Prince is one of the most iconic and talented figures in music known for his music and his unique sense of style, but lives a very private life. So, it is a bit shocking that some of his personal items are up for auction and it is not your typical run of the mill personal items neither.
Some these very rare items are being auctioned off courtesy of courtesy of his first wife Mayte Garcia, former manager Owen Husney and collaborator/guitarist Dez Dickinson.
The catalog includes a rare cassette tape recorded in the mid 1970s, loaded with early Prince material including three unreleased songs and earlier versions of eventual releases like an acoustic version of “So Blue,” “Gotta Broken Heart Again” (which later appeared on his 1980Dirty Mindalbum) and a “virtually unrecognizable version” of “Sometimes It Snows in April” (which eventually landed on the 1986ParadeLP). The minimum bid for the tape is $20,000.
“Prince originally gave me the cassette in late 1978 because he wanted me to listen to a record he had recorded on side A (a female-fronted funk band whose name I don’t remember now),” Dickerson explains . “Sometime during the next year or so, I used the A side to record some scratch bass and guitar parts for songs I was going to be recording for a rock/power pop demo I was doing, recording over the original content (you can still hear a snippet of the funk record at the end of the side). On side B, Prince had his work versions of 6 songs, which I left intact for, at that time, unknown reasons (obviously, we now know it preserved a piece of musical history).”
The “Purple Rain” legend personal belongings come with a very heavy price just to place a bid on these exclusive items.
Prince’s engagement ring has a minimum bid of $100,000, a five-piece set of wedding china touting his famous “Love Symbol” design starts at $5,000, and the 1959 Gibson L-Series used to compose early demo tracks is up for $60,000. A closet full of Prince’s previously worn stage attire including his velvet sequined jacket, elaborate red tunic and gold mesh outfit is also up for auction.
