The Problem:
In the year following the death of musical icon Prince, all talk was on what (if anything) was in his mythical vault and how the estate would handle its release. I saw a problem of a similar size that was staring at them in plain sight.
My Pitch:
As an exercise to channel my knowledge of Prince I decided to evaluate and propose a solution on how to introduce non-fans to the enormous amount of material he had quietly released on minor labels between 1995 and 2016.
The Result?
An overview of how the situation occurred: his fervent pursuit of full ownership of his music, his legal stouch with Warner Bros; and the resulting tsunami of material he unleashed with the “shackles” of a label removed … and a proposal on how to curate this enormous output realistically – including playlists!
**Since this article, Prince’s estate and Sony music have released the majority of the albums from this period digitally, with a mega-sampler entitled Anthology. I’ve decided that a follow-up article in response to this strategy will be forthcoming.
