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Prince to release next album via Mirror

By | Published on Wednesday 30 June 2010

Prince will once again release his new album in the UK via a newspaper giveaway. As you may remember, back in 2007 the purple one broke with convention and gave away his then brand new long player ‘Planet Earth’ via the Mail On Sunday. It was a controversial arrangement at the time, because while newspapers had been giving away cover-mount CDs for years, and artist-specific CDs for a while too, it was the first time a new album had been distributed this way.

Three years on, with other artists having followed Prince’s lead in the interim, it is unlikely his decision to release new record ’20Ten’ via the Daily Mirror, and its Scottish sister title the Daily Record, will ruffle so many feathers.

The Mirror say they will distribute 2.5 million copies of ’20Ten’ on 10 Jul, which will involve the tabloid increasing its circulation that day considerably – the combined Mirror and Daily Record circulation is normally closer to 1.6 million. Presumably the newspaper publisher believes the giveaway will seriously boost interest in its two titles that day.

It’s not known what fee Prince will receive from the Mirror deal. The Mail On Sunday were reported to have paid up to half a million to secure the rights to ‘Planet Earth’, and that would be in addition to the 7p MCPS royalty that is paid on every single cover-mount CD.

It’s unlikely the Mirror could afford anything like that figure – they have just laid off 200 editorial staff across their various national titles – but this time Prince will release his new album via similar media deals across Europe, so he was possibly less demanding fee wise in the UK.

In Belgium the album will be released via the Het Nieuwblad newspaper, in France by the Courrier International magazine, and in Germany via that country’s edition of Rolling Stone. It is thought in the US the album will get a more traditional release via a distribution deal with Warner.



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