MIRvmn1 said:

Awww, Londell has gone quiet because he couldn’t handle the criticism on his post. He’s embarrassing himself as always. [Edited 1/21/26 23:28pm]

Don't worry, he'll pop back up in a few months when it's time to start shilling for Celebration '26

happyshopper said:

Fingers crossed they actually have a plan (and then follow through with it) for 2026!

Although the rumours and impression you get from Londell's tweets don't bode well. He's clearly focusing on later material, not the Warner days.

They do not have a plan, they've not had 1 in 10 years and they aren't going to start it now

The Estate is a mess and always has been

Londell and Charlie are terrible at managing the Estate

PennyPurple said:

happyshopper said:

Fingers crossed they actually have a plan (and then follow through with it) for 2026!

Although the rumours and impression you get from Londell's tweets don't bode well. He's clearly focusing on later material, not the Warner days.

They do not have a plan, they've not had 1 in 10 years and they aren't going to start it now

The Estate is a mess and always has been

Londell and Charlie are terrible at managing the Estate

At least the previous team had some semblance of a plan and compiled three good-to-great SDEs before they were given the boot.

bozojones said:

BonnieC said:

Equally pathetic is the repost:

I genuinely think we older fans ...who lived the dream in real time need to sit this one out...& let the estate open up Prince to a much younger audience. Its a job truly well done. So props to @LondellMcMillan & co.

By the way, bozo, "living the dream in real time" meant spending a kid's allowance, in other words a fortune, in "back-from-the-toilet-hole" sounding cassettes, after digging and scrapping for months, investigating like crazy, at a time when there was no internet at all.

We're kind of romanticizing those times a bit, aren't we? Going to those Prince concerts was fun and at the same time quite stressful.

olb99 said:

BonnieC said:

Equally pathetic is the repost:

By the way, bozo, "living the dream in real time" meant spending a kid's allowance, in other words a fortune, in "back-from-the-toilet-hole" sounding cassettes, after digging and scrapping for months, investigating like crazy, at a time when there was no internet at all.

We're kind of romanticizing those times a bit, aren't we? Going to those Prince concerts was fun and at the same time quite stressful.

Not really I think.
In those days I went daily to various recordstores that carried boots and had people working there or customers who were tape traders, and amazing time that was killed during the 90s bootleg boom and the internet. Even tho it was really stressful after a show with everybody pumped up from the adrenaline to figure out ASAP where he would party or play next, but honestly that was awesome.

bozojones said:

PennyPurple said:

They do not have a plan, they've not had 1 in 10 years and they aren't going to start it now

The Estate is a mess and always has been

Londell and Charlie are terrible at managing the Estate

At least the previous team had some semblance of a plan and compiled three good-to-great SDEs before they were given the boot.

Yep. If the old Estate management were still in charge I'm pretty sure we'd have had "Diamonds and Love" already. PR 40 SDE. Parade SDE this year. And who knows what else. Maybe a Lovesexy SDE ready for release, Originals 2, Live albums, etc.

They were huge fans, and worked to make things happen.

The new Estate doesn't even have an Archivist anymore to pull and organise the material.

JorisE73 said:

olb99 said:

We're kind of romanticizing those times a bit, aren't we? Going to those Prince concerts was fun and at the same time quite stressful.

Not really I think.
In those days I went daily to various recordstores that carried boots and had people working there or customers who were tape traders, and amazing time that was killed during the 90s bootleg boom and the internet. Even tho it was really stressful after a show with everybody pumped up from the adrenaline to figure out ASAP where he would party or play next, but honestly that was awesome.

Exactly what I wanted to convey: it was both awesome and stressful.

happyshopper said:

bozojones said:

At least the previous team had some semblance of a plan and compiled three good-to-great SDEs before they were given the boot.

Yep. If the old Estate management were still in charge I'm pretty sure we'd have had "Diamonds and Love" already. PR 40 SDE. Parade SDE this year. And who knows what else. Maybe a Lovesexy SDE ready for release, Originals 2, Live albums, etc.

They were huge fans, and worked to make things happen.

The new Estate doesn't even have an Archivist anymore to pull and organise the material.

Indeed, there's a huge gap between now & then.

Whatever the critics we had, the previous team was dedicated to music and trying to please the fans (which is quite hard ).

Now...well, you know.

[Edited 1/22/26 13:28pm]

olb99 said:

I think we have all wrong....this is not Prince Estate Survey which is in trouble or might be but us ...FANS as a collective !!!!

happyshopper said:

Fingers crossed they actually have a plan (and then follow through with it) for 2026!

Although the rumours and impression you get from Londell's tweets don't bode well. He's clearly focusing on later material, not the Warner days.

^ I would be happy if they released post WB material.i believe that there is a lot of good stuff from those eras still in the vault.I just want them to release "new" material regularly and commit to it.They have been teasing us with music, but delivering mostly bedsheets, luggage and t-shirts.

andrewm7new said:

At the beginning of january I subscribed the Peter Gabriel "moon club" on Bandcamp. I liked Peter Gabriel, but I'm not a fan. I was curious about his new album "o\i", and the way he is gonna release it in double mix every full/new moon night, like he did for "i/o". Well, the club could remember the NPGMC, some song every month, unreleased songs, rare tracks, unreleased live albums. The differences from the NPGMC are the sound quality, all the tracks are in flac format and the duration. Unlike Prince projects this is still here after three years, so if I subscribe now I can download in flac format all the songs he released in the last years. It is a lot of things. From the demotape of Don't Give Up he sent to Kate Bush, to obscure "new age" album he released only attached to spanish magazine. Anyway: yesterday he released the demo of the last track of his new album and I was thinking that he released more songs in a month that the Estate in more than two years. Is is a shame. The club Peter Gabriel created on Bandcamp could be an example for the Estate: a solid platform, low costs, happy fans with unreleased songs and live every month.

rudeboy4711 said:

andrewm7new said:

^ I would be happy if they released post WB material.i believe that there is a lot of good stuff from those eras still in the vault.I just want them to release "new" material regularly and commit to it.They have been teasing us with music, but delivering mostly bedsheets, luggage and t-shirts.

I think the early recordings from 1976-1981 should be a priority because of the possible level of degradation on those tapes due to improper care over the years (read some horror stories on how they were stored back in the day). Also given the fact that Prince’s early career is not as well documented as the PR, SOTT, Diamonds and Pearls and other later eras so we may be in for some really good surprises if done correctly! I always find so many fans suggesting to combine the Dirty Mind and Controversy eras but there is so much we the fans don’t know that there could be more material than we’ve seen written about on Uptown magazine or princevault so… who knows?

.
Different media formats all have their specific issues, so it's not just the oldest analog tapes that are in danger. Later formats, such as digital magnetic tapes (DASH) that Prince recorded to in the '90s, and even more modern hard disk drives can be even more problematic than good old analog tape. The same is true for legacy consumer formats such as MO disks and DAT cassettes that P also used for shorter term backup of mixdowns and masters. And then there are the dozens of different video formats that were in Paisley.
So archiving the vault is a VERY complex task, regardless of the age of the recordings, and it requires a great number of different gear setups that are more and more problematic to source, let alone the issue of finding staff that is experienced in all these areas.

Kares said:

rudeboy4711 said:

andrewm7new said: I think the early recordings from 1976-1981 should be a priority because of the possible level of degradation on those tapes due to improper care over the years (read some horror stories on how they were stored back in the day). Also given the fact that Prince’s early career is not as well documented as the PR, SOTT, Diamonds and Pearls and other later eras so we may be in for some really good surprises if done correctly! I always find so many fans suggesting to combine the Dirty Mind and Controversy eras but there is so much we the fans don’t know that there could be more material than we’ve seen written about on Uptown magazine or princevault so… who knows?

.
Different media formats all have their specific issues, so it's not just the oldest analog tapes that are in danger. Later formats, such as digital magnetic tapes (DASH) that Prince recorded to in the '90s, and even more modern hard disk drives can be even more problematic than good old analog tape. The same is true for legacy consumer formats such as MO disks and DAT cassettes that P also used for shorter term backup of mixdowns and masters. And then there are the dozens of different video formats that were in Paisley.
So archiving the vault is a VERY complex task, regardless of the age of the recordings, and it requires a great number of different gear setups that are more and more problematic to source, let alone the issue of finding staff that is experienced in all these areas.

I'd add to that that preserving/digitalizing the material is a thing while releasing it is another. Obviously their first priority should be (and hopefully is) preserving, which doesn't mean they have to carbon copy their releasing schedule on their archiving schedule.

databank said:

Kares said:

.
Different media formats all have their specific issues, so it's not just the oldest analog tapes that are in danger. Later formats, such as digital magnetic tapes (DASH) that Prince recorded to in the '90s, and even more modern hard disk drives can be even more problematic than good old analog tape. The same is true for legacy consumer formats such as MO disks and DAT cassettes that P also used for shorter term backup of mixdowns and masters. And then there are the dozens of different video formats that were in Paisley.
So archiving the vault is a VERY complex task, regardless of the age of the recordings, and it requires a great number of different gear setups that are more and more problematic to source, let alone the issue of finding staff that is experienced in all these areas.

I'd add to that that preserving/digitalizing the material is a thing while releasing it is another. Obviously their first priority should be (and hopefully is) preserving, which doesn't mean they have to carbon copy their releasing schedule on their archiving schedule.

.
Yes, but curating is certainly more difficult until everything is archived and catalogued – and unfortunately (afaik) they still have a long way to go until all the videos and films and all the rehearsals, concerts etc are archived too. Only then they'd be able to say this or that source of a certain material is "the best we have".
.
Nevertheless, it is obvious that there's more than plenty of material that could and should be released at this stage too.

[Edited 1/27/26 12:17pm]

And while we have no influence on what the Estate is doing with the Vault, we have some influence on what we're doing with what we have at home.

Reminder: if you have CD-Rs, DVD-Rs, drives, etc. with important stuff on them, please back them up now! If they're old enough, they might be unreadable or partially unreadable, so don't wait!

peedub said:

Dear londell, Look how the zappa estate does. Seems easy enough. I'm sure the load group of zappa fans are creaming their jeans. https://store.zappa.com/p...per-deluxe

There's quite a list!

https://store.zappa.com/collections/box-sets

.

Someone who's supposed to know what they're talking about claimed none of the Estate's releases (or, at least, none of the SDEs—I'm paraphrasing from memory) were profitable, hence the current pause in new vault releases.

.

If this is true (which, of course, I cannot guarantee)...

.

1/ Are we to believe Zappa now sells more than Prince? Bowie (who also gets a boxset a year + regular odd releases), I could possibly believe, but Zappa?

According to the numbers I find, Zappa sold some 3+ millions albums (and probably not too many singles), vs some 100+ millions records for Prince.

.

2/ Or is the Zappa Estate (and possibly Bowie's as well) releasing records at a loss, out of charity for the fans? Seems unlikely as well, unless they make so much money from other royalties and/or merchandizing that the releases are just prestige stuff to keep the "brand" alive—but if so, it seems to work well for them, so why not for Prince?

.

3/ Or... is the Estate doing something wrong either when it comes to the production process or marketing?

.

4/ Or... WTF?! I mean seriously, even Sheena Easton gets boxsets for chrissakes!! I know she had a few hits in her days, but she ain't Madonna either!

.

Besides, it doesn't have to always be huge boxsets, it can also be smaller, cheaper releases like AP&AM83, Originals or W2A.

.

Missa honestly confused.

databank said:

peedub said:

Dear londell, Look how the zappa estate does. Seems easy enough. I'm sure the load group of zappa fans are creaming their jeans. https://store.zappa.com/p...per-deluxe

There's quite a list!

https://store.zappa.com/collections/box-sets

.

Someone who's supposed to know what they're talking about claimed none of the Estate's releases (or, at least, none of the SDEs—I'm paraphrasing from memory) were profitable, hence the current pause in new vault releases.

.

If this is true (which, of course, I cannot guarantee)...

.

1/ Are we to believe Zappa now sells more than Prince? Bowie (who also gets a boxset a year + regular odd releases), I could possibly believe, but Zappa?

According to the numbers I find, Zappa sold some 3+ millions albums (and probably not too many singles), vs some 100+ millions records for Prince.

.

2/ Or is the Zappa Estate (and possibly Bowie's as well) releasing records at a loss, out of charity for the fans? Seems unlikely as well, unless they make so much money from other royalties and/or merchandizing that the releases are just prestige stuff to keep the "brand" alive—but if so, it seems to work well for them, so why not for Prince?

.

3/ Or... is the Estate doing something wrong either when it comes to the production process or marketing?

.

4/ Or... WTF?! I mean seriously, even Sheena Easton gets boxsets for chrissakes!! I know she had a few hits in her days, but she ain't Madonna either!

.

Besides, it doesn't have to always be huge boxsets, it can also be smaller, cheaper releases like AP&AM83, Originals or W2A.

.

Missa honestly confused.

.

3: Yes.

.
The Zappa estate doesn't do totally unnecessary things like big vinyl sets in expensive, heavy boxes, with hardbound books inside, for example. They did a few, but they were the exception, rather than the rule. Most of their releases are CD-only.

[Edited 1/28/26 18:37pm]

databank said:

peedub said:

databank said:

There's quite a list!

https://store.zappa.com/collections/box-sets

.

Someone who's supposed to know what they're talking about claimed none of the Estate's releases (or, at least, none of the SDEs—I'm paraphrasing from memory) were profitable, hence the current pause in new vault releases.

.

If this is true (which, of course, I cannot guarantee)...

.

1/ Are we to believe Zappa now sells more than Prince? Bowie (who also gets a boxset a year + regular odd releases), I could possibly believe, but Zappa?

According to the numbers I find, Zappa sold some 3+ millions albums (and probably not too many singles), vs some 100+ millions records for Prince.

.

2/ Or is the Zappa Estate (and possibly Bowie's as well) releasing records at a loss, out of charity for the fans? Seems unlikely as well, unless they make so much money from other royalties and/or merchandizing that the releases are just prestige stuff to keep the "brand" alive—but if so, it seems to work well for them, so why not for Prince?

.

3/ Or... is the Estate doing something wrong either when it comes to the production process or marketing?

.

4/ Or... WTF?! I mean seriously, even Sheena Easton gets boxsets for chrissakes!! I know she had a few hits in her days, but she ain't Madonna either!

.

Besides, it doesn't have to always be huge boxsets, it can also be smaller, cheaper releases like AP&AM83, Originals or W2A.

.

Missa honestly confused.

Right? They're trying too hard to maintain Prince as relevant to contemporary pop culture. He's not. He's done. His legacy is his work. They need to stop competing for clicks and present the work.

Everything's a bubble now anyway. You get the occasional buzz like when your song is proeminent on Stranger Things, but that's it. Back when Prince was at the peak of his career, we were all more or less exposed to the same music, movies, TV shows, novels, video games, newspapers, etc. People may like or dislike famous artists, but they knew who they were and the music they made. Today, how many artists are there left that more or less everyone's heard of? And even if people know their names because, you know, they're really super famous, have they ever heard their music at all?

.

Now, everyone navigates in their own algorythmic filter bubble: you can spend a whole evening trying and trade new artists and bands names with a friend—even a friend who shares your musical tastes—without finding a single one you both know. 30 years ago you wouldn't have had to name 10 acts to find one you have in common...

.

So trying to reach out to the mainstream and new audiences... cool, that's what entertainment does, it's a logical thing to try and do, but it's a different world: your niche audience is the one you should always try and pet first IMHO, today much more than ever. + soon they'll be competing not only with other artists, but with countless AIs generating "Prince music" that sounds undistinguishable from the real thing...

databank said:

databank said:

peedub said:

Dear londell, Look how the zappa estate does. Seems easy enough. I'm sure the load group of zappa fans are creaming their jeans. https://store.zappa.com/p...per-deluxe

There's quite a list!

https://store.zappa.com/collections/box-sets

.

Someone who's supposed to know what they're talking about claimed none of the Estate's releases (or, at least, none of the SDEs—I'm paraphrasing from memory) were profitable, hence the current pause in new vault releases.

.

If this is true (which, of course, I cannot guarantee)...

.

1/ Are we to believe Zappa now sells more than Prince? Bowie (who also gets a boxset a year + regular odd releases), I could possibly believe, but Zappa?

According to the numbers I find, Zappa sold some 3+ millions albums (and probably not too many singles), vs some 100+ millions records for Prince.

.

2/ Or is the Zappa Estate (and possibly Bowie's as well) releasing records at a loss, out of charity for the fans? Seems unlikely as well, unless they make so much money from other royalties and/or merchandizing that the releases are just prestige stuff to keep the "brand" alive—but if so, it seems to work well for them, so why not for Prince?

.

3/ Or... is the Estate doing something wrong either when it comes to the production process or marketing?

.

4/ Or... WTF?! I mean seriously, even Sheena Easton gets boxsets for chrissakes!! I know she had a few hits in her days, but she ain't Madonna either!

.

Besides, it doesn't have to always be huge boxsets, it can also be smaller, cheaper releases like AP&AM83, Originals or W2A.

.

Missa honestly confused.

The claim that new releases are not profitable always been ridiculous to begin with. Even a bootlegger with a rehearsal on a cassette tape and a laptop do make some profit. Yeah, I know, professional mastering and all that takes money and time. But it just can't be that painfully difficult for the Estate.

MIRvmn1 said:

databank said:

There's quite a list!

https://store.zappa.com/collections/box-sets

.

Someone who's supposed to know what they're talking about claimed none of the Estate's releases (or, at least, none of the SDEs—I'm paraphrasing from memory) were profitable, hence the current pause in new vault releases.

.

If this is true (which, of course, I cannot guarantee)...

.

1/ Are we to believe Zappa now sells more than Prince? Bowie (who also gets a boxset a year + regular odd releases), I could possibly believe, but Zappa?

According to the numbers I find, Zappa sold some 3+ millions albums (and probably not too many singles), vs some 100+ millions records for Prince.

.

2/ Or is the Zappa Estate (and possibly Bowie's as well) releasing records at a loss, out of charity for the fans? Seems unlikely as well, unless they make so much money from other royalties and/or merchandizing that the releases are just prestige stuff to keep the "brand" alive—but if so, it seems to work well for them, so why not for Prince?

.

3/ Or... is the Estate doing something wrong either when it comes to the production process or marketing?

.

4/ Or... WTF?! I mean seriously, even Sheena Easton gets boxsets for chrissakes!! I know she had a few hits in her days, but she ain't Madonna either!

.

Besides, it doesn't have to always be huge boxsets, it can also be smaller, cheaper releases like AP&AM83, Originals or W2A.

.

Missa honestly confused.

They could easily split the SDEs and release the vault tracks separately, but they can’t even be bothered. It’s becoming pretty clear that we’re not the target audience.

For the last years since Lonny and Spicer took over we've been told we old fans aren't important or there target auddience anymore and that they are thrying to reach the newer generations and build a new bigger fanbase with the billions of people oiut there who don;t even know who PRince is/was. It's just now becoming clear that it's truly the case, we just didn't want to believe it I guess.

JorisE73 said:

For the last years since Lonny and Spicer took over we've been told we old fans aren't important or there target auddience anymore and that they are thrying to reach the newer generations and build a new bigger fanbase with the billions of people oiut there who don;t even know who PRince is/was. It's just now becoming clear that it's truly the case, we just didn't want to believe it I guess.

Under Comerica's management, curating the Vault had a monthly global cost of more than 90 000$.

If you do the math, it's 1,1 million each year.

Londell & Co decided to put a stop to that and choose a business strategy involving fewer expenses.

All that to say, until the same people stay in charge, nothing will change.

Honestly, it's not really surprising because during the probate period, Londell complained on several occasions that the way Comerica was handling the vault/releases etc was way too coslty. It's not rumors, it's written in the probate files.

fredmagnus said:

JorisE73 said:

For the last years since Lonny and Spicer took over we've been told we old fans aren't important or there target auddience anymore and that they are thrying to reach the newer generations and build a new bigger fanbase with the billions of people oiut there who don;t even know who PRince is/was. It's just now becoming clear that it's truly the case, we just didn't want to believe it I guess.

Under Comerica's management, curating the Vault had a monthly global cost of more than 90 000$.

If you do the math, it's 1,1 million each year.

Londell & Co decided to put a stop to that and choose a business strategy involving fewer expenses.

All that to say, until the same people stay in charge, nothing will change.

Honestly, it's not really surprising because during the probate period, Londell complained on several occasions that the way Comerica was handling the vault/releases etc was way too coslty. It's not rumors, it's written in the probate files.

Then good luck to them selling Prince t-shirts and merch.

.

It's like complaining of running the Louvre museum and having to take care of the maintenance of the works of art, literally.

.

Overall feeling is that they just don't get what they are handling. Of course - figures, business, profits, maintenance ARE important. But they are missing the point that Prince was a musician and a recording artist foremost.