An Open Letter to Prince

Dear Prince,

I understand you're upset about the news that all six of your recent shows at the Dakota were recorded and are being pressed for sale as bootlegs as I type this.  Believe me, I sympathize.  I don't like bootleggers any more than you do.

You may find that a little hard to believe, considering I only recently posted a review of a bootleg DVD, have professed to owning over 600 unreleased tracks, and Jehovah only knows how many concerts, but hear me out: I despise bootleggers.  Stick with me for a bit and I'll explain, but first let's go back in time to 1988.

One rainy day my older brother picked me up from school in his ratty old Plymouth Horizon.  As I got in, he pointed out a nondescript brown paper bag wedged in between the seat and the center console and told me to open it.  That's when I saw it: an all-black vinyl album sleeve. 

My heart skipped a beat.  We'd read about The Black Album in nearly every major music publication at the time.  Rolling Stone Magazine even reviewed it after it was shelved in favor of Lovesexy.  Somehow, my brother had tracked down a copy of the near-legendary record! 

"Where did you get this?!" I asked.

"This little store around the corner from our house," he replied nonchalantly.  "I'm going back to get me another one, too." 

With that we drove to DJ Records (don't worry, they've long since closed up shop) and purchased a copy of Charade - a collection of Parade-era outtakes - and, thus, our introduction to the world of bootlegs was complete.

Over the years, we scoured independent record stores and collector's shows for every boot we could find.  With the advent of internet services like Prodigy and America Online, we met other traders and formed bonds that last to this very day.  We amassed quite a collection of material, and we spent a pretty penny doing so.

Which brings me to my point (hopefully you've stuck with me so far...): if you want to stop bootlegging, all you have to do is release the material yourself.

Remember in 1994 when you wanted to release more material than Warner Bros. was willing to allow?  You began painting "slave" on your face, and talking up a project known as The Gold Experience, claiming it would never be released.  Of course, it eventually saw release and remains one of your finest works, but by the time it came out, you were bored with it and had moved onto something else.  You began working on Emancipation, a 3CD magnum opus to be released when your contract with Warners was over, and promised fans more new music than they could handle.

For a while, it seemed like a dream come true.  You started a phone line, and opened your vaults for the 3CD Crystal Ball set, but it was the NPG Music Club that truly broke new ground.  One of the first of its kind, NPGMC was a direct link between the fans and the artist - a way to release as much material as you pleased outside of the archaic industry system - and all the profit went directly into your coffers.  It was a forward-thinking, and surprisingly well-run service (the same could not be said of 1-800-NEW-FUNK).  Then, like everything else, you got bored with it and moved onto something else.

Despite the ever-changing landscape of technology, the NPG Music Club is still a valid idea today.  iTunes has become the world's largest music store.  Amazon has their own mp3 service, while smaller sites such as Beatport focus on niche markets like electronic music.  It's easy and convenient for the end user to find and purchase what they want, but the stores still take a percentage of the profits for themselves.

The 1998 Crystal Ball set was a good idea in theory, but in practice it ended up falling short of expectations.  Some questionable song selections aside (a remix of "Love Sign" and an edit of the already-released "Good Love"?), one of the biggest problems is that many of the classic songs that had been circulating on bootlegs amongst fans for decades were clearly altered.  "Sexual Suicide", "Crucial", "Calhoun Square", "Movie Star" - all featured small changes ranging from overdubs to inexplicable cuts and edits that not only bothered fans, they failed in their goal of making bootlegs obsolete.

In order to fully understand, you'll need to see it from our perspective - the fans.  Why do we buy and download bootlegs?  Ultimately, because we love the music.  We can't get enough.  There is something about your music that speaks to us, and we want every note we can get our greedy little hands on.  What we don't love is the system.

Consider: in the 80s and 90s, the going rate for a single CD bootleg was $25, and 2CD sets were at least double that.  Not a penny of that money went to you, the artist, but we were still willing to pay it to get often inferior quality material.  Don't you think the same fans would happily pay you for soundboard recordings of live shows, instead of something recorded from the back of the arena?  Wouldn't we rather have perfect quality versions of our favorite unreleased tracks?  I think the answer is obvious.

But there are some caveats.  In order to eliminate the need, and thus the market, for bootlegs, you need to release songs as they are.  I know your religious beliefs may not jive with some of the lyrics in your earlier works, but for the sake of history, you can't change them.  Doing so would only make the bootleg versions that much more necessary.  It's your prerogative if you don't want to swear in concert anymore, but when it comes to your vast back catalog, leave it as it was when you recorded it.

Furthermore, there are numerous services that press made-to-order live performance CDs.  Pearl Jam used to have a big problem with bootleggers, until they started releasing every show.  Peter Gabriel often releases unedited live recordings, warts, miscues and all.  Even if you made shows available through a digital distribution service, such as your new 20pr1nc3.com website, fans will pay for them - especially if given the choice between mp3s and a lossless audio format, like .flac.  But again, leave them as-is.  No overdubs.  No edits.  No "correcting mistakes."  Those are all part of the live experience, for better or worse, and that's what fans want.  When we listen to a live recording, we want to feel like we are there in the crowd, grooving with everybody else.  Altering live recordings only gives the bootleggers alternate material to release.

If you've read this far, I'm sure you've grasped my point.  If you want to stop the Dakota shows from being released, or at least make them useless and obsolete, all you have to do is release them yourself.  Fans buy bootlegs only out of necessity, and I think I can safely speak for each and every one of us when I say we'd much rather get perfect quality releases directly from you than pay exorbitant prices for audience recordings and stolen material. 

Perhaps you're worried about piracy, but you need to accept that there are just some problems you simply cannot control.  There has always been music piracy, and there will always be music piracy.  You cannot possibly hope to curtail it, much less stop it altogether, so it's a waste of time, money, and energy to try.  What you can do, however, is eliminate the need for bootlegs in one swift, simple stroke.  Bring back the NPG Music Club, or the 3rd Eye Club, or whatever you want to call it, and release unedited soundboard recordings of the Dakota shows.  Open your vaults and let fans buy previously unreleased material as it should be heard.  Even if there are ten different versions of the same song, we will buy them all (and why not?  We did on overpriced bootlegs). 

Take it from a young(er) person who is firmly entrenched in internet culture: this is how you stop bootleggers.  What need would there be for anyone to buy the upcoming Eye Records Dakota set if they could spend less money to get better quality versions direct from you?  It's just pure logic and basic economics.

It may be a costly endeavor, but I'm sure your pockets are deep enough.  If you want to break the system, you're going to have to spend a little cash to ensure solid hosting and hire a good web designer, but it will be worth it in the end when fans eagerly snatch up each new release.  Just think of it: decades of material at our finger tips!  The very thought of it makes me want to apply for some new credit cards!

Hopefully you've stuck with me through this, and if you have I thank you, not only for reading, but for three decades of incredible music and live performances.  More importantly, I hope you'll take my words to heart. 

Sincerely,
Matt A., Media (and especially Prince) Junkie

Comments

[Monkizio]

...So eloquently put Matt A. Prince ,please note..theres a whole new generation out here, deprived of real music.B their educator, surely U don't underestimate yr ability 2 do so....We await , with anticipation yr consideration . Resectfully and sincerely Katya.

[Troy Gua]

Beautifully written - thank u.

[NO1]

U should add a illegal audio file - otherwise U'll B ignored ;-)

[Markus Bonten]

It speaks out of my heart and soul.....Thank U...

[Erikhumstad]

Well said, and what about DVD`S from your concerts, I know everyone is taped. We want accsess to these as well. I would happily pay for HQ dvd`s of your performances.

[Mark]

How do we know he's upset?

[Matt A.]

"Mark,"

You're joking, right?

We're talking about a man who has waged war on bootleggers for over 30 years. At one of the One Nite Alone soundchecks I attended in Detroit, he half-jokingly told a fan, "Hmmm, you look like a bootlegger."

It's a well-known fact that Prince hates bootleggers. That's why, by his own admission, he has a team of lawyers scouring YouTube to take down any and everything they see. That's also why he has a "no recording devices" policy. No cameras, no recorders, nothing. He even said in the Billboard interview that he won't let people record his voice because some people have sold it in the past.

If you don't think he's upset that all six Dakota shows were recorded, in spite of the no cellphones policy, you're incredibly naive.

[Azifikare]

AMEN!!!

[C. K. Dexter Haven]

"over 600 unreleased tracks" do you think you might want to create a list of all those track names? It would seem that you have every one of the 400 tracks listed as unreleased at PV and then a couple hundred more. Would love to know the names of the songs not listed at PV and some sort of description! Dying to know what Katrina's Paper Dolls sounds like!

[Matt A.]

CK,

Are you taking into account the fact that many of those 400 tracks have multiple versions? There are 10 or 11 versions of "We Can Funk" circulating alone, if memory serves.

I actually just did a quick tally on my iPod, which shows how many tracks are in each "album," and the final count is 615 - but like I said, that includes multiple versions of the same songs. There are a few TECHNICALLY released tracks in there too, such as "Joy In Repetition" since it runs into "The Ball" and I kept it for the sake of being able to play the songs back-to-back as intended, even though it's no different from the version that appeared on Graffiti Bridge.

[C. K. Dexter Haven]

Ah, yes there are multiple versions of the same song. The Work It 2 set was approximately 587 songs. So throw in some new stuff since then, yeah I can see how it easily can top 600.

So everything you are talking about is the stuff in common circulation. Not the stuff that is known, but not know to be in circulation, such as Katrina.

[Matt A.]

Exactly. In fact, the majority of my collection came from the Work It set. We had a house fire in 2009 that destroyed all the original CDs and tapes, but that set replaced it all in one swift stroke.

There's also a few other duplicates in there, like two versions of "Moonbeam Levels" because, for some reason, bootleggers love to clip the fade-out/fade-in ending off. So I have one version in really crappy quality off an old vinyl that has the whole ending, and one in much better quality without it. And there are the versions of "Come" and "Race" the set left off, for some reason, even though they were released on some Moonraker/Thunderball boots a while ago.

I'm not really the type of person to brag about having outtakes I can't or won't trade with anybody. I hate that attitude. :)

[Reverend]

I'm going to play devil's advocate here and slightly stick up for P in this regard. As much as I hope to hear loads more out takes from the 80s, I can understand P not wanting to have absolutely everything he's ever recorded put out there.

Say you're a musician/artist or other form of creative and you've sketched an idea out in rough which later goes on to evolve into a piece of work you consider finished - why should it be necessary to release the early drafts as well? Why should someone have to release work they consider redundant and not up to scratch?

Yes, a lot of his early out takes are better than what he currently deams fit to release officially, but surely it's an artist's prerogative as to what he does or doesn't release. We can all wish that he'd release *favourite-out-take-here*, but we shouldn't think it's something he should do as a matter of principal, or as a business decision in order to thwart bootleggers making money off of his music.

Again, I'd love nothing more than for P to put out the Roadhouse Garden album of Revolution era out takes in their original, unaltered state, but I don't see it as something he should be obliged to do for his fans.

[Matt A.]

Zanna,

I agree he shouldn't be obliged to release anything, however, he complains about bootleggers taking money out of his pockets, then does nothing to correct it, except maybe go after fansites. We're not just talking about outtakes, but live shows. He could blow Eye Records' Dakota set out of the water right now by releasing those shows. He even had 3rdEyeGirl tweet about walking out with a soundboard copy of the first show which seems like a big F.U. to the fans to me.

But instead, he'll complain about bootleggers and fans are forced to get the material through other means.

I know we'll never see the inside of his vault, but my point was that even if he WERE to release 10 different versions of a song, diehards would pay for it.

[Moogie]

I strongly believe Prince edited Crystal Ball 98, at least those songs we already had, in order to remove Warner Bros Records claiming it as something they own.

If for example Prince would of placed Crucial with Eric Leeds horn part and solo AND the guitar solo version, complete as original, WB would of had to claim it as work done under contract.

Editing them up, probably removed that claim.

Prince doesn't discuss his past work not becuase of the pretext of old work, but because one, he's a Jehovah W. and old work contains a lot of nasty content, two, it would benefit WB records if he did, people would not seek his new work, which he would rather sell.

Aside from that, Prince does NOT care what fans think in any way, thats a myth.

[Matt A.]

Songs that were recorded during his time with Warner Bros. Records are not owned by them. All Warners owns are the master tapes to material they released. Many of the songs on 'Emancipation', for example, were recorded while he was still under contract and "Rave Un2 The Joy Fantastic" is the same version recorded more than a decade earlier and circulating in terrible quality amongst fans. There are also songs on 'Crystal Ball' that weren't changed, such as "Crystal Ball" itself, which was one of several versions circulating, and "Last Heart".