laurarichardson said:

http://www.digitalmusicne...estaylor/. Ran across this article from a few years ago. Concerns James Taylor trying to more payment out of streaming and how his accounts found rip offs that Warner Brothers had been pulling him back to 1969.

Wonder if Prince ever initiated an audit of his royalty payments throughout his career during his battle with them? Would've been interesting. Wonder if it could be done now if he didn't before? WB seem like real pieces of work.

Let's just say that Prince's own creativity plays perfectly into record labels tactics to rip off artists. Prince wanted to release a record a year and that played into him potentially being ripped off. When a recording artist gets hot, the record label immediately wants the next record and opens up a huge budget for that second project. The label requires that full budgets be recouped so they will use money that the artist earned off the 1st project to pay for the 2nd or 3rd or 4th etc. To think about the success of the 1999 album and tour, which went right into Purple Rain and that tour and movie, then the release of Around the World in A day, which still went double platinum, then the Parade movie flop but successful single and another platinum record. Regardless of the Flop of Under the Cherry Moon, Prince should have had coffers of money overflowing in banks off of Purple Rain the Movie, the Soundtrack, the Tour, the Merch, and the platinum Home video. But come time to build Paisley Park, Prince has to go to Warners for 12M to build Paisley Park. Prince should have walked the streets with 12M in his car just based on the success he was having between '83-'86. However, that is the tactic of labels. Thank you for Purple Rain, Prince you're rich beyond your wildest dreams but give us the nest project, open a budget, now Prince wants another movie, open another budget, now prince has a soundtrack for that movie, open another budget. Then the label sets absurd markers for an artist to recoup those budgets so they can sift away from the money Prince is rightfully owed off of Purple Rain. They keep artists coming to them to feed themselves while they keep the artists money, that they rightfully deserve, circling in limbo until the label can take it for themselves. So, we bought you a car, a house, kept studio's on call for you, paid this bill and that and that's why we took this money from you. Meanwhile that's actually the artists money. When you factor in Prince's own records and his singles and then factor in the Time, Apollonia 6, Shiela E's 2 albums and those singles, then Purple Rain as a movie, the tour and the merch and the Home Video sales then think about how Prince had to get 12M from Warners to pay for Paisley Park. SMDH, it makes no sense to me at all.

ivey0126 said:

Let's just say that Prince's own creativity plays perfectly into record labels tactics to rip off artists. Prince wanted to release a record a year and that played into him potentially being ripped off. When a recording artist gets hot, the record label immediately wants the next record and opens up a huge budget for that second project. The label requires that full budgets be recouped so they will use money that the artist earned off the 1st project to pay for the 2nd or 3rd or 4th etc. To think about the success of the 1999 album and tour, which went right into Purple Rain and that tour and movie, then the release of Around the World in A day, which still went double platinum, then the Parade movie flop but successful single and another platinum record. Regardless of the Flop of Under the Cherry Moon, Prince should have had coffers of money overflowing in banks off of Purple Rain the Movie, the Soundtrack, the Tour, the Merch, and the platinum Home video. But come time to build Paisley Park, Prince has to go to Warners for 12M to build Paisley Park. Prince should have walked the streets with 12M in his car just based on the success he was having between '83-'86. However, that is the tactic of labels. Thank you for Purple Rain, Prince you're rich beyond your wildest dreams but give us the nest project, open a budget, now Prince wants another movie, open another budget, now prince has a soundtrack for that movie, open another budget. Then the label sets absurd markers for an artist to recoup those budgets so they can sift away from the money Prince is rightfully owed off of Purple Rain. They keep artists coming to them to feed themselves while they keep the artists money, that they rightfully deserve, circling in limbo until the label can take it for themselves. So, we bought you a car, a house, kept studio's on call for you, paid this bill and that and that's why we took this money from you. Meanwhile that's actually the artists money. When you factor in Prince's own records and his singles and then factor in the Time, Apollonia 6, Shiela E's 2 albums and those singles, then Purple Rain as a movie, the tour and the merch and the Home Video sales then think about how Prince had to get 12M from Warners to pay for Paisley Park. SMDH, it makes no sense to me at all.

Reading your post makes me really wonder. Prince never seemed to be money savvy, like he wasn't interested in the details of his finances, so it would've been easy for experts to rip him off. Like I said, I wonder if he ever did an audit of his royalties like James Taylor's lawyer did for him? And, can it be done posthumously by his family?

A Billboard story,

Like Chasing a Phantom': Prince Tour Guru John Meglen on His Super Bowl Epic, Musicology's $44M Run

5/4/2016 by Ray Waddell

• What was Prince's approach to his business?

Honestly, he really didn't like to deal with the business. The business bothered him. I think if there could have been no monetary side to the music business, that would have been a better world for Prince. He felt like people always ripped him off. We did that entire tour with him, we're the two straightest guys in the business, we put every penny on the table. Others have in the past -- and we could have -- robbed him blind. Blind. The final number could have been half that and he still would have loved it. But we put every cent on the table, Paul is relentless on the operating expenses. Not only did we not rip him off, we didn't let anybody rip him off. We made sure that he really benefited, and he knew it.

endiadj said:

laurarichardson said:

endiadj said:

Reading your post makes me really wonder. Prince never seemed to be money savvy, like he wasn't interested in the details of his finances, so it would've been easy for experts to rip him off. Like I said, I wonder if he ever did an audit of his royalties like James Taylor's lawyer did for him? And, can it be done posthumously by his family?

-- You can't put it all off on Prince or any artist. You hire people you think you can trust and half the time they are working with the label to rip you off. Even after James Taylor did his audit the follow up audit showed that WB kept ripping him off. Besides years later Prince would take control and make more money then he did earlier in his carreer listen to the AGE live guys and how those 6 cents to make those Musicology CDs and they bundled them in the ticket price for &12.00 a piece. Look at all the real estate he owned. You have ups and downs in business every thing you do has risk. In the end he did alright.

That's why the person responsible for making all of this cash needs to learn all he/she can about their finances, where, when, how, what, who. It's the smart thing to do to protect yourself, instead of just putting someone else in charge of your hard earned fortune and praying that they won't cheat you. You can look at your tax forms and understand what's going on or at least know enough to ask the important questions and understand the answers. There were reports of people not being paid, lawyers, band members, taxes, etc. Was it because he didn't want to pay them, or he left it to other people who didn't/were late paying them, or he didn't have the money to pay them? You have to know what's going with your cash flow.

endiadj said:

ivey0126 said:

Let's just say that Prince's own creativity plays perfectly into record labels tactics to rip off artists. Prince wanted to release a record a year and that played into him potentially being ripped off. When a recording artist gets hot, the record label immediately wants the next record and opens up a huge budget for that second project. The label requires that full budgets be recouped so they will use money that the artist earned off the 1st project to pay for the 2nd or 3rd or 4th etc. To think about the success of the 1999 album and tour, which went right into Purple Rain and that tour and movie, then the release of Around the World in A day, which still went double platinum, then the Parade movie flop but successful single and another platinum record. Regardless of the Flop of Under the Cherry Moon, Prince should have had coffers of money overflowing in banks off of Purple Rain the Movie, the Soundtrack, the Tour, the Merch, and the platinum Home video. But come time to build Paisley Park, Prince has to go to Warners for 12M to build Paisley Park. Prince should have walked the streets with 12M in his car just based on the success he was having between '83-'86. However, that is the tactic of labels. Thank you for Purple Rain, Prince you're rich beyond your wildest dreams but give us the nest project, open a budget, now Prince wants another movie, open another budget, now prince has a soundtrack for that movie, open another budget. Then the label sets absurd markers for an artist to recoup those budgets so they can sift away from the money Prince is rightfully owed off of Purple Rain. They keep artists coming to them to feed themselves while they keep the artists money, that they rightfully deserve, circling in limbo until the label can take it for themselves. So, we bought you a car, a house, kept studio's on call for you, paid this bill and that and that's why we took this money from you. Meanwhile that's actually the artists money. When you factor in Prince's own records and his singles and then factor in the Time, Apollonia 6, Shiela E's 2 albums and those singles, then Purple Rain as a movie, the tour and the merch and the Home Video sales then think about how Prince had to get 12M from Warners to pay for Paisley Park. SMDH, it makes no sense to me at all.

ya, it's all pretty fucked up, the whole system. those people with the money and resources find people to do all the hard work and they take the lions share, someday it'll change, it already is, the music business is done really.

laurarichardson said:

http://www.digitalmusicne...estaylor/. Ran across this article from a few years ago. Concerns James Taylor trying to more payment out of streaming and how his accounts found rip offs that Warner Brothers had been pulling him back to 1969.

I'm pretty sure he did have an audit done regarding Purple Rain and said so in an interview??