He was such a great musician. 🙁

Did you include A Love Bizarre with Sheila E? I can't find it anywhere.
He's uncredited on it but he sings the entire song with her.
It was a Top 15 hit in the US and a Top 5 hit in Germany.

Hi worldcitizen! It's not included, which is an error from us!

Whitney and MJ also debuted in Prince's era and were much more successful than him commercially.

And you say it was easy to sell albums in the 90s? It was very hard, few females got multiple 10 million albums in the US, Celine got two. You don't need to discredit her.

Prince released 33 albums, but Celine outsold him by over 60 million. You just can't deny she was more successful than him. 60 million is a lot!!!

Commercially, Celine is a step above Prince. He did release albums even if you say he left, which is complete BS. He just didn't sell.

Really MJ??

62 million is a few million?? Don't be so biased.

She destroyed him commercially. It's written in the numbers. Prince could have released 100 albums in the 90s,and he still would have sold less.

This has nothing to do with talent or artistry.

So if I get this right, Purple Rain is about 30 percent of his sales/popularity? That's far more even than I would have thought- he had a very consistent career ala a Bruce Springsteen.

Not really, he only had a decade or so of multi-million selling albums while Springsteen was still having 2-million selling albums 40 years into his career... And yes, Purple Rain was way, WAY bigger than any other Prince album, so I don't think "consistent" is the word you're looking for 😉

the huge amount of albums he released created a sale that masks the disparity of this record. he released practically 1 album a year, which in the 80s/90s, however weak it was, could easily make 1 million.

Overrated? He was the most talented musician to have ever walked this planet. It wasn't even close. There isn't one musician who would ever be crazy enough to go head to head against him. Prince didn't write songs just to be hits. He wrote songs to push the envelope. He wrote songs to get off on mentally. When he needed a hit, he wrote a hit. And if you combine the business side as well then it turns into a complete butt kicking. One of the first artists to use the internet, left a big label to go independent, got control of his publishing, showed other artists how as well, etc, etc, etc, Overrated? Michael Jackson had a team to get him from A to B and then B to C and so on. Prince went from A to Z on his own. In the words of Stevie Wonder, "If Michael Jackson was the King, Prince was the Emperor" And I think Mr. Wonder just might know what he's talking about.

His streaming numbers are... not very good, are they? People say that about Janet but it's actually not that different:

Prince: 134m EAS
Janet: 78m EAS

Prince: 1.15m daily streams
Janet: 0.58m daily streams

So their catalog has a somewhat similar longevity compared to their initial success. For comparison Cyndi Lauper has 1.3m daily streams and Lionel Richie 1.2m.

Prince always had a difficult relationship with the internet. Although he was one of the pioneers of music's distribution through the internet, he became very restricted about his music on free services like YouTube and even in streaming services. While he was alive, he never allowed his music on these services and it's decision certainly affected his impact on gen z. His music only became available on streaming services in 2017, after his death

His music was on Tidal though, and I believe he only removed it from the other platforms in 2015, so it was unavailable for 18 months or so. For comparison, The Beatles' catalog wasn't available on streaming before late 2015.

As for Youtube, I think he removed his videos in 2014? In any case I'm sure all of this didn't help when it comes to exposing his music to young people but I wouldn't say it's the only/main reason for these low streaming numbers.

Tidal is very limited since it don't have a free version. His WB catalog was on streaming services for a few years only and I think it was only on Spotify.

As for YouTube, He never allowed his music/performances on there and I'm sure of It, because I remembered vividly that Web Sheriff always removed any videos that contained his music. He even sued people who uploaded video with his music long before 2014 (2008, I think).

YouTube was the most powerful streaming platform in the 2000s, and I still think it is, to expose anyone to the young people and he wasn't there for more than a decade.

Not saying it's the only reason for the low streaming numbers (and I think his numbers are decent though), but of course it affected.