

I don't know where you get that idea from because I never said such a thing nor eluded to it...
The vault keys and combination (I was told the combination was changed every day since a couple of years... Before it was changed weekly...) were in his Paisley Park office to which his engineers had access...

Neversin.

This guy was so busy checking his fans and record labels that I doubt there is a will. And maybe it was intentional as it will be a shitshow with or without one - just let the next of kin deal with it all.

As for 'songs', I think this is a bit of an embellishment. What will be found is a room 'primarily' filled with sketches and demos.

Anyone else hear the similarities between Mooonbeam Levels and Darling Nikki? There are probably two or three more songs to utilize that template and get the most from that theme. I believe what we got with each 'release' was the best of themes.

Maybe we'll get to hear the original version of When Doves Cry w/ bass or full versions of songs which were edited down for release but I'm not expecting to be blown away by any of the vault material.

Perhaps they didn't really drill, those with access cooperated, and this is just clickbait journalism that keeps Prince's story going to sell some ads. Or perhaps those with access refused to cooperate. I hope its the latter. Either way drilling makes no sense... the material has been perfectly secure for decades. Now its security is compromised.

[Edited 4/28/16 4:31am]

Neversin said:

KaresB said:

I don't know where you get that idea from because I never said such a thing nor eluded to it...
The vault keys and combination (I was told the combination was changed every day since a couple of years... Before it was changed weekly...) were in his Paisley Park office to which his engineers had access...

Neversin.

Okay, I misunderstood you, sorry.

GoldiesParade said:

Neversin said:

tollyc said:

violectrica said:

Is it possible a will is in there?!?! Genius!

The Vault IS the Will.

tollyc said:

The vault contains more than his music. He kept his cash there (hundreds of thousands) He kept gold down there too.

Like to know where you got this revelation.....

Funny I was wondering that as well since the get go.

I also wonder if people are honest enough if something is found (that he prepared on some random piece of paper)...would they actually present it or pretend it ddin' exist.

violectrica said:

Is it possible a will is in there?!?! Genius!

paulludvig said:

Anyone idea what we can expect to find in the vault? Have collectors heard most of it?

Not by a long shot...
The sheer number of songs in there is ridiculous...
From the 1980's on out Prince doubled albums and presented single album to WB for release, this is a known fact...
From 1993-1994 on out he started to triple albums and present one of those for immediate release, the other two were shelved for either later release or revision... And that has been the strategy ever since; he records 3 albums worth of material and releases one of them...
Do the math and compare it to the number of bootlegs (circulating and "uncirculating") out there... I once did and was surprised at how many stuff there is still unheard...
Sure he mashed up some old recordings on later releases or rerecorded them, but there are still numerous unique songs still not heard...
The number of finished studio albums in there is also incomprehensible... Not to mention the live albums including annoying overdubs...
The only thing he didn't seem that interested in were live video recordings... I was told there were less of these in there than on would imagine...
Music videos however is another story since there's a shit ton of those in there... Since Paisley Park opened he shot video's for almost every song on his albums...

Neversin.

I am hoping there will be a will in there. Please....it just does not make sense that there is no will. None at all.

sqhootie said:

I am hoping there will be a will in there. Please....it just does not make sense that there is no will. None at all.

Are you sure you'd like the will Prince might had in mind?

sfinky1 said:

I'm already heartbroken from his death and still can't believe it. Now my heart breaks all over again at the thought of his precious vault being ransacked it all just feels so wrong..

Let's just not assume they'll hold a garage sale. I trust it will be handled with due respect and security and no-one will be allowed to take anything.

This makes me somewhat worried. I hope this bank knows what it is doing. To be fair, I'm sure they understand the sentimental value of that vault and its contents. That i snot only music history but also Minnesota history. It's like walking into a pyramid and finding stuff. I sincerely hope they put someone like Wendy and Lisa in charge of that thing.

Please Bremer Bank, don't eff this up.

sqhootie said:

I am hoping there will be a will in there. Please....it just does not make sense that there is no will. None at all.

I agree.