In Memory of Prince

        In two weeks it will be two months since the untimely passing of Prince. Today would’ve been his 58th birthday. This is the only celebrity death that has shook me up. I’m still bummed out about it because I thought we’d have him around for a longer time.

        I'll always remember getting picked up from school as my father drove us home blasting his Very Best of Prince CD. Mom got it for him as a Christmas gift when I was in the 4th grade. That was my first time being introduced to Prince and I hated him. It was hard for me to respect Prince because I knew nothing about him. He was mysterious and weird. I didn’t understand his obsession with the color purple, I didn’t get the whole name change to symbol thing and I found it hard to believe that he held a candle to Michael Jackson in his prime.

        Dad and I would often have debates about who's more talented between Prince and Kanye. All Dad did was rebuke Kanye for relying on sampling and then say "Prince plays instruments” before going on about how he makes all of his music from scratch. Mom would hop in and bring up the fact that Prince has performed at the Super Bowl, a feat which she believes Kanye will never achieve. Maybe one day… Dad wouldn’t even mention Prince’s dance moves. I honestly didn’t know he could dance until I saw Purple Rain. The “Let’s Go Crazy” scene was a big surprise. I’ve never seen any concert footage and because of his beef with YouTube, I didn’t think he had a lot of music videos. It was hard for me to see or hear his work, all I had was Dad’s CD and the radio. 

        As the years went on my hate turned into a respectful indifference. When I found out that Chris Rock is a huge Prince fan, I looked more into “The Purple One.” I said to myself “this guy has to be a big deal if Chris Rock and my father, two people whom I admire, are fans of his.” It took me 18 years to finally appreciate his greatness. Last year, I wrote a tribute to Prince and Purple Rain as part of a Black History Month series the school paper was doing. For that article I watched Purple Rain twice and I listened to nothing but the soundtrack for a whole weekend. Through all of this I was able to see that all the praise was more than warranted. I became a fan. That summer I got 1999, Dirty Mind and the Batman soundtrack. It was like I discovered a treasure that’s been around since before my time. Writing that article brought out a special moment between my father and I. It made him proud and my newfound admiration for the artist I once hated brought us closer. The way my father put me on to Prince is the same way I’ll put my kid(s) on to Kanye. I might play Late Registration in the delivery room so I can tell them what song played as they were brought into the world.  

What I like about Prince is his productivity and his realness. At the age of 18 Prince signed a record deal with Warner Bros. and his debut album, For You, was released when he was 19. Since then he went on to create 39 albums and he has an entire vault of unreleased work. This is a guy who released an album every year and then some. He wrote his first song at 7 and he played all 27 instruments on his debut album. He’s got a lot to say and he loves what he does. You can’t help but respect someone like that. Prince was also never afraid to be himself. He wasn’t weird because he was a pretentious artist, that’s just who he was. All of the flamboyancy, the hyper sexuality, the reclusiveness, all of that was Prince being Prince. It wasn’t a gimmick or a stage persona.  

        It’s become a life goal to experience something as epic as the climax of Purple Rain. It’s on my list of the most impactful things I’ve ever seen. The “Purple Rain” performance, the close ups of Billy and the crowd’s reaction, The Kid storming off stage and having the audience roaring for him to come back on stage... it’s all so powerful. And when he leaves his dressing room he locks eyes with Apollonia who looks at him as if to say “You did it, babe” Oh my goodness it’s all so triumphant!

        I always told myself that if I made it I would introduce Dad to Prince, but now that's not a possibility. I wanted to thank him. I wanted to thank him for bringing me and my father closer, for helping me better appreciate music and artistry and for using his God given gifts to change the world.