Customer Reviews

Possessed: The Rise and Fall of Prince

5 star:		(15)
4 star:		(10)
3 star:		(6)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(5)

 

 

If you're a devoted, got-everything, member-of-npg-online Prince fanatic, skip this book. It paints Prince as a fallible human being, and you don't want to hear that.

For the rest of us (I'm a fairly big Prince fan), this is an enlightening look at Prince's career through 2002. I didn't find the reporting to be tabloidesque - both Alex and the people interviewed (including such vital players in the Prince saga as Alan Leeds and Dr Fink) paint Prince as a fascinating and incredible human being, both with strengths (mostly musical and visionary) and weaknesses (mainly in business and interpersonal relationships, as well as the "always taking credit but never taking blame" facet that is common to many people in his position). None of what I read contradicts what I knew about the man, and reading the book threw him into sharper focus. I don't entirely agree with Alex's reviews of particular Prince albums or songs, but his insights prove very engaging reading to any Prince fan, and I think the overall picture he paints is fascinating.

I do think there's a major flaw in the book, and that's its division into two halves: Rise and Fall. Alex's basic premise is that Prince was on an upward climb until around 1988 (around the time Black Album was due to be released) and been falling ever since. Due to this, everything that's happened in Prince's career is seen as confirming this theory. So "Controversy" (which was more or less a sidestep) is treated as an artistic consolidation, "Diamonds and Pearls" as a commercial sellout (which it may have been, but it still returned him to the public eye), and "The Gold Experience" as a commercial flop (while it didn't sell too well, it was a critical success). This coloring of the facts doesn't really detract from the book as a whole, but it does make Prince's career look more like a mountain (up then down) rather than the peak-and-valley rollercoaster ride it has actually been.

I don't think this flaw should detract any less-than-fanatical Prince fan from reading and enjoying this book. Lots of interesting information, and almost none of it of the "juicy" nature - most having to do with unrelease tracks, abandoned projects, and so forth. Pick it up if this sounds intriguing.

This book hits things right on the nail. From someone who has personally been around the Prince Camp (1994-2001) as a fan and supporter with the hope that Prince would pull out of his self destructive pattern, this is the book to get. The only downside of this writing is that everything couldn't get covered. There was much more hell than this book has reported. Nothing mentions the relationship between Prince and Sheena Easton. None of you know about the many winter jams Prince invited us to that were held at Paisley that found fans waiting for 2+ hours outside in below zero weather. He could have let people inside to get warm until the show started, most of the time it was only 50 to 60 people and we were all regulars, they knew us. People don't know how Revlon offered Prince a deal to promote a perfume around "The Most Beautiful Girl in the World" and he turned it down feeling he could do better with his own brand which was "Get Wild" that ultimately bombed. The treatment of his staff and fans is stuff of legend. We all put him where his is but I challenge any of you who are not of female gender to get close enough to him to say `hello'. He will not acknowledge your jester, kindness is not in him. "What's with the Ocean" is his term for any hiss he may hear in a recording session, believe me engineers caught hell. I'm saying all this not to put Prince down but to confirm this book as being a truthful depiction of the life and times of this music legend. I for one am not getting paid a cent but it's great to finally see someone tell it like it really happened. Too many times we want to make people into what we want them to be and refuse to acknowledge the truth. Stars build fancy propaganda around themselves that's totally false. Prince has serious problems emotionally even though he is a wonderful artist. And anyone who has been around him to witness his actions first hand has a truly amazing story to tell you, I personally could go on and on. It's really scary the kind of people we choose to look up to and follow. This book is a must have for anyone wanting to know the truth of how things started and got to the point they are today in Prince's life. Get this book....

A warning to Prince die-hards: this is not a flattering portrayal of him whatsoever. We all knew he was a mercurial control freak, and that he was essentially a one-man band, but I had no idea to what lengths he would go to alienate people. I also never realized that he had a tendency to not credit others with writing (wait 'till you read about "Kiss").

For me, I bought the book because I wanted the answer to a burning question: why did the Revolution break up? Let's face it, that was his most interesting period, his best band (if not chops-wise, certainly taste-wise) and the departure of Wendy & Lisa seemed to end an era. You'll get the answer here, and it's pretty disturbing. Only one Revolution member parted with Prince on amicable terms--drummer Bobby Z.--and that was when Prince fired him to replace him with Sheila E.

As I've found with most idols, when you look behind the talent, at the person, you most often will be disappointed. As a person, Prince is disappointing. Still, his music endures and there's plenty of fascinating stories here about the creation of his classic albums and singles, not to mention his endless side projects, both good (The Family) and bad (Carmen Electra, Vanity 6, etc.).

The irony of this book is that it ends on a sour note; it was published before his big comeback this year, and as I'm reading it the Rolling Stone arrived yesterday... with Prince on the cover.

It should be retitled The Rise, The Fall, the Return.

A must-read if you're a Prince fan. You'll also find out some amazingly interesting stuff about The Time, the whole Purple Rain phenomena, the diastrous Under the Cherry Moon, and just about everything else--including his self-immolating war with Warner Bros., who actually come out here looking pretty sympathetic.

I could not put it down.

Some Prince fans have greeted this book with howls of injured outrage, but they may not have read Oedipus Rex or Hamlet. The author has. He knows Oedipus is a powerful, important king with a fatal blind-spot, a world-shaker whose pride, wrath, and failure-to-listen lead to his fall. He knows Hamlet is a brilliant, philosophical young prince who is also a manic-obsessive, tormented by indecision, tortured by his ingrown intellect as much as by circumstance, by his ego as much as by his enemies. Thus Hahn is able to discern and reveal the universal patterns in the story of Prince.

Prince zealots retort that their idol is alive and well, thank you, producing music and retaining a loyal fan base. But at his peak Prince combined the vast fame of a chart-busting pop mega-star with the critical esteem of a Miles Davis, while today, though his work continues, he is known to the general public mainly as a footnote, a man who became an unpronounceable symbol, a house-hold name who faded from view. What happened, and why? This book tells the story.

Neither sensational nor humdrum, the book relies on the method of a sound investigation: patient, probing, persistent. It will appeal to a wide range of readers, from those alert to pop culture to those attuned to the universal relevance of a rise-and-fall trajectory, whether tragic or ambiguous, aware that the best and brightest of us carry in ourselves the seeds of a potential undoing. This is what gives Hahn's important book its larger resonance.

I loved this book. I have been an avid (artist formally known as) Prince fan for years, and I found this the best book on him to date. I got so much insight into Prince's life, music, and psyche! It is well written and riveting. Its clear that it was very well researched; I feel even with everything I already knew about Prince that I was learning new information. Excellent read!

At first I was excited to read about Prince. I just love reading biographies. Though I was never a Prince fan, I always thought he was an talented individual and interesting personality. So I thought I would gain insight into this intriguing person. All I got from this biography were typo's, wrong dates, contradictions and an obvious dislike by the author for his subject. Thoroughout the entire book I kept wondering about the author "what's wrong with this guy?" Either he has a beef with Prince or someone he knows does. I gleaned a few tidbits about Prince's past, but nothing worth the price of that book. The author is giving everyone credit for Prince's success except for the artist himself. For instance he attempts to credit Alan Leeds, Prince's road manager with turning Prince on to Jazz. I ask the question: How could Leeds have introduced Prince to Jazz, when in a previous chapter he stated that Prince's very own father was a known, working Jazz musician on the Minneapolis scene and his own mother was the Jazz singer in his father's band??? Another example, making constant and totally wrong comparisons to Prince with Michael Jackson who only have in common their ethnicity. The picture he paints of the subject is an awful one. It became so irritating that I had to stop reading it and throw it in the trash. Honestly. I'm looking for another Prince Bio. Hopefully a more honest and interesting one. If you are a Prince fan don't even think about buying this one. I am sure it will only infuriate you.

The epitomy of the classic "rock star", Prince has seemingly taken an inspired career and turned it into a sort of ironic mystery...author Alex Hahn presents this theory using an amazing access to personal subjects and un-released music to destroy the mystique and bring Prince into the general public's eye for all to scrutinize. What we find is a sort of mini-demagogue who remains brilliant musically, but suffers from many years of petulant behavior to systematically reduce his faithful following and, unfortunately, become nothing more than a cult figure.

Back in 1985, however, the thought of Prince being anything but a major musical influence and icon would be inconceivable...this was following the final push to superstardom that "Purple Rain", the record and movie, provided and the country/music industry was agog at what the next Prince project might be. Of course, the underwhelming and self-aggrandizing "Around the World in a Day" was the next release and this started the downward spiral that continues to this day. Author Hahn attempts to analyze this with "Possessed" and he brings it off with an amazing balance...remaining true to his literary responsibilites, he paints a realistic and forthcoming picture of the tortured musician. At once brilliant in the conceiving and performing of cutting edge music while at the same time displaying a curious bewilderment at the ever changing face of popular music, Prince remains the mystery that he so fervently relishes and in the process has virtually destroyed any fan base that could resurrect his career.

A stunningly comprehensive biography, Hahn shows the entire Prince career from his childhood up to and including the 2001 release of "The Rainbow Children". Riding the emotional and psychological roller-coaster that was Prince, we see the meteoric rise and subsequent demise of this influential artist and also the human waste he laid as a side product...his (Prince's) treatment of "friends and associates" is disturbing and speakes to (in my opinion) a lingering psychosis. Conversely, Hahn, again using amazing access to unreleased recorded material, shows Prince to be prolific and brilliant in his conception of and performance of many major turns in his musicianship. Indeed, the few unreleased tracks that I have personally heard would make for a great album and it's hard to conceive that this level of great music is still "in the vault".

Hahn covers all the important episodes in this star-crossed career...even sharing some new information that former "hard-core" fans never knew...the homosexual relationship of Wendy Melvoin and Lisa Coleman was new to me and I was a fan at the inception of the "Revolution"...the interaction of fellow musicians and subsequent denial of artistic credit (i.e. Rosie Gaines and Melvoin) is part of this afore mentioned disturbing psychotic behavior and was also a surprise to me. What astounded me the most, however, was the continued denial on the part of Prince towards the burgeoning rate of change in the popular music world and his denail of this fact. He continued to think that he was one record away from the "Purple Rain" type of mega-stardom and Hahn presents this part of the story in sober terms...I certainly felt the frustration that most fans assuredly went through and this feeling is the most prevelant throughout this work. Time and again, a new idea or initiative was started by Prince, only to be reduced or disintegrated by the ever-present "haughtiness" that only served to limit his career growth and is something that he continues to pay for in his musical standing today.

Hahn does serve the music fan well, however, with his many reviews of some of Prince's classic music...he raves about "Controversy", "1999", "Sign O the Times" and, of course "Purple Rain". Some of the later works ("Graffiti Bridge", "Lovesexy" and "Emancipation") that I thought were pure genius were sort of described as episodic and partly rationalized into the spiraling downward turn in Prince's career and music...unfairly, I felt, but an opinion that I respected given the depth of Hahn's research. Closing out the book is an impressive discography of all Prince's works and his part assisitance in others (Bangles, Stevie Nicks, Sheena Easton...etc).

Whether you love him or hate him...or even if you're just a popular music fan in general, you'd do well to read about the rise and fall of Prince in this book. A more interesting story you won't find (yes even given the latest Michael Jackson fiascos) and a story that has you at once criticising and conversely hoping for a more fortunate outcome, Alex Hahn is to be commended for a comprehensive, scholarly and entertaining look at one of Rock's remianing mysteries. I recommend this book very highly.

As another reviewer wrote, if you don't want to see anything negative written about Prince, don't read this book. But again, if you don't pick up and read this well researched and written work, you will truly deprive yourself and miss out on something great. Furthermore, if you really love Prince, you will accept his rough behind the scenes side as well as his stage image. Sure, we want to see our idols as flawless, but realistically, that is not the case. The book takes you on a fantastic journey of highs and lows throughout the artist's personal and business relationships, financial hardships, and his creative triumphs and failures.

There were times during my reading of the book that I actually despised him for his treatment of others, especially those who really cared about and stood by him, but then again, that's his personality, and who am I or anyone else to judge? The scary thing is, I see a lot of myself in him, not musically, but personality wise. I really felt bad after reading about how he lost his child. In fact, that was the most heartbreaking part of the book to me. After finishing the book, I watched "Purple Rain" again for the umpteenth time , and it is strange how my perspective of the film was altered by the bio.

Some of the content will be shocking and downwright offensive, and upon completion of the book, you will either love Prince or hate him. Either way, the fact remains that Prince, no matter what his faults or weaknesses are, is one of the best artistic geniuses of our time and has left a permanent footprint on pop culture. Even his worst detractors give him credit for his abilities. Frankly, I couldn't imagine what life would be like without his music. I now have a newfound respect for Prince, in the sense that he is as human as the rest of us. Get this!

As a hardcore Prince fanatic I was ready to see a halfbaked hatchet job with this book (as other titles have been), but it is EXCELLENT. It is thorough, fact driven, and a pageturner, and NOT a National Enquirer bull**** gossip book. Just for the secrets alone (the mysterious 'Alfred' from Corrine Baconskin for example) it is riviting, but it shows as fact what I have always thought about Prince - that he actually is a true musical prodigy/genius/artist, and with that comes what afflicts most true artists, a self-destructive streak that is evident in the passion they show in their work. It will be a joy to go back and relisten to my library of his cds now that I know the stories behind the songs. From Walt Whitman to Kurt Cobain, true artists often succumb to their artistic muses, and when they cannot mask tribulations with substance abuse (Prince is notoriously anti-drug&anti-drink) they conflict with those around them, which leads to a 'downfall'. Having recently purchased the 'Live at Alladin' DVD, I think it is far too early to put him as 'down and out' however, and I can't wait for the big 'Comeback'.... Alex Hahn has done a masterful job here!!

Not a great biography. The whole book front to back reads like negative propaganda. I've been a HUGE Prince fan for years, and without a doubt he has many flaws, but this book attacks every decision he's ever made. Prince can do no right by the author (whom I might add was at one point involved with suing Prince).

Haan only points out how Prince fails and comes up short, and when Prince does make a good move Haan immediately says how he could have done better. The book is titled "Fall or Prince" when just 18 months after it's publication Prince launched his "Musicology" Tour and became the Top selling performer in the world for 2004, that sure doesn't sound like a guy on a downward spiral to me.

This book verges on slander