The Earth Tour - Prince 2007

2007

Concert tour

One of the most exciting showmen on the planet.

This was an entire Prince ‘tour’ performed at a single venue, the newly opened The O2 Arena in Greenwich, London. The O2 was officially opened on 24 June 2007, its promoters AEG were looking for a big name international act to launch the new venue.

Prince delivered the announcement at a press conference held at The Hospital Club in London’s Covent Garden, on 8 May 2007 confirming what was high risk to any artist’s reputation to commit to filling the same 23,000 capacity venue 21 dates in a row. That evening he staged an invitation only evening performance at Koko in Campden.

Bucking expectations, all 21 shows sold out, amounting to 351,500 tickets priced at a modest £31.21, although stage-side tables could be reserved for £250 per head. Not requiring road crews to transport the set around multiple venues The Earth Tour was hugely profitable. It allowed Prince to set the ticket price low to combat the ticket selling websites – “the Masters of tickets” – which he blamed for inflating cost to concert going in recent years. The first show of Prince’s residency was played on 1 August 2007.

21 Nights in London

Officially titled The Earth Tour after Planet Earth the album which was handed free to every attendee on entry to the shows, the event was billed as 21 Nights In London and performed in the round on a Prince Prince Love Symbol symbol-shaped stage. It was the very stage Prince played his halftime show at the Miami Dolphin Stadium for the Super Bowl XLI in Miami earlier that year on 4 February. The logistical problem of access to the stage was solved by seating Prince in a tall wheeled stage travel case complete with chair, the same method employed for his previous Musicology Tour in 2004. His entry and exit onstage was via a hydraulic trapdoor at the apex of the symbol. The band was positioned in a recess within the O portion of the symbol, which allowed Prince to walk around and offer unobstructed views to all sides of the arena wherever he was on stage. The Earth Tour was essentially a revue show adopting the format of the residency shows he played at Las Vegas in a purpose-built venue Club 3121 but staged on a grander scale. Prince intended to play all his hits and more, and with fans anticipated to attend multiple shows, the band rehearsed over 200 songs so that set lists could vary considerably.

The band remained unchanged from Vegas, save for the addition of Marva King in the lineup as backing vocalist. Twinz appear again as dancers, gliding round the stage on roller shoes, that is until one fell from the stage during the performance. The London arrangement came out of promoters seeking a big name artist to inaugurate The O2 Arena as the city’s new music venue, and Prince having tested the concept with success during his high profile residency in Las Vegas. Each night following the main event in the arena, an aftershow or party was staged at the 2,350 capacity adjoining nightclub IndigO2, specially renamed 3121 for the duration. Tickets for the aftershows were priced at £25, although there was no guarantee Prince would perform.

Prince’s Yamaha Motif 8 keyboard was located in the swirl in the symbol’s left arm, ready for the ‘sampler’ set. Because Prince had accrued so many hits throughout his 40-year career, teasing audiences with snippets of much loved tracks became highly popular and was often performed during the main show. At other times, Prince would return to the stage after the, usually 130-minute, performance finished to surprise the audience and play the sampler with the house lights up. This resulted in audiences hanging on long after each show in case Prince put an impromptu return to the stage. The Earth Tour saw a rotation of support acts on select nights: Mya, Mutya and Common, as well as surprise guest appearances from Will.i.am (2 September) and Elton John (13 September).

Nineteen shows into the run, Prince and Twinz played an impromptu performance of Chelsea Rodgers right on the catwalk at London Fashion Week on 19 September to support model Chelsea Rodgers during the Matthew Williamson collection presentation in a tent in Eton Square. With the final night of The Earth Tour, 21 September 2007, in addition to receiving the CD the audience were each handed purple a glow stick. Prince appeared onstage for his final encore with 21 painted in red on the back of his jacket, the crowd waved the stick during Purple Rain. A photo book documenting the London residency was published in 2008, titled 21 Nights and included recordings captured from two the IndigO2 aftershows issued as a companion CD Indigo Nights.

Prince’s two month residency cemented The O2 its reputation as one of the premier live music venues in the world. No other performer has since matched a consecutive twenty-one night stint at this large venue. In commemoration of this historic run of shows, on 21 September 2021 The O2 Arena unveiled a gold Prince Love Symbol shaped artwork commissioned to mark the fourteenth anniversary of Prince’s final performance of his 21 date run at the venue. It is placed at the backstage entrance of the arena so that other performers see it. Artists who play 21 nights at the venue will be entered into the ’21 Club’ in honour of Prince. A duplicate of this artwork is on display at Paisley Park Studios.