Marrk said:

XLBubba said:

i dont give a fuck about race.

let's all just rock'n'roll!

Dumb, dumb, dumb.

If what is being said is that "what's wrong with Prince" has to do with what is assumed to be a large white fan base holding on to a particular period of Prince's music, then the root of the problem is being missed: Prince. He recorded the music. Whether people love it or hate it, the root of the music is Prince. So, this argument boils down to this: Prince made music that a lot of people did and still do like. Ergo, Prince has problems.

Prince should wish for more people to re-discover his "most popular" eras -- that would lead to more people investigating what he's up to now.

Regardless, the fact that a Prince admirer is white and happens to keep two of three of his discs from the mid 80s on "repeat" does not affect what Prince does in the studio or with any of his current endeavors. And no one person on the org is leading a pack of white-man lemmings off a cliff with his alleged 520 CD music collection.

XLBubba said:

is it that ur jealous of his impressive collection & the fact that he is a devoted fan who likes 2 share cool photos with fellow fans?


i think u need 2 get out mate.

EvilWhiteMale said:

Yeah and Prince isn't?

Joshy84au said:

That is exactly what I was thinking. He's a devoted fan. Period. If Prince cares what race he fans are, then he's an idiot.

EvilWhiteMale said:

ppl get this idea tho that Larry is some evil person.

here is the sane way I c it:

Prince & Larry G r mates.

Prince either took interest in Larry's religion or Larry introduced him 2 it.

Prince is now interested in it.



so who cares??
it's his bloody life.
if it makes him happy more power 2 him.

& obviously he & Larry r gr8 mates so good on the both of them.

ThreadBare said:

u posted.
ur not ignoring it 2 much.

magnificentsynthesizer667 wrote:

Yeah and Prince isn't? :hmmm:


Sure, especially when it comes to women, but he's a sucker for a father figure.

Joshy84au said:

well said!! or written

Joshy84au wrote:

ppl get this idea tho that Larry is some evil person.

here is the sane way I c it:

Prince & Larry G r mates.

Prince either took interest in Larry's religion or Larry introduced him 2 it.

Prince is now interested in it.

Well it seems Larry wanted to use Prince so he could be part of big tours and shit. He couldn't get that many people at one of his shows. It also seems he used Prince's need for a father figure and decided to "steer him in the right direction." For the first time, Prince actually let someone tell him how to behave. He no longer follows his own path, he follows the path of Larry. And that's why people are pissed off.



so who cares??
it's his bloody life.
if it makes him happy more power 2 him.

I agree, but if he still wants to sell records and if he wants to post his views for people to see, then he has to expect some backlash when people don't agree with him. If he can express himself, then so can we.

EvilWhiteMale said:

so, for those keeping score at home... in the last week or so, i've gone from being a hater (according to laurarichardson) because i speak critically of prince... to now being a fanatic according to xlbubba because i have 520 prince cds...

not once in my 1100+ posts have i ever even remotely suggested that prince get back with the revolution (although i (and many others) have ridiculed him for his decision to replace michael bland with kirky j.) and hey, what do we know? the music (and subsequent tours) during the kirky j time period speaks for itself...

i challenge xlbubba to have his african-american friend step forward and say that it was him that said this. it's more likely that xlbubba is doing what he so often does (and is banned for) on okayplayer. racebaiting... xlbubba (who just happens to be a white college dropout in northern texas) simply put this thread up as a pretty transparent disguise of a flame towards me.

"the moors" and "family name" are nothing new. neither is "avalanche" or the other songs that xlbubba is referring to in his lame attempt of an impersonation of johnnie cochran.

i guess it's safe to say xlbubba either has a very short term memory, or he just hasn't heard of any prince material pre-2001. "race" has always been a part of prince's lyrics. however, since prince's lyrical skills have clearly deteriorated over the years (from writing lyrics to songs such as "when 2 r in Love" to "the one" on "newpower soul" would be a great example)... prince has gone from being subtle about romantic ballads, to in your face. subtle about sex, to in your face (and now no longer)... to being writing subtle lyrics about race, to being in your face about them...

there was a time where prince challenged his audience as much as he challenged himself and his band. in my opinion one of his better time periods for live performances was between 1993-1995. where an entire aftershow (or paisley performance) was something that'll stand the test of time. not just one or two songs per show. the same could be said for shows between 1986-1989. however, in between that time period, it's believed by many that prince just kind of went through the motions... occasionally turning out a great aftershow, or a great guitar solo, but didn't really put out night after night like he does when he's in the mood to.

for admirers of his vast talent to sit there and say how every show that he's ever done is perfect... that every album is his best until his next album... to deny that his output has constantly declined over the last 15 years is not only living in denial, but it's a disservice to prince. he has enough YES SIR people around him. he no longer has warner bros to tell him "we won't release this because it sucks... go back in the studio and try again."

occasionally we get signs of the greatness that we've seen in the past. the acoustic set at last year's celebration followed by the electric set the same evening. several songs on "the rainbow children" (including the aformentioned "family name".)

diana dawkins of "the prince family" and "controversy" magazine once wrote that prince's best work comes out of controversy, pain, or love. one could argue that could be said of any artist. prince has surrounded himself with so many walls that none of those 3 things happen any longer.

prince's obvious decline in record sales has more to do with the fact that he is not the same person he was in 1984. people change. some fans can accept that, some can't and post about "purple rain II" and so forth. we all want to see the growth of an artist. we were all excited after the february 1994 performance at paisley that was aired on bet and mtv. the new band was smoking, the material was great. for nearly 2 years we had incredible performances from monaco, to his glam slam clubs, to the paisley shows that were attended by as few as 100 people (or less).

then prince met larry graham and something changed. mayte was gone. most of the new power generation was replaced. we got "newpower soul"..."rave un2 the joy fantastic"... arguably the two biggest failures of prince's career. his tours went from being lauded to being made fun of by both critics and fans alike. prince sued uptown, and websites on the internet for not becoming part of the collective. diana dawkins shut down the prince family newsletter. the internet went from having a great many websites devoted to prince and spreading the word about him, to having a handful. it can be argued that www.prince.org is the only site on the internet worthy of being called a true prince site. a site fulfilling the spirit of what prince used to be before larry come along.

it's not about race. it's about poor decisions that have been well documented that have harmed prince's legacy. it's up to the true fans to let prince know what we really think, rather than sugarcoating everything.

if non-fans like laurarichardson and xlbubba want to continue to give the message to prince that he is perfect and can do no wrong, then that's fine. they will always be outnumbered by those that will let him know otherwise, and where it counts most to prince = in the pocketbook. even though people like myself have bought everything in the past no matter how bad it was (1999: the new master), we won't do it anymore. we aren't going to sign up to be a member of the npgmc until you say at the beginning of the year what we are guaranteed to receive in return so we can decide if it's worth forking over $25 or $100 or $1000. if it's worthy, we'll gladly open our wallets again.

the days of blindly giving away entire paychecks is gone for some of us. for others, they still do. they'll still follow prince from concert to concert to hear the same playlist, because prince still doesn't get it. he'll switch it up in an aftershow, but not at the concerts? "can't nobody fuck with my band" he used to claim... well, while his band can probably play everything perfectly, he doesn't use them to their full potential by just playing the same setlist night after night... changing it a song or two every ten shows or whatever because he's getting bored.

he used to challenge us. used to challenge himself. used to challenge his band... i can't remember the last time i listened to something of his and said "wow, i didn't expect that." we expect greatness of prince, because he's delivered in the past. moments like "joy in repetition" at the world in nyc during the ona tour. for many, it's the only standout performance on the entire ona boxset. everything else had nothing terribly passionate or exciting to say. he could've pulled any version of "strange relationship" from that entire tour and it would've left us with the same feeling as the one on the set.

all that said, does that mean i'm a hater? that prince isn't still my favorite artist? anyone that asks that won't get it and never will. my money is there for prince to have. it will always be. however, the days of "this is the last tour" and "if you don't join, you won't be able to get this cd anywhere else", etc are over. we know better now.

lastly, i'll close with a personal message to xlbubba... just because i was set as a moderator over at okayplayer and deleted every racebaiting post you ever posted on there, doesn't mean you have to start doing the same thing here... if you don't think the mods here are more strict than they are at okp, you're in for a rather unpleasant surprise.

---

[This message was edited Thu Jun 5 0:51:51 PDT 2003 by suomynona]

suomynona said: