I ask because nowadays and even when he was still with us, it seemed like a niche thing to be a Prince fan. I never heard a lick about him EVER, and i don't know why...Why wasn't he more popular? Even after all of the scandals that Michael Jackson had, he still remains insanely popular today. I don't say that to disrespect Prince or say that MJ was/is better, but because i don't see why Prince wasn't/isn't on that same level of popularity. So, it just left me wondering; How popular was he in his prime? Was he on the same level of MJ? Bigger?...

MJ was more popular because he was mr nice and prince was mr controversial. Mj wanted to be the biggest star in the world. All the time. And had a army of people to back him.Fueled by sony and the quincy jones machine. Not saying he wasn't very talented. But Prince took a different path after the monster that was Purple Rain.

Being a kid in New Zealand in the mid and late 80s, he was known but not super popular. Here it was mainly local and Australian acts that ruled our charts, Split Enz, Crowded House, John Farnham and the annual Kiwi one hit wonder riding the charts (John Stevens, Tim Finn, All of Us - sailing away Americas cup song, Rob Guest, Holiday Makers, Margaret URLICH to name a few and I know you Americans and Europeans have never heard of them except maybe Split Enz and Crowded House, which the Aussies claim all the time).

.

Then British acts of the 80s were popular, Duran Duran, Thompsons, Boy George, Goerge Michael, Wham, Mel and Kim. Of the Americans - all the cowboy country stuff to 1985 and then acts like Guns and Roses, Poison, Bon Jovi in the later 80s. Black artists were only really popular with Maori and Polynesians in the 80s and apart from Whitney Houston and Lionel Richie, few really ahd any following until MJ borke through - he was big but not huge, having more Top 10s rather than #1 hits.

.

Prince was very muted as he was seen as a Disco one hit wonder in 1980/81 and all the albums before 1999 hardly circulated here. 1999 was a small hit thanks to the singles going Top 10. Purple Rain went platinum in its 1984/85 release, but only selling 15,000 copies and reaching #2 compared to 150,000 of Thriller. The singles did fair rather than excellent - WDC got to #2 (Kept out by the Specials - Free Nelson Mandela) and his biggest hit to date, LGC was #8, Purple Rain was #25 and IWD4U and TMWU were complete flops. Several more singles top 10ed, Kiss was another #2, but SOTT stalled at #6.

.

1988 saw a sea change in music and white NZers got heavily into funkier and blacker stuff, with Bad going to #1 and all of the singles being Top 10 smashes, then Alphabet Street was a #1 his first here and Lovesexy a #1 album here and then this feat was followed up with Batdance and Batman hitting #1, Graffiti Bridge got to #4 and TITT got to #5 on our charts. More success followed with D and P hitting #2 on the chart, with Cream and Gett Off Top 10 hits. Love Symbol also went Top 10 and Sexy MF reached #9, with 7 getting to #4. Princes last Top 10 hit and #1 smash was TMBGITW.

.

The 80s was a breakthrough, but Prince never saw huge success and fame here until Lovesexy in 1988 and this was thanks mostly to a man who wrote a music magazine here and played Prince endlessly in his radio show and really got him out there. By 1990 Rap and R and B was a big seller here, but before 1988/89, the only big time Black music was disco in the late 70s and early 80s and then a lot of white rock music through the 80s.

.

Even today he has never been huge and as we all know, true Prince fans in NZ are few and far between, I can think of about 10.

Adorecream said:

Being a kid in New Zealand in the mid and late 80s, he was known but not super popular. Here it was mainly local and Australian acts that ruled our charts, Split Enz, Crowded House, John Farnham and the annual Kiwi one hit wonder riding the charts (John Stevens, Tim Finn, All of Us - sailing away Americas cup song, Rob Guest, Holiday Makers, Margaret URLICH to name a few and I know you Americans and Europeans have never heard of them except maybe Split Enz and Crowded House, which the Aussies claim all the time).

.

Oi! Kiwis, both! Which you recognise here! Phar Lap (Timaru Reprazent!) and Pavlova, just the same!

NorthC said:

3y3no said:

I ask because nowadays and even when he was still with us, it seemed like a niche thing to be a Prince fan. I never heard a lick about him EVER, and i don't know why...Why wasn't he more popular? Even after all of the scandals that Michael Jackson had, he still remains insanely popular today. I don't say that to disrespect Prince or say that MJ was/is better, but because i don't see why Prince wasn't/isn't on that same level of popularity. So, it just left me wondering; How popular was he in his prime? Was he on the same level of MJ? Bigger?...

You need to understand that MJ was the star of stars, worldwide. Thanks to the sales of Thriller he'd reached a level of popularity that may only be comparable to The Beatles' popularity 2 decades earlier. Comparing any 80's star's level of popularity to MJ's is absurd because he was a league of his own. That's why Prince wasn't/isn't on the same level of popularity. No one was/is. So let's just put this aside once and for all because it leads nowhere.

.

Now as to P's level of popularity in the 80's, I'll speak from a European perspective only but I can tell you Prince was HUGE from the mid-80's to the mid 90's. No everyone liked him or his music, he actually divided people quite a lot. Back then there still was a sort of feud between people who were into rock and people who were into dance music, so rockers often disdained Prince, and many people were uncomfortable with his sexual provocations and ambiguities, not to mention that his music wasn't always that accessible. Most people didn't really know what he was about. But everyone knew him and his hits, he was being played on the radio constantly and he was definitely considered one of the biggest stars of the decade. Now you'd probably be surprised to know of other artists who were huge at the time and are today a "niche thing". How many Phil Collins fans do you meet on a daily basis?

.

That's for the general public, now when it comes to hipsters, artists, critics and the media, Prince was THE genius of the decade. If you were hype you had to be into Prince. Of course you had the occasional negative review in the music press but in the end Prince was synonym to cool. That went on up until the mid-90's, which is why even through the name change and WB wars, Prince had a lot of support from the media and elites in Europe. It's only after 1995 that Prince faded out from the public eye, if only because the 90's had produced a new generation of cool and hip artists.

maplenpg said:

NorthC said:

He was at the peak of his popularity in Europe in 1986-88. He may not have had the best selling albums, but every album made the top ten. His reputation as a live artist had a lot to do with it; between 1986 and 1993 he did 6 European tours in sold out arenas. Of course this doesn't mean everybody loved him, there were plenty of people who couldn't stand him and who thought he was a weirdo, but overall, he was pretty popular. Both with critics and the general public, which is something you can't say about Michael Jackson or Madonna. They may have sold more records, but they didn't have the reputation of a musical innovator that Prince had. It was the name change and the WB war that ruined all of this. When he toured in 1995, venues that were sold out two years before, were only half full. He made a comeback at the end of the 90s and from then, he was always assured of sold out arenas and there was always a buzz about possible aftershows. So even if he wasn't on top of the charts anymore, he could grab people's attention until the very last moment. [Edited 3/3/18 1:01am]

This. Though I was in school (UK) in the 80's and being a Prince fan was a lonely affair. People simply couldn't understand what I saw in him. Most preferred MJ. It possibly didn't help that all the cool kids were into MJ and I was far from a cool kid, especially when I copied some of Prince's fashions . I definitely felt a sense of camaraderie at concerts that I never felt with those around me.

I was an 80s schoolkid in the UK, too. I remember there being an air of "ooooh, a Prince fan..." like they'd stumbled on something exotic, unfamiliar and precious. Then he became cool and more kids enjoyed the music. I was constantly reminded by a friend of mine that I had not enjoyed 1999 the first time I'd heard it...it was Lovesexy that brought me on board.

Born in '75

Mickey J was my route in to discovering Prince

I don't mean that as a direspect to MJ

MJ is great, but when I discovered Prince it was like a whole new universe opened up

MJ was the King of the 80's

But Prince was the cool kid for those in the know

MJ had Thriller. That held all the records

But Purple Rain came close and Prince was mega popular in the US and Europe in the 80's

MTV was in it's prime, feeding the imaginations of us teenagers

Adorecream said:

Being a kid in New Zealand in the mid and late 80s, he was known but not super popular. Here it was mainly local and Australian acts that ruled our charts, Split Enz, Crowded House, John Farnham and the annual Kiwi one hit wonder riding the charts (John Stevens, Tim Finn, All of Us - sailing away Americas cup song, Rob Guest, Holiday Makers, Margaret URLICH to name a few and I know you Americans and Europeans have never heard of them except maybe Split Enz and Crowded House, which the Aussies claim all the time).

.

Then British acts of the 80s were popular, Duran Duran, Thompsons, Boy George, Goerge Michael, Wham, Mel and Kim. Of the Americans - all the cowboy country stuff to 1985 and then acts like Guns and Roses, Poison, Bon Jovi in the later 80s. Black artists were only really popular with Maori and Polynesians in the 80s and apart from Whitney Houston and Lionel Richie, few really ahd any following until MJ borke through - he was big but not huge, having more Top 10s rather than #1 hits.

.

Prince was very muted as he was seen as a Disco one hit wonder in 1980/81 and all the albums before 1999 hardly circulated here. 1999 was a small hit thanks to the singles going Top 10. Purple Rain went platinum in its 1984/85 release, but only selling 15,000 copies and reaching #2 compared to 150,000 of Thriller. The singles did fair rather than excellent - WDC got to #2 (Kept out by the Specials - Free Nelson Mandela) and his biggest hit to date, LGC was #8, Purple Rain was #25 and IWD4U and TMWU were complete flops. Several more singles top 10ed, Kiss was another #2, but SOTT stalled at #6.

.

1988 saw a sea change in music and white NZers got heavily into funkier and blacker stuff, with Bad going to #1 and all of the singles being Top 10 smashes, then Alphabet Street was a #1 his first here and Lovesexy a #1 album here and then this feat was followed up with Batdance and Batman hitting #1, Graffiti Bridge got to #4 and TITT got to #5 on our charts. More success followed with D and P hitting #2 on the chart, with Cream and Gett Off Top 10 hits. Love Symbol also went Top 10 and Sexy MF reached #9, with 7 getting to #4. Princes last Top 10 hit and #1 smash was TMBGITW.

.

The 80s was a breakthrough, but Prince never saw huge success and fame here until Lovesexy in 1988 and this was thanks mostly to a man who wrote a music magazine here and played Prince endlessly in his radio show and really got him out there. By 1990 Rap and R and B was a big seller here, but before 1988/89, the only big time Black music was disco in the late 70s and early 80s and then a lot of white rock music through the 80s.

.

Even today he has never been huge and as we all know, true Prince fans in NZ are few and far between, I can think of about 10.

You must've been stoked when he finally showed up to give you guys the recognition you deserve in 2016. Did you go?

A few thoughts:

Prince isn't as easily digestible or family friendly as Michael Jackson. His lyrics are not for kids, his themes are more complex, his music is less mainstream sounding, he didn't chase sales numbers like MJ. Prince's catalog is also WAY more overwhelming than MJ. With Michael, you gotta get like 6 albums and you have most of his output as a singles artist. Lastly, Prince was A LOT more protective of how his music was used. Billie Jean was a Pepsi commercial, When Doves Cry never sold Coca Cola. It was only after his death, that we are really starting to see Prince's image and music licensed in a more traditional (wide reaching) manner.

-

Current pop music now is ALL a niche thing compared to the 80's. There are SO many options that listeners can easily ignore entire genres of music, let alone individual artists.
Back in the 80's we basically got our exposure to musicians/artists through the radio and MTV. So everyone was exposed to EVERYTHING. You had to sit through Phil Collins, Billy Ocean, and Def Leppard to get to a Prince video. Nowadays, music is more divided and niche than it ever has been. I am a teacher and kids these days care more about youtube than music. They don't LOVE their music the way kids did in the past.

-

Example:
Think about the most "popular" music act today. Beyonce? Not EVERYONE owns a Beyonce album. In the 80's EVERY one BOUGHT Purple Rain, every one BOUGHT Thriller.

I emphasize BOUGHT because people don't really pay for music now. Streams and youtube followers are a much easier thing to attain than having people have to go to a store to buy your music.

-

Prince has always been an enigma in terms of popularity. He is one of the biggest selling musicians of all time, and he is known the world over. Yet, even in the 80's, Prince was simlutaneously insanely famous, and at the same time, kind of a niche artist.

[Edited 3/3/18 12:58pm]

During the Purple Summer of 1984, he was an absolute phenomenon in the US. He was by far the most popular star of any stripe. His movie was an unexpected smash, his concerts were selling out in minutes, his music was booming out of cars driven by all sorts of people anging from suburbanite teenyboppers to businessmen to folks from the hood, had two #1 singles including the most popular song of the year ("Doves"), had massive critical acclaim for his music, and his album was on it's way to set a record for the most consecutive weeks at #1. Before then, he had an increasingly positive buzz that was quite loud by the time 1999 caught on. After then, droves of Purple Rain fans abandoned him due to his refusal to make Purple Rain #2 and a variety of well documented PR issues. However, he maintained a large dedicated following during the 80s that got his artistic and musical integrity.

Who knows, I wasn't alive then, but here in Mexico He's never been popular, like ever.

antonb said:

maplenpg said:

NorthC said:

He was at the peak of his popularity in Europe in 1986-88. He may not have had the best selling albums, but every album made the top ten. His reputation as a live artist had a lot to do with it; between 1986 and 1993 he did 6 European tours in sold out arenas. Of course this doesn't mean everybody loved him, there were plenty of people who couldn't stand him and who thought he was a weirdo, but overall, he was pretty popular. Both with critics and the general public, which is something you can't say about Michael Jackson or Madonna. They may have sold more records, but they didn't have the reputation of a musical innovator that Prince had. It was the name change and the WB war that ruined all of this. When he toured in 1995, venues that were sold out two years before, were only half full. He made a comeback at the end of the 90s and from then, he was always assured of sold out arenas and there was always a buzz about possible aftershows. So even if he wasn't on top of the charts anymore, he could grab people's attention until the very last moment. [Edited 3/3/18 1:01am]

This. Though I was in school (UK) in the 80's and being a Prince fan was a lonely affair. People simply couldn't understand what I saw in him. Most preferred MJ. It possibly didn't help that all the cool kids were into MJ and I was far from a cool kid, especially when I copied some of Prince's fashions . I definitely felt a sense of camaraderie at concerts that I never felt with those around me.

The cool kids were into Prince not MJ

214 said:

Who knows, I wasn't alive then, but here in Mexico He's never been popular, like ever.

So only you have good music tastes.

I was a proud Prince fan at school in the 80's and i did not give a flying f@@k what others thought. Prince and MJ were opposites. Funny that one was thought of as weird but the other later in his career was thought of as more weird. Another thing with Prince was most thought he was gay another problem for all those homophobes. They just could not get why as a straight kid i was into Prince, i told them his music man.

[Edited 3/3/18 9:54am]

NorthC said:

Nice to see you back, Guitarhero.

Hey NorthC nice to see you buddy

during the diamonds and pearl release ...his hits from that album were all over NY radio....last time he was all over the radio was The Holy River

Guitarhero said:

Guitarhero said:

maplenpg said:

Guitarhero said:

214 said:

Who knows, I wasn't alive then, but here in Mexico He's never been popular, like ever.

So only you have good music tastes.

I guess.

skywalker said:

A few thoughts:

Prince isn't as easily digestible or family friendly as Michael Jackson. His lyrics are not for kids, his themes are more complex, his music is less mainstream sounding, he didn't chase sales numbers like MJ. Prince's catalog is also WAY more overwhelming than MJ. With Michael, you gotta get like 6 albums and you have most of his output as a singles artist. Lastly, Prince was A LOT more protective of how his music was used. Billie Jean was a Pepsi commercial, When Doves Cry never sold Coca Cola. It was only after his death, that we are really starting to see Prince's image and music licensed in a more traditional (wide reaching) manner.

-

Current pop music now is ALL a niche thing compared to the 80's. There are SO many options that listeners can easily ignore entire genres of music, let alone individual artists.
Back in the 80's we basically got our exposure to musicians/artists through the radio and MTV. So everyone was exposed to EVERYTHING. You had to sit through Phil Collins, Billy Ocean, and Def Leppard to get to a Prince video. Nowadays, music is more divided and niche than it ever has been. I am a teacher and kids these days care more about youtube than music. They don't LOVE their music the way kids did in the past.

-

Example:
Think about the most "popular" music act today. Beyonce? Not EVERYONE owns a Beyonce album. In the 80's EVERY one BOUGHT Purple Rain, every one BOUGHT Thriller.

I emphasize BOUGHT because people don't really pay for music now. Streams and youtube followers are a much easier thing to attain than having people have to go to a store to buy your music.

-

Prince has always been an enigma in terms of popularity. He is one of the biggest selling musicians of all time, and he is known the world over. Yet, even in the 80's, Prince was silmutaneously insanely famous, and at the same time, kind of a niche artist.

[Edited 3/3/18 6:54am]

Very good thoughts here, Skywalker. Not to tell on myself, but Prince and I were close in age. So, I have been a Prince follower for a LONG time. He was a real musician, and child of the 70's, a tragic figure, a trend setter, an artist, a believer, and I hear...had a great sense of humor. But he never felt he was here to produce commercially palatable or marketable music. He created what he created with no apologies; you could choose to be on his bandwagon or choose not to.

I personally think that the whole Purple Rain movie was cathartic to him- to banish some of the ghosts of his earlier life. (It just struck a chord with so many, but was not written just to be popular.) That's what I think.

milesb said:

Adorecream said:

Being a kid in New Zealand in the mid and late 80s, he was known but not super popular. Here it was mainly local and Australian acts that ruled our charts, Split Enz, Crowded House, John Farnham and the annual Kiwi one hit wonder riding the charts (John Stevens, Tim Finn, All of Us - sailing away Americas cup song, Rob Guest, Holiday Makers, Margaret URLICH to name a few and I know you Americans and Europeans have never heard of them except maybe Split Enz and Crowded House, which the Aussies claim all the time).

.

Then British acts of the 80s were popular, Duran Duran, Thompsons, Boy George, Goerge Michael, Wham, Mel and Kim. Of the Americans - all the cowboy country stuff to 1985 and then acts like Guns and Roses, Poison, Bon Jovi in the later 80s. Black artists were only really popular with Maori and Polynesians in the 80s and apart from Whitney Houston and Lionel Richie, few really ahd any following until MJ borke through - he was big but not huge, having more Top 10s rather than #1 hits.

.

Prince was very muted as he was seen as a Disco one hit wonder in 1980/81 and all the albums before 1999 hardly circulated here. 1999 was a small hit thanks to the singles going Top 10. Purple Rain went platinum in its 1984/85 release, but only selling 15,000 copies and reaching #2 compared to 150,000 of Thriller. The singles did fair rather than excellent - WDC got to #2 (Kept out by the Specials - Free Nelson Mandela) and his biggest hit to date, LGC was #8, Purple Rain was #25 and IWD4U and TMWU were complete flops. Several more singles top 10ed, Kiss was another #2, but SOTT stalled at #6.

.

1988 saw a sea change in music and white NZers got heavily into funkier and blacker stuff, with Bad going to #1 and all of the singles being Top 10 smashes, then Alphabet Street was a #1 his first here and Lovesexy a #1 album here and then this feat was followed up with Batdance and Batman hitting #1, Graffiti Bridge got to #4 and TITT got to #5 on our charts. More success followed with D and P hitting #2 on the chart, with Cream and Gett Off Top 10 hits. Love Symbol also went Top 10 and Sexy MF reached #9, with 7 getting to #4. Princes last Top 10 hit and #1 smash was TMBGITW.

.

The 80s was a breakthrough, but Prince never saw huge success and fame here until Lovesexy in 1988 and this was thanks mostly to a man who wrote a music magazine here and played Prince endlessly in his radio show and really got him out there. By 1990 Rap and R and B was a big seller here, but before 1988/89, the only big time Black music was disco in the late 70s and early 80s and then a lot of white rock music through the 80s.

.

Even today he has never been huge and as we all know, true Prince fans in NZ are few and far between, I can think of about 10.

You must've been stoked when he finally showed up to give you guys the recognition you deserve in 2016. Did you go?

Totally! Both of them, cost me $800 in all and worth every cent. My Adorecream videos went into depth about them. Just type Auckland Feb 24th 2016 Show 1 or Show2 and I am all that page.

.

I was lucky enough to go to a show in Melbourne in 2012, which was the Welcome to Australia tour and saw the whole band thing there. I was too young to go to the Diamonds and Pearls tour in 1992 and the 2003 tour, I was in Korea at the time (I still could have gone to the show in Fukuoka). So I took up the opportunities.

I only remember the time from 1986 and futher, he was extremely popular in holland. Critics loved him, everybody talked about his concerts, i mean, even If I was your girlfriend was a hit!

Lovesexy was a smash and went to number 1.

I remeber going to a stadium to see the Lovesexy concert, later it was broadcasted on national television.