Prince's Purple iPod Package Is Selling..........A Little

Prince's $2100 Opus One purple iPod and book collection has sold about 1/3rd of the 950 over the weekend. I guess that's OK, considering the price, but it's not like there was a run on these things.

But according to the British company that's actually doing the sales and marketing, Kraken Opus, they couldn't be happier.

I’m ecstatic about that,” founder and CEO Karl Fowler said. “Without being overly confident or too arrogant about it, we always knew that we would get to a sellout position within a few months.” To sell at this rate, however, was unexpected, he said.

It's pretty audacious to price any musical item at such a high price during these economic times, but the Purple One seems to be oblivious to the market at the moment. Even though it's obviously the brainchild of Fowler, all this paints Prince in a pretty bad light. Instead of being a brilliant example of Music 3.0 marketing like Trent Reznor, Josh Freese or Radiohead, it just feels like someone so full of himself that he feels that everything he puts out is worth the extra cost.

I'm sure Prince and Fowler will sell these packages out, but he sure isn't helping Prince endear himself to his fan base with this one.

Prince's $2100 Tour Book And iPod

After the news that the Grateful Dead is making a tour book available from blurb.com and even picking up the custom cover charge for their fans for a limited time, we find that the kind-hearted Prince will make available his "21 Nights Opus Package for a mere $2100."

The tour book is leather bound in a velvet case and the 280 pages are made of 200gsm silk engraved with metallic gold. The box set also contains a custom purple iPod loaded with 40 minutes of "exclusive" footage along with a live soundtrack from Indigo Nights and preloaded with a variety of Prince songs. Only 950 will be available.

If $2100 is not rich enough for you, you can also participate in a private auction for Number One in the series, which comes with a special alligator binding and an iPod encrusted with 5 "rare purple diamonds" and 21 "round brilliant cut diamonds."

Sounds opulent and ostentatious, but that's just me. I actually have no objections to these kinds of offerings aimed at superfans, as long as the rest of your fans are also taken care of, which I'm not so sure Prince did in this case.

I'm sure Prince will sell this package out in no time and good for him, but it just feels a bit smarmy as compared to similar offerings from Trent Reznor and Josh Freese. It seems that some artists are all about their fans while others are all about themselves.