And this is not in reference to "Let's Rock", and his first kerfuffle with Warner. In 1989, he was talking to Alan Leeds about getting music out. He was still frustrated with the lack of speed in which he could release music. He felt that the impact of the music at that point was more relevant and that people could be reactionary to it in a better way if it were out when he recorded it. He said if he puts something in the vault, it loses its timely significance, and becomes dated quickly.

Leeds also said Prince had the idea of doing "one of those infomercials" and selling the record. He wanted Leeds to run a new label. Leeds said, "I can't do that. I'm running this label, and it's a joint venture with Warner. I could go to jail." Prince, matter-of-factly stated, "Put it in your wife's name!" He was serious, Leeds said. He felt such an urgency on releasing music (more than ever), that even in a still-pre-internet-age he was searching for ways to get his music out. Leeds says Prince was dead serious, and not just kicking around ideas over lunch or something.

There are two notes of irony and humor in this. One is that it's pretty much the reason he had protege groups. It wasn't necessarily because he was cultivating talent (although those folks were talented in their own right), it was to get his music out through other means. The fact that you can hear his voice on most of The Time stuff, and Sheila's first two records says a lot. Madhouse, New Power Generation, it was a not-so-clever way of getting more out. And oddly, WB let him do it. They knew NPG was him, but hey - let's put out another Prince record at the same time. He was still there, in some fashion beyond the title of co-writer or record label CEO. He was the record. So while he could record 3 albums in a year, we only saw one. Maybe two.

The second note is that he knew what the hell an infomercial was, of course. I always thought Prince was just being Prince and being goofy, when he was on Arsenio a couple of years ago and said "What's an infomercial?" He knew. Of course he knew, and we knew he knew. He knew that too. But he still dropped the joke, because honestly it was funnier to hear "what's an infomercial" than to hear a legend say "I really dig Oxyclean, and that Dump Cake Recipe cook book."

TrivialPursuit said:

NorthC said:

That part about Alan Leeds is from Matt Thorne's book, isn't it?

I think so. The video is also in the Slave Trade documentary. I'm not sure if Thorne was involved with the documentary or just interviewed for it.

Noodled24 said:

Noodled24 said:

NorthC said:

That part about Alan Leeds is from Matt Thorne's book, isn't it?

I think so. The video is also in the Slave Trade documentary. I'm not sure if Thorne was involved with the documentary or just interviewed for it.

It's from a panel discussion with Alan Leeds, Danyel Smith, Questlove, Toure...and I'm not sure if that's Alan Light or not, but I'm leaning toward no.. Here's the specific clip. The video was posted in 2013.

Yeah I was like "yeah ok prince who doesn't know what an infomercial is?" and then he laughed when Arsenio said "you don't own a bacon bowl?" cause he knew what he was talking about