Prince - Nothing But A Prince Of Thieves

Have you ever gone to a gig and thought you’ve just wasted what could have been potentially the two most important hours of your life? Two hours where you could have met the woman of your dreams. Where you could have found the cure for cancer. Where you could have, well, done anything but gone to see Prince play one of the most over rated shows of the century.

Within ten minutes of Prince’s show at the O2 Arena I was slumped in my seat wishing that I’d actually gone to the Millennium Dome to visit one of the attractions it was originally built for back in 2000.

A quick run down of the show (from my standpoint don’t forget) goes a little bit like this.

We wait. We see no support act. Prince arrives (punctually) at 8.45pm. There’s smoke, there’s 6ft women (not a wise decision when you’re barely scrapping 4ft in heels) and there’s big brass instruments. Then there’s Prince. For what the purple man lacks in height he makes up with an EGO which is ENORMOUS.

In fact, it blights the whole of the performance. From when a spotlight is ‘accidentally’ shone on him, prompting Prince to order the light man to “Turn that spot of brother” to when he plays the most over exaggerated medley of Piano songs you’ve ever seen.

My reaction. To leave pre-encore. Prince might warm the hearts of the rest of the audience tonight, but to the impartial viewer, it’s extremely difficult to see why he’s sold out 21 nights at this venue. Now...where's the science zone?