Publication: PC Guide [US]
Date: July 1995
Section:
Page Number(s):
Length:
Title: "Sign Of The Times"
Written By:

Dateline: 1999 AD. Here's the scenario. You fancy buying the new Prince album, so off you saunter to the local HMVirgin Price, 50 ECU notes clutched firmly in your hand. But hang on-how can you have been so daft? You know very well it was over six years ago since he last recorded an album under the name of Prince, let alone released anything you could actually buy in a record shop. Slapping your forehead, you hurry back to your den, switch on your PC, log on to O{+>'s internet site, and excitedly wait for the first notes of his new interactive album to fill your room...

On June 7th 1993, Prince Rogers Nelson was pronounced officially dead. there were no flowers sent, no showbiz fawning and no tombstone. instead, we were introduced to The Artist Formerly Known as Prince, now to be unforgettably known only as O{+>-the dancer on Prince's grave, the head of the New Power Generation and a self-styled artist for the 21st century.

O{+>'s voyage into the exciting world of multimedia began with his rechristening. Symbol, Squiggle, Davo(as rather memorably suggested by an Australian national poll)-potential pronunciations for the hieroglyphic came thick and fast. In a desperate attempt to put a stop to all this unwanted cynicism, Warner Brother's public relations department distributed floppy disks with the O{+> symbol on it to the press. Such a determined attempt to change out keyboards as well as our hearts and minds shows the importance that O{+> is placing on the influence of the media. Prince has not merely changed his name-Prince is dead, he's been replaced by someone who can't possibly be held by any existing contracts because he didn't actually sign them.

It's naive-overwhelmingly so- but perhaps this is the only route for an artist to take given the recent fiasco between George Michael and Sony Records. Whatever the reasoning, it's proof of O{+>'s acknowledgement of the electronic world at large, a world he must embrace wholeheartedly if he's to party until 1999 without the help of a record company.

The first tentative steps came with his CD-ROM, O{+> Interactive. Released solely under the guise of O{+>(with no sign of that nasty 'P' word on the packaging), it's a cross between Prince's Greatest Hits and an adventure game. Your mission is to roam around O{+>'s so-called "playground of fantasy", and in keeping with the man's rather modest appreciation of himself(the text on the back of the Interactive CD-ROM packaging confidently refers to him as "a modern-day Mozart") this playground is shaped exactly like his symbol.

A small craft crashes you at the front door only to shoot off, leaving you to fumble your way around by double-clicking on anything and everything that moves, doesn't move or looks like it could move. the objective is to return to your craft by collecting the scattered pieces of the aforementioned symbol. Pieces can be found all over the place-in the studio, candle room, music club and, predictably, the boudoir- but the fun is in looking for them. On the way to completion, you discover clips of old Prince videos, an extensive discograpy...even an animated version of his wardrobe!

Beyond the novelty and trivia, is Interactive any good? That depends on whether you approach it as a Prince/O{+> fan or as a PC enthusiast, but if the point of all this is to extend his artistic range, enabling O{+> to communicate and interact with his audience, then it's missed the mark. Despite the inclusion of the CD-ROM-only song Interactive, it's still very much a Greatest Hits compilation. That's all well and good for the 'normal' artist, but whatever your opinion, that's the last thing O{+> is. To redress the balance somewhat, gameplay and full-screen video something it does admirably. However, when compared with Peter Gabriel's Xplora 1 or even 2 Unlimited's recent CD-i offering Beyond Limits, this CD-ROM is unfortunately limp. Interactive is sadly destined to remain a courageous but failed experiment.

However, all is not lost for the PC-owning Prince fan. After his high-profile visit to the UK, O{+> returned to the States and the womb of his private pleasure palace, Paisley Park. the recording facilities are frequented by the likes of REM, fine Young Cannibals and Mavis Staples while its tele-studios have turned out commercials and even computer-animated videos. According to a spokesman for warner Brothers, Paisley Park affords O{+> the ability to do just about anything he wants, and even has the necessary hardware to release his material on the Internet. And that's where he sees the future.

"Once the Internet is a reality, the music business is finished. There won't be a need for record companies,"he explained in an interview for the NME(11 March 1995). "If I can send you my music direct, what's the point of having a music business?"

The Gold Experience album was recently advertised on the Internet with a release date of "Never!", so could O{+> hasten its release with the wonders of the World Wide Web? Well, it was allegedly O{+> himself who posted the ad, but then that could be a bluff... First thing's first, let's see whether he could actually do it.

No problem. Nowadays, virtually every band's press advertising boasts an Internet site that features audio samples among the inevitable dearth of hype. Warner's site features a brief snatch of Prince's Letitgo- but music has been available on the Internet for some time.

Ironically, it was the old guard who lead the way in this field. Having set a precedent by doing on-line interviews, Aerosmith recently made the previously unreleased Head First available only in the Internet. And on a somewhat bigger scale, The rolling Stones broadcast 20 minutes of their 1994 Dallas show on the Internet, in both sound and vision.

At the moment, the main problem with all this is the eternity it takes to download songs on to your machine and the subsequent poor sound quality you receive in return for your patience- an 8 KHz mono sample of around 40 seconds takes over five minutes to download. It's a fair trade given the material's exclusivity, but it's a deal you won't have to strike in a few years time. New compression techniques will mean speedier access and CD-quality sound, but until then you pays your money...

In recent interviews, O{+> mused over the possibilities of releasing self financed CDs and tapes. This would require pressing plants, a distribution network plus, if he's to reach enough people to self finance the venture, his own press department and sales force. As long as he could provide both the material and the hardware, the Internet could replace all the above, and guarantee the interaction O{+> strived fro with his CD-ROM. However, there's a snag...

It's not called a music business for nothing. O{+> may have songs coming out of his every pore, but what's the point of releasing them on the Internet if, as Aerosmith had to do, he must waive all songwriting royalties? The only financial winners are going to be the telephone companies-it's good to talk, but even better to listen.

Things are inevitably changing. While it might be against the free access principles of the Internet, digital distribution networks are already being set up. A step on from the Internet's "cyberstores", through which you can order CDs, they enable you to double-click on the songs you want, 15 pounds are debited from your credit card (checked on-line) and the song is simply downloaded to your PC's hard drive. Combined with the move towards recordable CD-ROM drives, all you have to do is print out the sleeve from the network's picture file, and you'll never have to visit a megastore again. All this might be music to O{+>'s ears, but it also chings the cash registers of the music business as a whole. current major label efforts at Web sites usually mean little more than a glorified fan club -monotonous band biographies a la The Chart Show, the odd free screen saver and dire competitions that aren't up to the level of those on Ceefax.

Once again, things are on the move. The financial potential of the Internet has been swiftly realized by record bosses. The aforementioned Rolling Stones concert wasn't organized by the band members themselves, and most musicians who boast about their Internet friendliness have been encouraged into on-line conferences by their creed-seeking employers. While it's too late to stop all the merry pranksters who roam the Internet (The rolling Stones had an "unbooked"support band hook into their Internet concert), the record giant can at least muscle in on the act. By placing back catalogues up for sale on the Internet, labels can bypass the need for both distributors and record shops.

Money, as always, is a prime motivator in the entertainment business, and while O{+> could release and charge for his songs over the Internet, there's still a binding contract hanging over his head. Warner had made it perfectly clear that he is signed to them and that's where his songs will be coming from until they say differnt-recent chart-topper The Most Beautiful Girl in the world came out on O{+>'s own NPG Records purely as a matter of record label courtesy. It's a stalemate situation that's lead to Warner releasing such releases as The Purple Medley, and O{+> felt-tipping the somewhat over-stated "slave" on his right cheekbone when venturing out on the town.

So the means are there but not the method- how are we going to hear The Gold Experience? For that, it's back to the Internet- or http://morra.et.tudelft.nl/npn/ if you want the precise location.

Musicians can choose many ways to release their music, but the fan is a beast unto him or herself. bound only by what is usually blind devotion to their beloved artist, unofficial Web sites have sprung up for artists such as Blur and REM, and Prince is no different. Set up in late 1993 by BretG, the New Power Network describes itself as an "electronic Paisley encyclopaedia" which enables fans to share thoughts on the diminutive one. Regularly updated by its 14 member, pages are devoted to the latest O{+> news and gossip, transcriptions of interviews and galleries for O{+> related art and fiction. Indeed, NPN's immaculate presentation puts the official Warner site to shame. As with all such networks, the content can quickly shift from the interesting to the mind-numbingly trivial, but it's done with such loving detail you can't help but be charmed.

It's innocuous enough-a hi-tech hybrid of cb radio and a fan club-until bootlegging enters the equation. A trip to an independent record shop reveals an extensive array of bootleg CDs of your favourite artist, manufactured in copyright-free Italy and featuring live shows, unreleased studio tracks and other unofficial booty. Prince is one of the most heavily bootlegged artists ever, so it's no surprise that his Black Album, only commercially released last year, has been available on unofficial CD since its completion in 1987.

A browse around the New Power Network reveals entire pages dedicated to bootlegs. Listings, reviews, appraisals-as quick as O{+> can record a track, someone can smuggle a copy into the hands of those naughty Italian pressing plants. Such CDs are only of interest of the collector, but it took just 10 minutes roaming the Internet to find two sites offering downloadable audio files of bootlegged tracks. Samples include live tracks from the Berlin MTV Awards aftershow ceremony, blues versions of older tracks, and a snippet of an unreleased duet between Prince and the late Miles Davis.

With Internet hardware improving all the time, we could have The Gold Experience on our hard drives one day. It's a prospect to send shivers down the spines of both O{+> and Warner Brothers, but how close are we to it now? We put this, and a few other loaded questions, to members of the New Power Network...

1. Firstly, the Royal Squiggle himself. Is the name change truly part of some "spiritual revelation", or just a naive attempt to escape what he sees as a restrictive contract? "My feeling is that the man simply wants to leave his past behind as quickly as possible," claims BretG. "A name change is a psychological and perhaps financial way to do it." One of the other Network members, April Dornbrook, is a little more cutting. "Changing your name simply won't hold up in any court of law. if that were the case, I'd change my name to :) this very moment to be relieved of all my credit card debt.

2. The O{+> Interactive CD-ROM: a genuine attempt to interact with the fans, or just another format to purchase? "The CD-ROM is commercial"offers Richie B. "For dedicated fans it's boring, too easy [and] there is no interaction with anyone." Bret G summed up the NPN's general apathy towards the project. "I think it's a boring museum piece. The graphics are pretty nice, but I find the content cold and lonely." Peter Berger, however, thinks Interactive is a "good attempt" and was, "happy that Prince/O{+> was one of the first to release a CD-ROM."

3.Could The Gold Experience be released on the Internet? "On his latest work (the NPG CD Exodus), there is a conversation about downloading music to the fan's computers," explains Peter. "The operator clams that the artist has to be free [have no other contracts] to do this." April Dornbrook maintains that "it could happen, but I don't see how O{+>'s desire to 'give away' music via the Internet is going to keep his pockets fat- unless he means it when he says 'music should be free'." Richie B has posted bootleg songs on the Internet (http://morra.et/~richie/gold/gold.html) in what he admits is "bad quality- but with MPEG2 audio compression, it's very possible to distribute CD-quality music on the Internet." But with MPEG2 a good couple of years away, BretG sums up th PC-owning fan's current dilemma: "I have a fast network connection, so I could download the files and throw them on floppy disks in no time... but I have no way of getting that music on a cassette. I'm not going to sit at my computer whenever I want to jam to Gold."

4.And finally, why all the devotion? Richie B sums up the devotion that keeps the Network so current. "I don't care what he does/says/calls himself. As long as he can make music the way he wants to, I don't need to listen to anything else."

Whether it was his intention or not, when Prince left the English language for the keyboard, his image, recordings, and his public and rivate persona became public domain. The quest for interactivity has been taken out of his hands and placed in those who see freedom as more that the luxury to write 'slave' on a cheek worth millions of dollars.

Recent reports suggest relations between O{+> and Warner have improved considerably, enabling the video release of Dolphin from The Gold Experience album and the freeing of the New Power Generation album, Exodus, which features O{+> under the pseudonym of Tora Tora. Insiders and Internet surfers alike are predicting the release of The Gold Experience late this year, and whatever hype smells like there's a distinct whiff of it in the air at the moment. However, before those Warner presses start to bump 'n' grind into action, it's almost certain t hat teams of Italian bootleggers ae busy getting The Gold Experience to those people who truly want to hear it first.

How long before they're e-mailing you?