A sign of the times: Prince and the Croke Park gigs that never were

He may have played many Irish shows during his career, but it’s the show that never was that produced some of the best Prince stories of all.

This was the mooted show at Dublin’s Croke Park in June 2008, a date scheduled as part of Prince’s Greatest Hits For the Last Time tour.

But with more than 55,000 tickets sold and with less than a week to go before the gates opened, the show was abruptly cancelled “due to reasons beyond the control of Prince and (promoters) MCD Productions”.

The late cancellation produced an avalanche of speculation about the reasons behind the story. The bottom line, though, was there was not going to be a Prince housequake in Ireland that summer.

That wasn’t the end of the matter by any means. The promoters were out of pocket so Prince’s next Irish date was in Dublin’s High Court when MCD took legal action in 2009 to recover total losses of over $1.66 million.

Fascinating details

The case revealed some fascinating details. For instance, we learned that Prince’s fee for the Dublin show was $3 million, and the promoters had paid half of that upfront as a deposit.

While Prince himself did not appear before Justice Peter Kelly, the case produced some colourful anecdotes and insights about the singer, including one from Keith Sarkisian, an agent who acted for Prince.

When told by Sarkisian of MCD boss Denis Desmond’s worries about whether the artist’s Croke Park show would proceed, Prince told Sarkisian to “tell that cat to chill”.

Sarkisian also told the judge that “Prince was not very good at deadlines” and conversations with him were usually about things such as “world issues, politics or religion – not guarantees or monies”.

After a day spent listening to this evidence, Justice Kelly remarked he got the impression that Prince was a “very erratic individual”.

‘On a whim’

Interestingly, no reason for the cancellation was ever furnished by any of the parties in court. At one stage, Desmond told the court that it seem to have been done “on a whim”.

An out-of-court settlement was agreed between the parties in February 2010 and Desmond told reporters afterwards that “the cat has chilled”.

But the cat may have chilled too soon because Prince reneged on the terms of the deal. Everyone was back in court again the following month, when a €2.2 million judgment was entered against the pop star.

And the story didn’t end there. Prince continued to prove reluctant to pay up. MCD then took out a European Enforcement Order and began legal proceedings in the Los Angeles Superior Court in 2011 to get the singer to comply with the terms of the judgment.

In May 2011, Prince finally settled the bill. A few weeks later, he played what would be his final Irish show, at Dublin’s Malahide Castle, a concert promoted by John Reynolds and POD Concerts.