Publication: Minneapolis Star Tribune [US]
Date: January 16, 1995
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Title: "Paisley Park Money Woes Won't Sink Prince"
Written By: Jon Bream

Is it the darkness before the dawn at Paisley Park, or just business as usual with the mercurial despot known as Prince?

In a copyrighted story Sunday, the St. Paul Pioneer Press reported that Prince's multimillion-dollar empire is in financial disarray; that Paisley Park Enterprises, his Chanhassen-based business entity, has not been paying all its bills on time or at all; that Point of View, a local film production company regularly hired by Prince since 1991, was owed $450,000 and 10 months later, settled for 70 cents on the dollar but was nonetheless forced into bankruptcy.

So what else is new?

The sun is not about to set in Paisley Park. Prince is one of those crazed, creative geniuses with no regard - or sense - about business. It just happens that, since the release of his first album on Warner Bros. in 1978, this mad genius has managed to sell more than 35 million albums in the United States, make four movies, win an Oscar and a handful of Grammys, and generate more than $300 million worth of business.

Prince Roger Nelson, 36, the Minneapolis-born rock and film star, is Elvis without the drugs. He lives in isolation, surrounded by a cadre of functionaries, gofers and yes-men and women who carry such fancy but often meaningless titles as manager or vice president. He may call at 3 a.m. requesting that the wardrobe department make an outfit. If you buy into his vision and want to keep your job, you head to the office and execute the boss' orders.

As a teen, Prince bounced from his mother's house to his father's to the home of a friend whose mother became a de facto step-mom to Prince. But he never starved, he never had to get a job to pay for rent or gasoline, he never even had a checkbook that required his signature until last year. (I wonder if he signed "Prince Roger Nelson: or that glyph that has become his stage name?)

Elvis Presley didn't have a sense of business, but he had Col. Tom Parker, an ex-carny who had a knack for business and promotion. Elvis did have the good sense to turn his business over to Parker - even if it was at an exorbitant commission, reportedly 50 percent. Prince has not had the good sense of turn his business over to the right people since 1989, when he fired the managers, lawyers and accountants who had guided him since 1980.

Back then, the three entities provided a checks-and-balances system. They were the ones who listened to Prince's vision and put together the improbable deal to make a $7 million, quasi-autobiographical movie in Minneapolis with a rookie director and unknown star, and "Purple Rain" grossed more than $70 million, sold 11 million soundtrack albums and catapulted Prince into stardom.

Since '89, Prince would hire a manager and tell that person to hire a lawyer and accountant because the star had neither the time nor inclination to do it himself. The manager would hire his lawyer and accountant, an approach with an inherent conflict of interest. Then Prince would fire the manager and ask the lawyer to find a new manager.

There is no manager now. Gilbert Davidson, who started as Prince's bodyguard in 1984, took over his business affairs in 1990. He announced his intentions to quite at the end of last year, but Prince fired him last summer. The Levi Seacer Jr., Prince's former bassist and guitarist who had been running Prince's NPG Records, took over some of the management responsibilities. He left when his contract expired in November.

Who's minding the shop? A team consisting of Prince's half-brother, Duane Nelson, who started working for Prince 12 years ago mowing his lawn; Therese Stoulil, who has been Prince's personal assistant for nearly 10 years, and Juli Knapp, a former assistant to the vice president of the now-defunct Paisley Park Records. Prince's longtime Los Angeles-based booking agent, Rob Light, who represents Janet Jackson and other stars, has, by default, take over some of the managerial responsibilities such as meeting with officials at Warner Bros. Records.

A case could be made that in entrepreneurial endeavors such as Prince's - making records, films and videos; running Glam Slam nightclubs in Miami and Los Angeles, and operating a retail store/catalog selling everything from his own perfume to custom guitars - cash flow can be a problem, even if annual revenues are more than $10 million, which is probably what Prince pulls in royalties and fees in a show year like 1994. He spends capriciously with no regard to the balance in a ledger.

For example, in early 1993 he set up an expensive office with 10 or 12 people for Paisley Park Records in Centure City, Calif., at the time when he was feuding with Warner Bros., which distributed Paisley Records. The plush office operated for a year; Prince never set foot in the place and he still is paying off contracts of some of the employees, including the top executive, John Dukakis, who now comanages the hugely successful Boyz II Men. Also in '93, Paisley Park Records spent more than $2 million, at Prince's insistence, on a video and promotional campaign for a record by his friend, dancer Carmen Electra, that generated minimal sales.

If Prince wants a project to get done, he assigns it to a staff member, whether that person is qualified or not. He is demanding and also has a magical way of instilling confidence in his people. But if he meets resistance from an employee, he usually finds another to execute his orders. In the 1980's, manager Steve Fargnoli would challenge Prince's ideas. For instance, Fargnoli and others had to convince Prince that Paisley Park Studios, his $10 million recording complex that opened in 1987, could not be a personal playground, but rather a cash-generating studio open to the public as well as his occasional private romper room. In the early '90s, longtime staff member Alan Leeds, who ran Paisley Park Records, often assumed the role of the business-minded adviser who understood Prince's vision and would challenge him about the reality of trying to fit it into the business world. But since Leeds left in May 1992, Prince has essentially surrounded himself with folks who drink his Kool-Aid, or they're let go.

At Paisley Park Enterprises, some bills get paid, others apparently don't. A catering company for a Prince video shoot was paid three times for the same bill (and returned the checks). The Pioneer Press investigation discovered several unpaid - or underpaid - creditors, including at least two Minnesota video production companies. In 1994, Prince did not undertake a concert tour, abroad or in the United States, for the first time in years. Thus he did not generate the cash flow he had been accustomed to. Not that he probably was paying much attention to the books.

Prince's financial disarray can be summed up simply and bluntly: He is an artist, not a businessman. As the New York Times put it last year, Prince is too creative for the recording industry. He has studio diarrhea - he's constantly creating new songs, enough to fill four albums a year in an industry that is reluctant to issue even one album per year by an artist.

Moreover, the hypercreative Prince, who sleeps only three hours each morning (if at all), changes his mind more often than he changes outfits. The latest controversy is his forthcoming album, "The Gold Experience". He says that Warner Bros. with which he is feuding, won't release it. At least twice, the company has scheduled the release and then Prince has changed his mind and failed to deliver the master recording.

The nature of Prince's art, or gift, if you will, is by definition unstructured. However, in a business atmosphere that requires structure, he is a round peg in a square hole. His premise is not to make money; it is to create art. But he needs money to create his art, so he must try to sell his art. Music is his life, not his career. He is defined totally by what he creates and how he creates it. That doesn't fit in the business world. But Prince probably never will.