Prince believes in magic the kind you work at because it’s laying there inside you like a wand without an arm to wave it - and he’s been busy practicing his magic since he was seven, banging out Jazz and Blues songs on the piano. He was raised in South Minneapolis with his three brothers and four sisters. His dad, billed as Roger Prince. was a swing -band leader. His mother worked on and off as the band’s lead singer. When he was in the seventh grade at Bryant Junior High he joined a local dance band called Grand Central. Around the time he and the rest of the members were ready for a change of schools (Central High) they changed the band’s name to Shampayne .
By the time Prince was 13 he was comfortable with a bass or a lead guitar. A year later he began working on the drums with a Magnus Chord Organ, a clavinet. and an array of synthesizers following the beat of his magic in the making. A formal musical education didn’t have much influence in that magic . Prince says as he recalls his school days , “I took one piano and two guitar lessons while I was in school. I wasn’t really a mode l student. I didn’t want to play the funky stuff music teachers used and I couldn’t read music . It would always end up that the teacher would go through his thing, and I’d end up doing_mine . Eventually they just gave me an A and sent me on my way.
"By the time I was a sophomore. school had gotten to be a real drag. I was getting further and further into making music. The more I found myself entertaining at local gigs during the night. the more I hated the thought of going to school in the morning .”
"But later on. there I was seventeen. a graduate and still frustrated . I felt that I had to keep going after the music but didn’t know how long I’d be able to do it and eat too . I did know that I wanted something more than nine to five .”
Frustration and the going-nowhere-in-a-hurry blues trapped Prince in a case of the ’Midwest Lethargism’ syndrome . He was struck with the affliction ’s common symptoms. First you begin viewing the scene as lethargic . This lethargy soon spreads to your scene until you Just know that the only way anything’s gonna pop is if you get the hell out to where the action is. Destination choice is another predetermined characteristic of the afflict ion. You only see apples or oranges in your dreams. Prince chose the Big Apple because an older sister , Sharon , lived there.
"The only way I can relate to that period, is that it was part of a search ,” Prince admits.
"While I was living with Sharon I go t hooked up with a woman producer who was always busy pitching her own angles. She was only looking at me as a singer. the kind that opts for the silk capes, high heeled shoes and white Cadillacs. You know. somebody who dresses and sings the same part - a nice dresser and a sweet singer. I tried to explain that even though I didn’t have the key to the recording industry. that I knew myself and that I knew for sure what I would and wouldn’t do for that Key. I told her I never considered myself a singer. I saw myself as an instrumentalist who started singing out of necessity. I don’t think I ever got through, but I tried explaining, that to me, my voice is just like one of the instruments I play. It’s just one thing I do.
Two years ago Prince was just another 16-year-old musician with a band. The drummer’s mother managed it, arranging as many school gigs and club appearances as she could . Today he’s an 18-year-o ld studio soloist who just may be sit ting on the largest debut recording offer ever to be approved by Warner Brothers Records. Direction from Prince ’s new manager, Owen Husney , a three-song demo tape and an awe-inspiring amount of talent landed a bottom line that reputedly ran into six figures.
The debut LP entitled Prince-For You established enough firsts in its’ own right to humble a limo-load of market-prove n recording artists. “For You” is the first debut album ever to be completely controlled by the artist and his management. Prince was granted control of product ion, performance, composition and arrangement. On the LP, the Minnesota artist practiced what the contract preached . He arranged the material which — with the exception of “Soft and Wet” - he had created. In Warner Brothers’ Record Plant located in Sausalito, California this 18-year-old, 16-track neophyte stepped in and put down nine solid tunes — single handed. A previous studio merger had yielded the demo which had stimulated his lenient agreement. This time a developed conception emerged. Nine major league tunes — with lush instrumentation and enough multitrack voice dubbing to prompt the Divine Miss M into polishing her bugle.
Ironically. while Prince was in New York unsuccessfully explaining the magic he wanted to come across in a production to an unyielding producer, some of that same magic he’d left behind in Minneapolis was casting spells and lighting up wands on its’ own.
Before his eastern migration , Prince had gotten a call from Chris Moon. the owner of Moon Sound Inc., a recording studio in South Minneapolis. Moon had remembered the black dude on piano who had played with Shampayne in a previous session. Now he had a demo tape that needed a solid piano track tor icing. He knew Prince could easily handle the job and that he’d get an economical billing to boot.
After the pianist had added the keyboards he picked up a bass and suggested that it would also be an asset to the tapes· sound . Moon agreed. but added that he hand’! planned on paying for a bass player too . While a mesmerized Moon sat behind the control panel, the kid from Shampayne laid down a tight bass line. Then he put the bass aside and pounded out a drum track, added an electric guitar lead line and finished by feeding the studio ’s recorders with multiple backup vocal tracks.
A short while after Moon had edited the tape, he asked the proprietor of The Ad Company at 430 Oak Grove to give it a listen. The agency ’s owner, Owen Husney had been through the corridors of the music industry . He’d done everything from local and national promotion to artist management over the years. and Moon was sure he’d recognize Prince’s unlimited potential when he heard the tape.
”That’s pretty good, who are they?”, was Owen’s initial response. While Moon explained that the “they” being referred to was one. and that the “one” hadn’t any positive commitments for the future. Owen’s eyes grew the size of record discs, (color them platinum).
A phone call later and Prince was on his way back to the city of lakes; without the company of his silk pitching New York manager . . .
Owen and Prince became fast com rad es. As it became apparent to Prince that he’d finally found a manager who would work with him instead of against him, the music began to flow. “I knew whatever had to be done for Prince had to be first class,” Owen stated. “ If we went to L.A. or anywhere else to score a recording deal. we weren’t just going to go out there and phone record execs from our hotel room.” “The best support I could offer was to give Prince the confidence he needed to keep on doing it.”
A demo tape was cut at Sound 80 studios. The event, the young artist’s first long-term studio stay, created a bond between man and music-machine that isn’t likely to be broken. “For me, there’s nothing like working in a recording studio. It’s satisfying. It’s like painting. You being with a conception and keep adding instruments and laying tracks down . Soon, it’s like the monitors are canvas. The instruments are colors on a palet, the mikes and board are brushes. I just keep working it until I’ve got the picture or rather the sound that I heard inside my head when it was j us! an idea.”
Owen admits that Warner Brothers had a slight edge in negotiations due to friendships he had cultivated at the Southern California base. “But we were approached by everybody, and we considered each proposal.” Owen goes on to explain that although A+M and Columbia were more than a little interested in the 18-year-old Minnesota virtuoso. Warner Brothers showed the most positive interest in Prince’s music itself.
"We were wined and dined by alot of companies. but when everybody else was talking gifts and bonuses, the people at Warner Brothers were actually listening to the demo.”
Owen also recalls an incident in the negotiations during which the duo demanded the unprecedented latitude that the final agreement out lined. “Naturally, their first reaction was ·sure, doesn’t everybody nowadays want to have complete control ’?”
After a visit to a studio where Prince displayed his creative expertise first hand, Warner Brothers was convinced. Complete control could be granted on the debut disc. A three-year, three-album contract was signed.
Owen says, “I made a point of not hastling Prince while he was working at the Record Plant. They’d go in at 7: 00 P.M. and usually end up staying until sunrise. He kept the pace, five, sometimes six days a week for five months . Periodically he’d give me a tape so I could keep abreast of his progress. but other wise he handled it himself.”
Currently, Prince is back in the Twin Cities. working on soundproofing his basement so the neighbors aren’t bothered as he jams the night through. He’s not star-struck over the recent airplay he’s been getting all over the country, but confesses that hearing one’s own tunes on the radio is altogether another kind of adventure .
”I was driving down the street in my Datsun the first time I heard it ,” he says. “It wasn’t that I couldn’t believe it, it’s simp ly that my heart dropped to my knees.”
He’s also enthusiastic about taking his show on the road. That is. as soon as he assembles it. “Andre is a music ian friend of mine from the days of Shampayne. He’s the only definite member of my touring group so far. Andre is alot like me; he eats. and sleeps his music and that’s the only kind of people I want with me on that stage. I’m planning to add 6 or 7 people, a couple of keyboardists. a rhythm player and a percussionist. I’m looking for a big stage sound so I’d like to find people who can sing, too. During the performances I guess I’ll play guitar because that will allow me to move. It would be great if I could strap a piano around me too.”