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Did Princes Pop star status almost ruin his career? Personally, I think he was anything but a Pop star. He was a true artist in every sense of the industry, but once his music became commercial with the success of PR, it seemed to devalue his true identity musically and established him as an 80's Icon in music, fashion and image. He needed the boost at the time, but I often felt it hurt him in the end. What do y'all think? | |
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The average 'pop' star's career is about 7 years long. Prince continued to make beautiful music for decades after Purple Rain catapulted him to super stardom. He had the talent to out last all of the others who were stars after they faded away. He was smart enough to realize that you can't do the same thing over and over and that you have to keep things 'fresh' in order to be relevant. | |
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His career went pretty well from what I can see. Sure very few of us were buying his albums at the end but that's the same with most artists, how many people bought the last Keith Richards album? | |
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I guess that depends on how you define Pop Star. . I don't know if Prince was ever a 'Pop-Commercial' star though. Purple Rain actually brought out more his identity musically. He delved further into sounds and different instrumentations in the music from Purple Rain onward. . Purple Rain forever gave Prince a plateau that made him the 'artist' that musicians of all ethnic backgrounds and ages respected.
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It could have, but he used that success to give him freedom. He could never have built Paisley Park without that success, toured big venues when he needed the money. |
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I can see what you're saying. It hurt in the sense that people put alot of false expectations on him. Anytime his record sales dipped or when he released something that wasn't considered "commercial", everybody would start talking about if he was "over". Yet, right there, was the answer. No one is usually "over" when we say they are, they simply are. Somebody, I believe Matt Fink, said it was a massive mistake to assume PR would be the normal barometer for his record sales. That's probably why WB gave him so much grief over not duplicating that success. But that kind of phenomenon only happens VERY rarely. I'm actually relieved he didn't try to chase after that (well, D&P is sort of a move in that direction). On the whole, he stayed unique through all the ups and downs, a true original to the end. God, I miss him. | |
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The success of Purple Rain opened many doors and all the $$$ from being a mega pop star icon gave me a huge amount of artistic freedom. So was a net positve, even though some drawbacks. | |
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He was fine untill he felt he had to compete with Michael, Janet and Madonna's contracts and albums and then felt even more threatened by the explosion of Hip Hop. This made him make tragic career mistakes (the WB contract, Tony M, the Gun Mic etc....)
It was not until late 90's (e.g. "Dont Play Me") that it seemed that he once again stopped caring about "pop" fame but still needed $$, hence Rave, but then that didnt work so he became a touring machine.
I think that it was only just in this last 3rd Eye run that he finally started to feel comfortable with himself again. Sure AOA and H&R p1 seemed to "chase trends" and had elements of Prince being the "old guy at the club", it still all felt a bit more in good fun "lemme show you whippersnappers how its done" rather than "I HAVE TO KEEP UP WITH R KELLY!".
[Edited 9/18/17 11:26am] | |
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emesem said: He was fine untill he felt he had to compete with Michael, Janet and Madonna's contracts and albums and then felt even more threatened by the explosion of Hip Hop. This made him make tragic career mistakes (the WB contract, Tony M, the Gun Mic etc....)
It was not until late 90's (e.g. "Dont Play Me") that it seemed that he once again stopped caring about "pop" fame but still needed $$, hence Rave, but then that didnt work so he became a touring machine.
I think that it was only just in this last 3rd Eye run that he finally started to feel comfortable with himself again. Sure AOA and H&R p1 seemed to "chase trends" and had elements of Prince being the "old guy at the club", it still all felt a bit more in good fun "lemme show you whippersnappers how its done" rather than "I HAVE TO KEEP UP WITH R KELLY!".
[Edited 9/18/17 11:26am] Thanks everyone for fleshing out what I was trying to say, but in particular-emesem. Exactly! I'll send my thoughts to you in the future.😁 My post was originally about a paragraph and I have a tendency to let my thoughts get away from me, so Thank You! [Edited 9/18/17 12:37pm] [Edited 9/18/17 12:38pm] | |
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his 90's output proves otherwise | |
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He was always in a league of his own, mainly because he could compete with any genre. | |
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what are you talking about?...the only thing that "ruined" Prince's career, was death... his "pop-star status" WAS his career...it didnt ruin it... | |
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That's right, RJ. We can talk about the ups and downs of Prince's carreer all we want, but the fact is that he was in the music bizz for almost 40 years. If you want to look at a music carreer that was ruïned, then Prince's hero Sly Stone would be a better example. And yet, he survived Prince... That's the irony of history...  | |
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RJ and NorthC, you are both correct, but I never said his career WAS ruined? I don't agree that his death ruined his career though, it has preserved it. | |
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annalizer said: RJ and NorthC, you are both correct, but I never said his career WAS ruined? I don't agree that his death ruined his career though, it has preserved it. i say death ruined his career, because he is unable to create or perform music (his job descriptions)...the only thing left are scraps, crumbs, and throwaways, that the vultures are scavenging through, for their own profits.... | |
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RJOrion said: annalizer said: RJ and NorthC, you are both correct, but I never said his career WAS ruined? I don't agree that his death ruined his career though, it has preserved it. i say death ruined his career, because he is unable to create or perform music (his job descriptions)...the only thing left are scraps, crumbs, and throwaways, that the vultures are scavenging through, for their own profits.... I get understand , but unfortunately, even scavengers gotta eat I guess.Smh | |
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There was always, in my opinion, a conflict between what Prince wanted to do as an artist, his arty side if you will, and what he needed to do to maintain both his extavagant income and his status as an icon. For every Rave there was a The War, for every NEWS there was a Musicplight. He wanted to get 5M per album from WB then he'd deliver semi-experimental concept albums such as the 1992 Symbol and complain WB couldn't sell 10 M copies. I've always been convinced that Prince would have been much better off if he'd had the kind of career that would allow him to keep recording and releasing a couple of albums a year, as well as touring, without selling millions and being under pressure to sell more millions. He was an incredible pop songs writer but some of his least accessible material also counts among his best. I wish there would have been more experiments and a little less commercial records (even though I'm entirely satisfied with his catalogue as it is). When I see the creative freedom enjoyed by the likes of Bill Laswell or John Zorn, who sell few copies of their records but just enough to keep on going, I wish Prince would gave enjoyed such freedom. Maybe he would have eventually, making all his money with touring his hits and being free to release albums that don't sell much in the context of today, when albums don't sell anymore anyway. Gone too soon:( A COMPREHENSIVE PRINCE DISCOGRAPHY (work in progress ^^): https://sites.google.com/...scography/ |
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annalizer [Edited 9/19/17 10:25am] | |
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databank said: There was always, in my opinion, a conflict between what Prince wanted to do as an artist, his arty side if you will, and what he needed to do to maintain both his extavagant income and his status as an icon. For every Rave there was a The War, for every NEWS there was a Musicplight. He wanted to get 5M per album from WB then he'd deliver semi-experimental concept albums such as the 1992 Symbol and complain WB couldn't sell 10 M copies. I've always been convinced that Prince would have been much better off if he'd had the kind of career that would allow him to keep recording and releasing a couple of albums a year, as well as touring, without selling millions and being under pressure to sell more millions. He was an incredible pop songs writer but some of his least accessible material also counts among his best. I wish there would have been more experiments and a little less commercial records (even though I'm entirely satisfied with his catalogue as it is). When I see the creative freedom enjoyed by the likes of Bill Laswell or John Zorn, who sell few copies of their records but just enough to keep on going, I wish Prince would gave enjoyed such freedom. Maybe he would have eventually, making all his money with touring his hits and being free to release albums that don't sell much in the context of today, when albums don't sell anymore anyway. Gone too soon:( Well stated! | |
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At one point in the early 2000s it seemed like Prince was content to be an independent artist and icon, and those kind of albums - The Rainbow Children, Xpectation, NEWS - followed suit. As did performances of lesser-known material in smaller venues. Then came the Musicology album and tour and a return to the public arena. | |
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he always wanted to be big and famous, yet be free from restraints. And that just isn't possible.
I know he wouldn't get a lot of success from Rainbow Children. But I love that album. And wanted a 2nd. | |
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For me I never considered Prince a "pop star". I guess I'm biased on a couple of levels, but the main one being when I think of a "pop star" I think of someone who really is marginally talented and blew up because they had a machine behind them more so than because they were a great talent. Also, as someone else noted, he played across genres so I never saw him as "pop". | |
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Yeah I think that word 'Pop' has a lot of different meanings. Whitney Houston is considered a Pop Star, and she had extremely talented vocal abilities. Sting & Michael Jackson were called Pop Stars. . I tend to equate it with 'Popular' I don't think there really is a definative to it. . It seems we say 'Rock Star' 'Pop Star' but not 'Jazz Star RnB Star Folk Star Classic Music Star' Do we say Country 'Music' Star or Rap Star? | |
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OldFriends4Sale said:
he always wanted to be big and famous, yet be free from restraints. And that just isn't possible.
I know he wouldn't get a lot of success from Rainbow Children. But I love that album. And wanted a 2nd. I wanted him to continue in that vein also. It seemed then, that the time was ripe for it and he was (at least momentarily) at peace with the idea. | |
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The RC is an amazing album... | |
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