Name game?

Name game? Will he? Won't he? Is he, isn't he? And just what is his name? Who is Victor supposed to be? Is Prince to leave us in a blaze of glory? Is Prince about to leave us at all? His recent appearance at Flanders Expo in Ghent was a curious affair. For one thing, he was coming without a record to promote. He did the same thing with the “Nude” tour to disastrous results. This time, he sold out months in advance virtually by word of mouth. And then there is this business of his retirement. As everyone has been carefully informed, Prince is a workaholic. He has apparently laid down enough tracks to keep his record company Warner going for many years. So he is simply going to dip into the kitty from now on, and concentrate on film production. This sounds suspiciously like some sort of cat-and-mouse power struggle between himself and Warner. But it is forgetting that there is a third, much more whimsical and powerful party in the discussion: the record-buying audience. Whether the punter will be willing to pay cash for re-heated funk from Prince's deep-freeze will depend on the material. At Ghent, Prince and the New Power Generation were in top form. This was one of the last gigs of the tour which has proved to be a steamer everywhere it struck camp. When the black-clad singer swung over the audience's head from the middle of the hall to the stage, we knew it was showtime for real. When the singer stripped to reveal herself as Prince's dancing partner for the night, the crowd went berserk. Prince, meanwhile, ambled onstage singing “My Name is Prince” (thanks for the tip). Yep, Prince was as hyper as ever: running around the stage, performing splits and pirouettes on the piano, acting coy to get more response from the crowd and generally proving that when it comes to sheer showmanship, Messrs. Kravitz, Trent d'Arby and Jackson have a long way to go. This was billed as the “Act II” tour, and picked up pretty much where the previous tour left off (including the widespread use of the “sex symbol” logo, down to outrageously expensive pin's). The set was hit-heavy: “Kiss,” “Sign O' the Times,” “Raspberry Beret,” “Let's Go Crazy,” “1999” and an impossibly long “Purple Rain” which, yet again, proved to be an absolute show-stopper. There were also many odds and ends on which Prince and the band simply jammed. The encore was an example. It was during this part of the show (played with all the house lights blazing) that Prince announced off-hand that his name was now Victor. Um, OK. If you insist. But is this a joke or part of his chess match with Warner? Wait and see. A long overdue compilation of Prince's material will be released on September 10. After his Ghent concert, Prince and band turned up at the Mirano Continental in Brussels for an after-show jam which caused traffic snarls on the Chaussée de Louvain. Roughly 1,000 people packed into the hall, with more outside. “Madness” is how club manager Jean-Pierre Mels described the evening. Michael Leahy