Prince

by Ronin Ro

  Now that he had finished his new album, he had to choose a name. He liked artist Elizabeth Schoening’s creation “Love Symbol #2.” It looked like the symbol he included on Purple Rain’s cover, a mix of the male and female symbols. Since it wasn’t a “work made for hire,” he got the copyright “by written assignment,” and decided to call his next work simply:

  At first, he wanted to start with live band numbers, “Sexy M.F.,” “Love 2 the 9’s,” and “The Morning Papers,” but then he decided his solo work “My Name Is Prince” would be first. The song started with samples from his classics “I Wanna Be Your Lover,” “Partyup,” and “Controversy.” His lyric described his contempt for the trappings of fame, then seemed to respond to Michael Jackson’s claim of being “The King of Pop.” Prince rapped, “You jumped on my D.I.C.K.” He implied this target was an imitator and a simpleton. Prince would bust him like a pimple. “You must become a Prince before you’re King anyway.” Around him, some band members reacted to his decision to have this start the album by shaking their heads. The other way was better, they felt, but they said nothing.

  30

  MONEY DON’T MATTER TONIGHT

  WITH COMPANIES ALL TRYING TO OUTDO EACH OTHER, SUPERSTARS and huge multinational conglomerates were negotiating “status deals” for recordings, films, TV shows, videos, books, clothing lines, “and sometimes even their fragrance lines,” Bream explained. Early in 1992, Michael Jackson signed with Sony and Madonna signed with Warner “each for about $60 million.” Sony U.S.A.’s vice chairman Michael Schulhof described Jackson’s deal as economic for Sony. Madonna’s six-album agreement included a label and movie company.

  Gary Stiffelman of Ziffrin, Brittenham, and Branca had already negotiated huge deals for the Rolling Stones, Aerosmith, and ZZ Top. Negotiations with Warner had lasted “at least a year,” Alan Leeds remembered. And there had been much in-house disagreement on the priorities of the deal. The new deal in fact was part of the reason Leeds left, he explained. Prince, however, wanted a deal to happen. And in late August, he kept in contact with Stiffleman during every round of negotiations. Prince also kept pal Davison, President of Paisley Park Enterprises, in the loop. In the end, reporter Jon Bream wrote, “Prince wins.”

  Prince’s deal was “reportedly the biggest ever signed with a single entertainer,” even though he didn’t sell as many records as Madonna or Jackson. It extended a preexisting five-album 1986 agreement by one album. He’d deliver the first under new terms on October 20 and receive a royalty rate of about 25 percent (about $2 per record sold). And—if this album sold 5 million copies—a $10 million advance for his next one. These numbers, Daily Variety noted, would “place him at or near the top of music industry artists.” But Warner’s financial risk was actually minimal.

  Though Diamonds did well with its No. 1 single “Cream,” preceding works sold nowhere near 5 million. Even if he sold enough to merit a $10 million advance—triple, Bream claimed, what he used to get—it was actually just an advance against sales, “like a loan.” Still, the deal could inspire him to write hits again, and let shareholders see a big name stay on the roster.

  Besides his individual contract, the deal expanded Paisley Park Enterprises’s presence in Los Angeles. His label’s roster included acts like Rosie Gaines and Carmen Electra but he reportedly received $20 million to reorganize it, and an office on a studio lot in Burbank. He also created a second label called to release singles filled with “cutting-edge street music.” Employees called the hieroglyph “the Love Symbol,” but a spokeswoman stressed this wasn’t Love Symbol Records. Warner also agreed to name him a vice president; a position one person claimed Prince wanted in order to acquire stock options.

  Prince’s deal extended to his publishing. With Warner/Chappell Music, he formed a new company to discover and promote young songwriters. His existing company, Controversy Music, signed new administration agreements in North America and internationally. An insider valued the publishing side alone at close to $40 million, but no reporter verified this.

  Warner would keep sending annual funding for this and other joint ventures but had no interest in his films. Executives told his attorneys Prince could negotiate elsewhere for movies, videos, TV shows, books, and merchandise. Despite this, Prince was thrilled with the deal. After stories about other recent pacts, Alan Leeds recalled, he “wanted the headline of a $100 million deal.”

  The industry was abuzz. Reporters implied he’d automatically receive twice what Madonna got (“the reported $5 million”) under her Time Warner deal. Daily variety quoted his representatives claiming “several joint ventures” would guarantee income of over $100 million. A Los Angeles Times lead paragraph read, “Eat your hearts out, Michael Jackson and Madonna.”

  Warner was not happy with his staff publicly claiming it was a one-hundred-million-dollar agreement. Prince himself said it was nothing like this. Regardless, the claim continued to appear in various news reports. “If you’re saying that our deal with Prince makes him more market driven, I don’t see it that way,” Merlis added. “It’s always good to sell a lot of records.” If anything, Prince had always been “Prince-driven,” he noted. “The contract doesn’t change that.”

  Shortly after signing the deal, they reportedly disagreed about the new album’s lead single. Warner wanted his moody and ambitious “7” but he insisted on “My Name Is Prince.” This one was a lighter work, an up-tempo accessible dance-rap that seemingly told self-crowned “King of Pop” Michael Jackson, “My name is Prince, I don’t wanna be king.”

  He got his way and quickly planned another image-changing video. He had Kirstie Alley, formerly of the high-rated NBC hit Cheers, play a TV news reporter filming a segment outside of Glam Slam. She claimed there was a riot in the club but cops were letting Prince shoot a video behind the building. From here, he took his spot in an alley decorated with burning trash cans and fiery orange, yellow, and red lighting. He wore a strange cap. On its brim, pearl-like beads drooped and covered his face. His black band surrounded him, like a gang. Dancers splashed in puddles—as in Jackson’s clip—and swung fists toward one other. Prince wore the hat while singing, dancing, slamming into walls, and writhing on the floor. At clip’s end, he raised the cap to flash his face, but faced the ground.

  MTV premiered the clip on Monday, September 28. The single arrived in stores the next day. A Chicago Sun-Times headline soon asked, “2 Passe & 4-Gotten?”

  At Warner, promoters were in a bind. They had just released five singles from Diamonds in seven months. They sent singles to radio, but many stations wouldn’t play them since their listeners were still tuning in for Diamonds. Now, he delivered a pretentious genre-bending rock opera that attacked the very media Warner hoped would raise sales. Even so, Warner got the new album—the first under the new deal—into stores on October 13. However, from the start there were problems. Not even publicists knew how to pronounce its title. Since the cover provided no phonetic clues some reviews called it Androgyny, others Untitled; The Village Voice called it Prince XV. Other critics just called it The Love Symbol Album. reached the Top 10 of the U.S. Album Chart, but Prince felt it should be doing a lot better. Then, when it was obvious would slide out of view after sales of about 1 million in America, Prince wondered if publicists even bothered promoting singles they felt he shouldn’t release. He decided that was the case, and that Warner could somehow promote until it became a hit. “Look, I don’t blame the guy for being disappointed,” Bob Merlis told a reporter. “We were disappointed. But whose fault was it? The company who had just paid top dollar to get the guy?” Warner made a good-faith effort to market his ambitious, untitled work, Merlis continued. “Would it have done better on another label with another approach? No. I don’t think so.”

  He had already hid his face in that “My Name Is Prince” video. Now, on the Paisley Park soundstage, he slipped into a domino mask (like that of Robin the Boy Wonder; black with openings for his eyes) and kept spending nights—his peak
creative period—working on a video for “7.” Though he usually sped through videos, he lingered on this one for four months.

  The soft-lit set resembled his album cover’s science-fiction setting. Once cameras rolled, shadowy men in suits stepped forward. With a wave of his hand, a masked Prince sent lightning to strike them down. He filmed himself in an old stage costume—similar to his Dirty Mind period—trapped in a tall test tube, clawing to escape, with lightning finally doing him in. Prince added scenes of children dressed like the new him, and Mayte, walking hand in hand in a parade. Then another old Prince, in a different outfit, the yellow Parade suit, and hairstyle, tried to escape the fatal test tube and fell. The real Prince—the one in the mask near Mayte—kept singing and watching his old images perish.

  After this, he traveled to Puerto Rico for a short break. There, he experienced another revelation. This time, he considered recent developments in his career. Warner still wanted only one album a year, to release a single, an album, and more singles and reach the old Purple Rain heights. If something sold 5 million, they’d advance $10 million for the next. But during board meetings, he tried to persuade them to release an album—and perhaps an advance—every six months. They ignored him. Another time, he offered to leave and someone said, sternly, too, that he couldn’t. He answered, “Excuse me? What did you say?” He shook his head. By the time an album reached stores, he had finished a second. When he toured for the first, a third was ready to go.

  His name had lost its personal resonance. His Pop gave it to him, but people now used it to describe—or denounce—what he called a media-made persona. Millions of people all thought they knew who he was. But their perceptions were false. He was tired of defending himself. Constantly hearing “Prince is crazy.”

  Let me just check out, he thought.

  Changing his name could accomplish a few things. He’d leave the negative image behind. Be free of it. Start over. Save himself. He’d also “get out of the contract.” Take the first step toward emancipation from “the chains” binding him to Warner. But what would he call himself? Nothing conventional.

  Finally, it came to him.

  Back in Minneapolis, he told dancer Mayte, “I know what the symbol on the album is now … .” He wouldn’t tell her until the end of the tour. She asked again and promised to keep it secret. “Well, I can’t say just yet, but I’ll give you a hint. My name isn’t Prince.”

  November 17, 1992, Warner released “7” as a single with a still from the video on its cover—him in that black domino mask, with young Mayte seemingly about to kiss him. The B-side included “2 Whom It May Concern” and various mixes of the A-side. It soared to No. 3 on the Pop Chart. But even with its “Tramp” sample, most rap fans ignored it. “7” reached only No. 61 on the R&B/Hip-hop Chart.

  With not doing anywhere near as well as Diamonds, Prince suddenly resented the deal he just signed. The label didn’t want more than one Prince album a year. Nevertheless, he told The New York Times, “The music, for me, doesn’t come on a schedule. I don’t know when it’s going to come, and when it does, I want it out.” Then he claimed they wanted commercial rap—despite the battle he waged to have “My Name Is Prince” introduce this new album. He claimed when he sat to write something he could already picture Warner executives asking, “How many different ways can we sell it?” He was trying to appease them with trendy slang and current sounds, he claimed, but the big deal wasn’t working. They had different priorities, he said, and “those two systems aren’t going to work together.” Relations had cooled to the point where executives no longer stopped by his recording sessions. Now, he felt trapped. City Pages editor Steve Perry felt it was Prince’s own fault. “He wanted his cake and to eat it, too.” He wanted to be pop’s best-paid performer and to circumvent red tape and major label protocols. “And you can’t have it both ways.”

  He kept trying to promote , agreeing to an episode of ABC in Concert. But his people, not ABC, created it. Instead of a performance, the usual fare, he filled the episode with music videos, footage of band members praising him, scenes of them touring Japan, and part of a concert. He highlighted the album’s best moments, but shortened many songs so the audience wouldn’t hear any hip-hop. The network aired an hour-long version in mid-December with little promotion. Then it divided it and aired it on two separate nights. It did nothing to move sales closer to the much-needed 5 million. And he wouldn’t tour. “Nothing’s scheduled at this point,” New York—based publicist Michael Pagnotta said. “Right now, everyone’s focusing on the new single ‘7.’”

  31

  TAKE MY FAME

  IN FACT, HE WAS ALREADY TRYING TO MOVE ON. JANUARY 2, 1993, Prince rang in the New Year with a session that yielded rock numbers “Endorphinmachine,” and “Dolphin,” the mood piece “Dark,” and “Laurianne.” He was taking another break from the dance-rap and Warner, working with playwright David Hwang (M. Butterfly) and envisioning a play based on Ulysses. He kept recording, knocking out other dark works like “Papa,” “Pheromone,” “Space,” “Loose,” and “Poem.”

  He was also gearing up for Tara Patrick’s album as Carmen Electra. While their romantic involvement seemed to cool once Mayte entered the picture, Prince remained optimistic about Electra’s chances of attracting a large Madonna-like audience. Since recording new tracks in London, he had remixed her album and named it Go Go Dancer. But with arriving in stores in October, Warner delayed Go Go Dancer until February 9, 1993.

  After spending over $2 million on a video, promotional campaign, and an enigmatic but ineffective Rolling Stone ad, her album, now self-titled, arrived in stores. Relations were tense. Warner seemed less interested. The work reportedly received the bare minimum as far as promotion. Prince saw mixed reviews. Billboard’s critic was enthused but most others were incredulous. Derisive reviews didn’t inspire more work or sales. Carmen Electra flopped even as Prince struggled to raise sales of his own . He went out there to promote it, even singing four songs during his February 25 appearance on The Arsenio Hall Show. Then he did his in-store show and record signing for over one thousand fans at Atlanta’s Turtle’s Rhythm & Views (signing most items with ).

  The Act I Tour could raise sales. He’d play consecutive dates in smaller theaters and halls of about one thousand to five thousand seats. But Warner’s Bob Merlis said, “Promoters are looking hard at this tour to see what he can do. They’ve always been a little gun-shy in this country about booking Prince dates, but I think they’re heartened by what he’s doing this time.” Merlis likened it to “a ‘brand relaunch,’ although I hate to use a term you’d read in Ad Age.”

  Five months after its release, was stuck in the middle of the charts and hadn’t sold 2 million in North America. So he worked to endear himself to fans. At Fort Lauderdale’s Sunrise Musical Theater, March 8 and 9, he was casual with a sold-out audience of four thousand. He joked with the band, played guitar in the aisles, did a stage dive, and shouted “Can’t nobody fuck with my band.” He followed “My Name Is Prince” with eleven of sixteen songs from .

  The pop market still wasn’t responding.

  The Chicago Sun-Times called its April 4, 1993, report, “Prince—What Happened?”

  He reached San Francisco.

  On April 10, he met with Vibe’s Alan Light. His camp had contacted Light over a year ago after he enjoyed Light’s Rolling Stone review of the opening night of his album tour in 1993. But Prince wanted to get a sense of who Light was, Light explained, “and that went on through several sessions before his team finally decided it was time to sit and talk on the record.”

  He wanted Light to fly to San Francisco one weekend. “This was actually the weekend between my last day at Rolling Stone and my first day at Vibe,” Light remembered.

  In a theater in San Francisco, he sat in an empty audience section watching his band warm up. Light sat in the next seat. “We talked quite a bit, but of course it was pretty loud in there,” Light explained. Prince then rose to his
feet and invited Light onto the stage with him. He had the writer nearby while he played guitar and keyboard. “He’d play a bit and then say a few words to me.” He talked about Earth Wind & Fire, Mavis Staples, and some of the older acts he worked with at Paisley Park. Then he began to issue pronouncements. After playing a solo, he asked Light if he saw how hard it was to be able to play anything he could imagine. He was friendly, trying to feel Light out, but still wouldn’t let the writer use a recorder. “He also made it clear that he didn’t want me taking notes,” Light added. “So I would kind of hide in a corner or duck into another room and scrawl as much as I could remember.”

  After the sound check, he let Light come to his show that night and mentioned his name on stage. Then he met with him in a roped-off section of a club called DV8. “That’s when he ordered glasses of Port for us,” Light remembered.

  Handing him a glass, Prince told him Warner didn’t know a new album was finished. “From now on, Warner only gets old songs out of the vault. New songs we’ll play at shows. Music should be free, anyway.”

  One Thursday, Prince played the 7,500-seat Universal Amphitheatre in LA. It was the final stop and according to reviewer Jon Bream, his worst show in twelve years. Friendlier, warmer than ever, Prince kept entering the audience, inviting people onstage to dance, giving fans in the front row high fives. He tried to stage his rock opera to music from and soon joined the band in tearing off an actress’s skirt. After playing old hits, Prince started a long-winded jam built around the chant “rock the house.” The crowd demanded an encore, but he said, “I’m sorry, but Prince has left the building.” Before they could react, he was back.