5. Michael Jackson Thought Prince Was a “Meanie”
Prince had not gotten over the grudge during the negotiations about a duet on Bad. He showed up at Michael Jackson’s home one day in an overcoat, with a white box labeled “Camille” – Prince’s nickname for MJ. Its contents terrified the Single Gloved One. According to Quincy Jones: “The box had all kinds of stuff—some cuff links with Tootsie Rolls on them. Michael was scared to death—he thought there was some voodoo in there. I wanted to take it, because I knew Michael was gonna throw it away“. As time went by, Michael Jackson came to see his feud with Prince as a one-sided beef that he simply could not understand or explain. As he told an interviewer: “I have proven myself since I was real little. It’s not fair. He feels like I’m his opponent…I hope he changes because boy, he’s gonna get hurt.
He’s the type that might commit suicide or something…I don’t like to be compared to Prince.” MJ went on to describe Prince as “one of the rudest people I have ever met,” and that he had been “mean and nasty to my family“. By the twenty-first century, things had thawed a bit, but Prince had not forgotten the feud. In 2006, Black Eyed Peas leader will.i.am invited MJ to a Prince performance in Las Vegas. When Prince discovered that MJ was there, he walked out into the audience, and began to play bass in his face. As Rolling Stone editor Steve Knopper put it, it was “like aggressive bass slap“. Later, an outraged MJ asked Will, “Will, why do you think Prince was playing bass in my face?” He went on: “Prince has always been a meanie. He’s just a big meanie. He’s always been not nice to me“.
