Prince

[Malcolm]

Dead at 57 twenty minutes from where I live, probably right around the time I got home or shortly thereafter.

[GORDON]

I've listened to his stuff from time to time since he left his label, and I always found it bland and uninteresting. Makes me wonder if some artists do better when they have to work from the confines of the label giving them mandatory input.

[Malcolm]

He has a massive collection of unreleased material. I mean a shit-ton of fully produced music videos, movies, and albums that he never put out. Wonder when his estate will start publishing them.

[Leisher]

Darling Nikki is a favorite.

[Malcolm]

Huddled in the rain, fans touched a star bearing his name painted on the First Avenue music club in downtown Minneapolis, the “Purple Rain” site where he played often early in his career.

Damn. Got to go to a show there tomorrow (and maybe Saturday) for Bob Mould. I also spend a fuckload of time here about 12-13 years ago when it was the Quest.

In late 1989, Prince opened a nightclub in Minneapolis named after the song and partially decorated with paintings by Brian Canfield Mitchell. After eight years of frustration vis-a-vis its more established rival First Avenue, he sold it to new owner, Gilbert Davison, former Prince Manager and President of Paisley Park, who renamed it The Quest. The club became one of the premier nightspots in the Twin Cities, rivaling First Avenue as a live music venue, before closing in 2006 due to a fire in the club. The building was reconfigured following the closure and reopened as the nightclub Epic.

I remember my buddy was supposed to work that night. Used to park in the lot where the new Twins stadium is now.

[GORDON]

I was just made aware of this. Prince was pretty much a guitar god. He comes in at around 3 minutes and owns the stage.

[TPRJones]

Wait, where did his guitar go at the end? Was someone up in the rafters to catch it?

I expected to see it falling on someone's head in the wide but it's just ... gone.

[Malcolm]

Prince could play a fuckload of instruments. He was a spectacular guitarist easily up there with anyone.

[GORDON]

Wait, where did his guitar go at the end? Was someone up in the rafters to catch it?

I expected to see it falling on someone's head in the wide but it's just ... gone.

I think it ascended up to heaven because it knew no one would ever play it better.

[GORDON]

Sirius/XM has made channel 50 the Prince Tribute Weekend.

[Malcolm]

The attitude in town this weekend is bordering on surreal.

[Malcolm]

Bieber's a dick.

[TPRJones]

He's not wrong. All credit due to Prince, but calling him "the last of the greatest living performers" is less about how great he is and more about dissing all other living performers who are not Prince.

Besides it's a logically self-denying statement. Whatever performer that is alive that was next below Prince in greatness is now by definition the greatest living performer. Hell if everyone in the world but Chad Kroeger died in an apocalypse, then even he would suddenly qualify for the title. It's a dumb thing to say. Unless the claim is there are NO more living performers in existence now that Prince is dead, but that seems silly.

[Malcolm]

"the last of the greatest living performers"

That probably wasn't the best way to put it. However, Prince was of a certain class of entertainer I don't see much of anymore. He wasn't "the last" of anything, but he was one of an increasingly rare kind. Prince was a musician's musician in the same way Richard Pryor was a "comedian's comedian."

Hell if everyone in the world but Chad Kroeger died in an apocalypse, then even he would suddenly qualify for the title.

No, because then complete silence would still sound better. You'd need to find something that sounded worse. I don't know what that could be or if I want to know.

[GORDON]

I agree with what Bieber said, but I also agree that it is crass to say it the day the guy died.

[Troy]

Kevin Smith's story about Prince is hilarious for those of you haven't heard it. On youtube and other places.

[Malcolm]

Prince's new symbol: $.

[Malcolm]

No will. This is going to take years longer now.

[Leisher]

That's supposedly Prince's play list he sent the producers of New Girl when he was to appear on an episode in 2013. He heard his scene was a party scene and wanted to make it realistic in terms of what music he'd play at a party.

[Malcolm]

Ka-CHING.

But complicating an already head-spinning six-way split, Forbes tax and litigation expert Robert W. Wood estimates that as much as 40 percent of the “Kiss” singer’s lucrative estate could go to the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) due to estate tax laws.

As for new music, it’s well known Prince had a vault at Paisley Park where he stored a treasure trove of unreleased music. “It’s temperature controlled, it’s like a bank vault full of recordings,” says Thorne.

But would Prince want these secretive tracks released? “He made two contradictory statements,” Thorne explains. “He said that one day he might burn everything in the vault, but I don’t think that was a serious intention. And more recently he also said that one day everything in the vault will come out, that it will be released. I think that’s what we’ve got take on board—that is what he would have wanted.”

Fuck, yes.