Prince – “His Royal Badness”

Groove Innerviews

On February 2nd, the late rock legend Prince was honoured at The Grammy Awards in Los Angeles with a Lifetime Achievement Award. Since Black History Month is now in full swing for ’25 it would be fitting to look at the achievements of the man born Prince Rogers Nelson in 1958 in Minneapolis, Minnesota.

Named after his father’s jazz combo The Prince Rogers Trio, the future music legend showed an obvious attraction to music at a young age.

Landing his first record deal in 1977 at age 18, he was insistent that he produce his own debut album For You.

Many labels made offers to the management of the young budding musician but handing over production reigns to a kid just getting out of high school was not something that interested CBS or many of the other imprints interested until Warner Bros. finally agreed.

Prince would bring a whole new meaning to the word “prolific. He would release an album almost every year from his debut, For You in ’70 until his untimely death of an accidental fentanyl overdose in 2016.

“Prince would bring a whole new meaning to the word prolific, releasing an album almost every year since 1970.”

His original hybrid of pop, soul, rock, funk and punk, made early 80’s albums like, Dirty Mind and Controversy cult classics at the time.

But it would be his surprise success with the blockbuster film Purple Rain in ’84 and its accompanying soundtrack which would go on to sell over 25 million copies worldwide.

Prince’s purple driven funk rock with lyrics of sex, God and salvation would win millions fans around the world.

Prince’s androgynous and exotic look with lace laden outrageous stage outfits (which he wore offstage as well) made him one of the most recognizable rock stars ever.

Prince would continue to release great albums throughout his career including ’87’s Grammy-nominated double album masterpiece Sign ‘O The Times, but it would be his non-conformist approach to the music industry that he would be best remembered by.

His Royal Badness – as he was known – would release 40 studio albums in his life time, a live boxed set as well as various live concert recordings compilations and many singles and music videos.

However, Prince would best be remembered for his fight against the music industry for artists’ rights.

Prince wanted to control the frequency of the release of his music and wanted to release as much material as he chose to; which led to his very public war with Warner. He took to writing “slave” on his face between 1994 and 2000 in protest to his label wanting him to slow down the release of his output. He began using an unpronounceable symbol as his name until the end of his publishing contract with the label when he would then retain ownership of his name undeterred by Warner.

Prince would also be one of the first artists to utilize the internet as a platform to release his material.

“Prince was not a once in a lifetime artist. Prince was just once.”

He released his 2001 single The Work Pt.1 exclusively with the controversial file sharing service Napster.

He gave away copies of his album Musicology with the purchase of a ticket for the concert. This would propel the Musicology album to platinum status. The Recording Association of America would grant the album platinum-selling status but would then ban the practice from that point on as a means of sales calculation.

He gave away copies of his 2007 album Planet Earth in the British tabloid Daily Mail, thus granting him another platinum album achievement.

His live shows continued to be among the biggest tickets in town wherever he played. Sometimes announcing a one-off show in a town just days before.

Prince’s complex and simple music arrangements, his commercial and experimental songs as well as his usage of colour, sex and spirituality made him an artist beyond the ages. Prince was not a once in a lifetime artist. Prince was just once.

Duke Eatmon can be heard daily on CBC Radio with Sabrina Marandola on the Let’s Go! Drive Show from 3 to 6pm.