Apparently, nobody saw Prince’s guitar come down when he threw it up in the air at the end of the performance. (If you’re among the few who haven’t seen it, treat yourself by clicking above.)
That performance is SO. FUCKING. GOOD. Gives me chills every time I see it. Anyone who has not seen it - even if you are not a Prince or George Harrison fan - should watch it immediately.
Seconded. Prince’s performance that night is legendary. Youtube will keep it alive for a long while to come.
It’s made all the better on video, where you can see Dhani Harrison’s face while playing rhythm acoustic behind Prince – George’s son was in ecstacy that night.
Harrison and Tom Petty both looked like they couldn’t believe what was happening especially after Prince didn’t really have a chance to practice the solo with the group before they went on stage.
The story I heard (but I’m having a hard time finding) is that Prince was pissed that somebody stole his solo(s) during practice so he just left. Petty called him up and tried to get him to come back in to practice the solo and promised dude wouldn’t steal it again. Prince just told him to give the first solo to the other guy and just make sure he stays away from the final solo. Then he hung up the phone and no one spoke to him again before they showed up on stage and Prince did that. To me the looks on everyone’s faces are mixture of shock and amazement. I truly don’t think they saw that coming.
Add that back story to the performance and top it off with a disappearing guitar that somehow wound up with Oprah and is now enshrined in some museum…there are no words…
Here’s an account of that exact rehearsal and the follow-up on stage the evening of the 2004 inductions. Going by this version of the story, Prince did stay around and complete that first rehearsal when Jeff Lynne’s touring guitarist Marc Mann played his solos.
Later on during the night of the ceremony, as related by Joel Gallen (producer and director of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame ceremony):
(I added two paragraph breaks … it looked messy in the ‘Reply to Thread’ window.)
Marc Mann had played those parts of “While My Guitar” – and dozens of other Harrison compositions – during 2002’s Concert for George alongside Lynne and Petty.
I wasn’t in the room … but I’d like to think it was more a case of miscommunication than it was of Mann aiming to show up Prince.
Further speculation from me: from Prince’s point of view, he was stepping into that first rehearsal with a bunch of guys who were in The Traveling Wilburys’ orbit. Though the producer Joel Gallen had specifically asked Prince to play the solos – and though Olivia Harrison told Tom Petty that Prince was coming on board for the solos – Petty & Lynne’s musicians may have simply fallen into old habits during a loose early rehearsal. Prince might have been privately miffed that Mann kept taking the solos … but he might have felt like an outsider and thus might not have wanted to come in and dictate to the other guys.
Later on, it was Joel Gallen who got things sorted out with Prince, as opposed to Petty or Lynne. Though Petty’s drummer Steve Ferrone did help break the ice with Prince the night of the ceremony (see my link a few posts up).
EDIT:
BeagleJesus, I think you will enjoy this read as well. I like the idea that Dhani Harrison (and not the rest of the band) might have been tipped off at what Prince was getting ready to do.
I’ve always thought this video should serve as a lesson for guitarists on how to look cool while playing a solo, with Prince as the gold standard and Marc Mann as the cautionary tale.
