Jacqui Thompson — former manager and MPG Records executive at Paisley Park — joins Musicians Reveal with Joe Kelley to share rare, behind-the-scenes stories from her time working closely with Prince.

Thompson discusses how she first entered Prince’s world, her role in managing key projects, and what it was like operating inside Paisley Park during one of Prince’s most creative eras. She also reflects on Prince’s independent business mindset, groundbreaking releases like Crystal Ball, and his forward-thinking approach to music distribution.

The conversation includes unforgettable moments — including an impromptu jam session with Prince, Larry Graham, and Stevie Wonder — as well as insight into Prince’s work ethic, innovation, and lasting legacy.

Thompson also shares how Prince’s philosophy continues to influence her work today, from entrepreneurship to the creation of the PRN Alumni foundation supporting music, arts, and community initiatives.

🎙️ A must-listen for Prince fans, musicians, and anyone interested in the inner workings of Paisley Park and independent artistry.

This is 88.5 WVOF in Fairfield, Connecticut.

Joe Kelly here, the upper room on this Monday night as we celebrate the music and life of Prince here.

As we've had many special guests.

And our next guest is one of the most special people who joins our show and has over many, many years.

She had a close relationship with Prince as his former manager and record label head at MPG Records.

She's an entrepreneur, and she's a great friend of our shows.

We welcome, in between traveling around the world, Jackie Thompson.

Hey, Joe.

I'm bigger than what I am, man.

No, no.

I mean, that's so sweet.

You know, I started to think the other day, you know, even before we were putting together this special, like, I was thinking of different guests that had been on our show, and a lot of them have direct connection to you, putting them in contact with us.

So we got to thank you for that.

Yeah, you're welcome.

Of course.

You've always been a great support, and.

And I always loved your show, so.

And I just enjoy them, and you do such a great job, and it's always comprehensive, and so whenever you ask me to be on, I'm.

I'll be on, man.

Yeah, that's cool.

And, you know, you've been on our show several times, and.

And for those that are just tuning in, what was your first introduction into Paisley Park?

And then.

Then I'll follow up on how you got the big role being Prince's manager.

Yeah, I don't know about a big role.

We all played a role and, you know, helping him manage, you know, the.

You know, Paisley and that.

But, yeah, I actually got a call from Mike Scott, princess guitarist, and I've been friends with some of the band members throughout the years, and he said that there was a opening for the 1-800-New- Funk in the merchandise section of what they were doing.

And so I went and started working out there, got the gig, and started working with Maite directly.

She was ahead of it at the time, and just kind of fun little story.

I was in the office one day, and Maite comes in and she says.

She looked, like, just concerned.

Like, you know, I don't know.

They.

Frustrated is the word, I guess.

And I said, might tell you what's wrong.

She says, oh, we can't find a way to get in touch with Sugar Blue.

I said, oh, Sugar Blue, the legendary blues guy?

And she's like, yeah.

She said.

He said.

I was like, wow.

I said, well, I have a number if you want it.

And she looked at me like, I was out of my mind.

And back then you didn't have the, you know, it was a Rolodex, basically on the edge of a little.

It wasn't all digital now, and I know it sounds so long ago and it feels so recent, actually, but so I gave her the number because I used to book, you know, nightclubs and I booked specifically blues club, you know, blues acts, and it was a blues club.

So I had his number because I had just booked him like.

Like in Minneapolis, you know, maybe six months before that, before I started working there.

So anyway, long story short, just kind of grew from there.

I started working.

She came and asked me if I would had her dance company, MPG Dance company for her with her and work with her.

Prince wanted me to do that with her.

And I said yes, absolutely.

So we did that.

And then that was, you know, fairly successful.

We did about three shows.

And then, you know, for whatever reason at that point, I think for hell, she was supposed to do dancing at that point and as a principal and couldn't.

And so we just kind of.

After you got back from the first leg, it didn't go any further.

But it was so amazing that, you know, we sold out the shows and the shows were wonderful and Maite did all the choreography and it was set to Prince's music, and it was just wonderful.

The first night in Detroit was with Stevie Wonder.

And he came and we had some stars coming in Michigan, all of the different stars, and it was just a wonderful evening.

And then I got the opportunity really quickly.

This is such an amazing story.

I'll never forget it.

I think it's one of my favorite nights during the Prince time was we were all at dinner and it was myself, Prince, the PR at the time, it was Larry Graham.

We just.

Larry had just came in to the.

To start to, you know, he was Prince at that point.

And it was Tony Rich.

I don't know if you remember Tony Rich.

Yeah, yeah, he had a couple hits.

Yeah, yeah.

He was a keyboard player and that.

And then there was Kat Dyson, and we were all at the table and we all had dinner and.

And Stevie Wonder came in during that time and the way that the restaurant was situated was.

We were on the restaurant side all blocked off, but there was literally a bar.

Right.

Connected to was.

It was a long bar and at the front of the bar there was a, you know, a band set up.

And so, you know where this is going.

Right, right, right.

So Stevie Wonder leaves and comes back.

He's got his harmonica.

So we all go across can imagine no one knows this is going to go down.

They're in there having a drink and a little speakeasy, right.

Probably going to listen to some cover band or something.

And the COVID band had let us use the equipment and so Prince was on drums, Larry Graham on bass, Cat Dyson on guitar, Tony Rich on keyboards and Stevie Wonder Singh and played harmonica.

Wow.

Yeah.

Never, never recorded, right?

It hasn't, no, it's recorded in my mind.

I mean and the people that, you know price 50 people that were in there, you know, they all dropped their drinks, you know, they couldn't believe it.

And then at the front of the bar was all open, the glass was all open, right?

Yeah, you know, as far as just the class but.

And you could see the band, you know, the whatever house band and you would watch people walking by and then they'd stop and then they're looking like I'm not really seeing what I'm just seeing right now, right.

And they'd like back up and they couldn't believe their eyes.

You know you could see Prince's back, he's like jamming on the drums and they're thinking now they're grooving and everything and then you see people waving.

Come on over, come on over.

They couldn't get into the bar up, you know, but they could see it and it was just so surreal and crazy and those were, those were fun times.

I enjoyed that.

So I got lucky.

So what city was that in again?

I was in Detroit.

Oh, Detroit, okay, that's right on the maite.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

So anyway, that was a fun one.

But anyway it grew from there.

It was successful.

And then he had me go on to his tours and start doing all his merchandise and creating that.

And then you know, I started the next thing you know I'm pretty much managing different aspects of it and creating you know the different marketing for MPG records and.

And then we did, you know, a bunch of records there.

You know we did come to my house with Shaka Khan.

Which he did a one off deal.

Lonzell had done for was Clive Davis.

Right.

So yeah, so we were doing all that and I did a lot of stuff with the Rave album, you know, the epk.

What was called the Secret Gig.

And with the Cathy Dari, I did with Prince, myself and him in the editing bay alone, just me and him, and we did a silly video called Come on, which was fun, but it was, like, crazy because it was all Beta F piece shot, like, on the road.

There was like no kind of.

Any kind of put together.

We just shot a bunch of footage while we were overseas.

Okay.

And then just kind of put it all together and just made this.

And it was Beta.

It wasn't digital.

It was, like, totally analog.

You know, Beta.

You know, Beta sp back, right?

Yeah.

Oh, yeah.

It wasn't film.

Right.

So it was like.

But it was all intentional.

It was the one where he was.

Old guy.

Yeah, yeah.

He was in the park with Larry Graham.

Right.

That park was right in London.

And he had me get a data SB crew.

And we didn't even have any permits.

We just pulled up and did it right there.

It was crazy.

People didn't even know it was him.

Yeah.

Manny was in that video as well, right?

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Manuel was in it.

Yeah.

And Marva King was in it, and Rhonda was in it at that point, you know, and so that was fun, but crazy stuff.

But it was such a.

Such a fun time.

So.

Yeah, it was such a creative time.

And, you know, you were right in there.

And let me.

I wanted to always ask you about the music.

I know you were also involved in the Crystal Ball, right?

Yeah.

You know, I came in on the tail end.

I got the.

It had already started down the road of being, you know, done.

They had started doing pre orders before I got there.

And so I had to come in at the tail end of Crystal Ball and kind of help make it happen.

There was definitely some.

As you said before right now, we talked about this.

There were some glitches, but ultimately it was pretty amazing.

The idea and the concept behind it of having.

I think we're basically the first to really do it on, you know, on our own and, you know, charge $50 a pop and.

And, you know, he made really good money from that.

And it was.

It was really innovative.

And he was always innovative like that.

I always loved that about him, that he was always ahead of the curve on everything.

You know, Paisley park was ahead of his curve in time and thinking about that and himself investing in himself and not in a way that a lot of, you know, stars do when they get a lot of money, they invest in, you know, homes and Just living that style, that lifestyle where he did that.

But he really realized how to invest in himself and his own brand and really control that.

And I think that was really interesting about him.

Now, when Prince was putting together the releases, during the time that you were running MPG Records, did.

Did he play a lot of the music with, you know, for you, and you put your input on, you know, the sagging of the different tracks in order and stuff like that?

No, no, they were.

It was already done, really, pretty much when, you know, you come up with it pretty much together.

I mean, he knew what he wanted.

It was, you know, he didn't want anybody else to.

To tell him what he wanted to put.

That was the reason why he was independent, right?

So he'd SAG is all that.

You know, he'd work with Hans and Tom Tucker and whoever was there, and they would create the flow and.

And then Steve park would create the artwork, and he'd approve the artwork and.

And then we put it all together, then I get it manufactured, and then, you know, we would drop shots shipped to Target and Best Buy and whoever ordered, you know, and Mondell created his own, you know, just a way for us to have the distribution.

We didn't have any distributor, so it was just totally independent.

So it was definitely different than anybody else that has ever done.

And, you know, luckily in Minnesota, you know, Target was right there, the headquarters and Best Buy, and so you could go down and meet with the heads.

And, you know, they agreed, obviously, because it's Prince to just, you know, take his product on without having a major distributor.

Jackie Thompson is with us, and of course, she had a long business relationship at Paisley Park.

Prince's former manager, MPG Record Head.

And she is involved in so many different projects of her own now.

And we want to let you talk about your own project, and then we'll get back into the Prince family.

You run your own spirit company, right?

Oh, yeah.

Yeah.

Well, the one thing that Prince definitely did for me, you know, I stayed there not as long as other people and, you know, other people were closer, but what I did take from him and what he imparted in me was to be your own self, to jump off the cliff and to do what you want to do and love what you do and do it with passion and work hard.

And so, you know, when I do things, I think about that.

I think about him and how he did it, how he created and manifested his thing.

And so, you know, you know, I wanted to start my own company and be my own Brand at a certain point kind of moving away from music and you know, he's in the back of my mind.

It's so funny.

I, you know, when I think about him and, and just, you know, he would say, you know, don't be afraid, you know, just go get out there and do it and believe in yourself and you know, that type of thing.

So it, it's helped me to know that, you know, I can do anything I put my mind to if I work hard at it.

And you know, it's a little bit of talent, a lot of hard work, you know what I mean?

So, so yeah, so created a spirit company.

It's an agave spirit which is similar to tequila.

It's in a different region.

So it's kind of like that champagne Bordeaux situation.

So we're in a different state in Mexico and we've got, created some amazing spirits.

If you drink, it's a high end, it's sipping, it's not for shot, you know, it's not a shot type drink.

You know, it's a higher end drinks and it's one, they're wonderful.

And so yeah, we're launching, you know, officially we've been doing some test markets for the last couple years and getting it together and this year we launch.

So we're really excited about that.

And where can people go to find out more information.

Rebel Spirits.com Revolution isn't Victor.

Yeah, Elspirits.com.

yeah, yeah, Rebel Celebrate.

Yeah, we're here.

Okay, go ahead.

What were you gonna say?

No, no, you go ahead.

Yeah, Jackie Thompson is with us here.

We're celebrating the life and music of Prince, our annual celebration and we've got plenty of guests and up on our website, plenty of the archive videos for you to listen to and one of the, the biggest projects you, you've undertaken since Prince's passing.

The Prince Rogers, now the PRN alumni, which is helping so many people, plans for that and getting together a lot of your friends and, and for all these years.

Tell, tell us more about PRN alumni.

Yeah, well, it kind of started last year.

Obviously we all wanted to get together and celebrate Prince's life as a group of people that were former employees with Prince and all walks of life from, you know, production, hair, makeup, everybody that really helped contribute to create Paisley and help him do what he did and help him create what he envisioned.

And so there was a celebration last November and we created, we didn't know if there were going to be, you know, five people show up, you know, but we put it out there.

And almost 300 people came and it was such a wonderful event during that time.

We sold merchandise because John Blackwell, the drummer, former drummer Prince, who fell ill with brain tumors, and then also Michael Van Huffle, who has been sick, you know, for a long time.

He was a former graphic designer there at paisley in the 90s and just thought it would be a way to, you know, help help them out and, you know, boost their GoFundMe.

So we sold some merchandise and we sold, you know, a couple thousand and that got me going with a couple others.

We were like, wow, this is what we should do moving forward to kind of move the philanthropic part of Prince, you know, that he had so many facets of his life and one of them was he was really philanthropic and people didn't know.

He was very quiet about it.

He just did it.

And so we said let's, let's keep this going.

Was the group that worked with him.

And so we assembled an amazing team for the board and for the foundation and created it.

It's going to be nonprofit status here in about two months and we're going to start doing.

Creating events, special events and special things with.

From the PRN alumni that you only get with us.

And so we're really excited about that.

So one of the things that we're doing from that is we're creating a whole like Shopify store of really cool, interesting pieces and merchandise that you'll be able to get that goes to the foundation and then it'll help our mission.

And that mission we had like a three prong.

We really, you know, wanted to be authentic of what the type of things that he used to do and from really kind of talking to different people that would love for one another.

We really narrowed it down to kids, you know, helping them grow in music, arts and education programs.

So we're going to be really focusing highly on that.

We're also a lot of people don't realize, but he was.

He supported organic urban farming initiatives.

Yeah.

With Taj and Seville.

Yeah, yeah.

So we're going to do support those initiatives and keep it going.

And our plan is to help some of the already organizations that he helped already and to then further that along as well.

So we're going to keep moving forward and lastly we're going to.

We want to help our own alumni in need when they're in need.

Need like John Blackwell or Michael Van Huffle or Rosie Gaines or whoever that's out there.

That's sick.

You know, we want to.

Or just a need, you Know, we want to be able to help, you know, so that's part of.

Part of it, too.

But our main mission is kids growing, you know, for music, arts and education and urban farming initiatives.

And is the Facebook page, a PRN alumni, the best place to keep tabs right now?

Right now.

But we are actually getting ready to launch.

It's prnalumni.org and then in about two weeks or so, and I'll let you know when we go live, but we'll have the store up where you'll be able to buy some really cool merchandise that we're doing specifically to raise money for these initiatives.

Yeah, just let us know.

We'll spread the word for you.

Awesome.

Yeah.

So I'm really passionate about this.

I'm really excited.

Everybody else is.

And it's just kind of snowballed, you know, from that evening.

And, you know, we just had such an amazing night, that night of love and, you know, just kind of getting together and really celebrating life and also reconnecting with people and meeting new people that.

It's like, we can't let that.

That love and that energy stop there.

You know what I mean?

So.

So this foundation is the manifestation of that night, really, in a way, from

getting together with your friends like that in November and Prince's passing still fresh on everybody's mind.

How's it been going personally to grip that he's no longer here and stuff like that?

I still can't believe it, to be honest with you.

Pretty surreal to me.

And I just didn't ever think we'd be having this conversation.

You know what I mean?

Right, right.

You know, I think what's weird for me is, like, to say in him in past tense.

Yeah, that.

That's the oddest thing for me.

I. I sometimes I step back and I'll go, did I just say, you know, the past tense?

It just.

It's pretty odd in my mind still.

So it's.

It's definitely fresh.

And, you know, Paisley Park's doing a great job.

And, you know what they're doing this coming week, so that should be pretty cool for people.

So that'll be neat.

Yeah, hopefully they.

They build upon it.

It'll become annual.

Yeah, hopefully.

You know, so all I know is we'll, you know, our group is going to work really hard to help keep that philanthropic part alive.

And, you know, that's our mission, and we're excited about that.

Jacksey Thompson is joining us once again for our Prince Music and life celebration here.

And we used to do Minneapolis Music Month.

But right now, Prince, I guess, you know, one time he'd celebrate the day he died in an interview.

So that's, that's.

I guess everybody's following the wishes like that instead of his birthday.

Yeah, yeah, that was actually.

I remember, I was there.

Oh, that's right.

Yeah.

You were involved in that.

Yeah, it was that.

Yeah, it was for VH1 and he was with Spice Girl.

Scary, scary, right?

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

It was a good one.

It was a really sweet interview, you know, so.

Yeah, yeah.

You also are involved.

We.

I just found out with some, some things with the revolution or getting.

Going out on the road.

As soon as they hit this Prince Paisley park celebration, they're doing a pretty extensive tour.

You know, what are you doing?

I'm not really fully.

And Mark called me up, Mark Brown, and wanted to do an after show, kind of keeping that experience alive after the, you know, after their performance.

And so there's going to be some select cities where there'll be after show, official after shows and that'll be a lot of fun.

One in San Francisco, one coming up in on the 27th.

And silver is it Silver.

I always get that mixed up.

Silver Springs, Maryland.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Springs, Maryland.

That's a Thursday, the 27th.

So they leave Paisley after their performance and then they're going to Chicago to perform and then they go there and so we'll do a fun after party there, you know, just to keep that experience going and then do San Francisco and then also Detroit as well.

So.

So let me ask you about Prince after parties.

You know, speaking about after parties, you know, part of going to see a Prince show was always the hope that he was going to show up right after the show and do another legendary after show.

What.

What went into the night for him to actually say, I'm gonna play on stage.

Was it spur of the moment a lot of times or.

Well, he would always have us on point during the day at every event.

And then probably around 2 o' clock he'd say if he wanted to do an after show set or he just might want to go out.

Okay.

So he would let us know.

And then he would have someone either go out and find a spot or I would go out with them.

And when I was there, I'm sure he did the same other times.

It's just, you know, my perspective of how we did it during our time.

And we'd go find a, A club and then, you know, we would.

Then the back line would head on over to the club after the show and then they'd set up and then he'd get it, come on in and play at 2 o' clock in the morning or 1 o' clock or whatever time until the, the.

It was light outside.

I remember this is a perfect example.

Madison Square Gardens.

We did a show and he wanted to perform after.

So we found a club called Life.

It happened to be a little further, you know, Manhattan's challenging.

So right after that show, all that backline had to head on over to Life and there was so much traffic and everything.

So he literally didn't get on stage until probably around 2, 2:30 in the morning.

And I would be at the front door taking, you know, it would be, you know, the door, making sure the door and then, you know, kind of making sure everything was good.

And then he got on stage.

And I remember leaving the club that day, that night, that day, that morning at 8am I remember opening up the doors to Life and it was like light out at that point.

I was like, wow, okay, let's go have some breakfast because, you know, and get on the plane for the next show.

So those were kind of the flow that would happen.

Yeah, yeah.

A lot of the great experiences that we know wouldn't have happened without your help and a lot of great, great friends you work with all these years.

Oh, yeah, we got to thank you.

They work really hard.

You know, all the people that were came before me and after me and you know, with me and I don't credit myself, I just was working hard, trying to make it happen.

But it was a lot.