Prince Collaborator Selling ‘Soft and Wet’ Songwriting Stake on eBay
Amid the bevy of Prince auctions offering clothing, handwritten lyrics and other ephemera from Paisley Park, a former Minnesota studio owner is offering a truly unique item on eBay: A co-songwriting credit on Prince‘s first solo single “Soft and Wet.”
Chris Moon, credited with co-writing the lyrics to the track off 1978’s For You as well as nurturing the career of the soon-to-be music icon in the late Seventies, is selling his stake in the song for Buy It Now price of $490,000.
“It’s very unusual, but it’s completely real,” Moon told the Star Tribune. “Nobody has ever done anything like this before that I know of, so I understand why some people don’t believe it.”
While the buyer wouldn’t be recognized as Prince’s co-songwriter on the track – one of the few Prince recordings where the musician shared credit – the new owner of Moon’s rights would receive songwriting royalties, revenues from streams and album purchases as well as any future earnings the song generates.
Given that “Soft and Wet” isn’t one of Prince’s most well-known tracks – it only peaked at Number 92 on the Hot 100 in 1978 – Moon admitted that the buyer is very unlikely to turn a profit from the auction; the studio owner said the most money he’s received from the track is when MC Hammer sampled it for a song on 1990’s Please Hammer, Don’t Hurt ‘Em.
“Around 1990, MC Hammer came out with one of the top albums of the year,” Moon wrote on the eBay listing. “When it came out he sold 10,000,000 copies of that album which meant I sold 10,000,000 copies of Soft & Wet. To date that MC Hammer album has now sold over 22 Million copies worldwide … and each time that album sells so does a copy of SOFT & WET.”
“Anyone who buys this probably shouldn’t be doing it for financial purposes,” Moon added to the Star Tribune. “It’s more about owning one of the most unique collectibles ever related to Prince.”
Additionally, Moon, who lent his Moon Sound Studio to Prince early in this career, also owns Prince’s demo recordings that helped the musician score his Warner Bros. recording contract, as well as the full rights to an unreleased Prince track titled “Make It Through the Storm,” although those treasures are not up for auction.