Prince, the beloved pop culture icon and one of the most popular musicians of the 1980s, has passed away. On Thursday, Prince died at Paisley Park estate. According to his publicist, he passed away in the morning.
Born Prince Rogers Nelson, he hailed from Minneapolis, Minn. After recording demo tapes, Prince came into the music scene with his 1979 album Prince. On that album were the two singles “Why You Wanna Treat Me So Bad?” and “I Wanna Be Your Lover”. After that, the rest was history.
The most known era of Prince was his Purple Rain era of the 1980s. The album was released on June 25, 1984. Rolling Stone ranked it as number two of “The Best Albums of the 1980s”. It is also 76th on their list of “The Greatest Albums of All Time”. Coming in at 13 million copies, it is one of the best-selling albums of all time according to the Record Industry Association.
This album was followed by the 1984 film Purple Rain which received an Academy Award for Best Original Song Score. Prince plays a singer named “The Kid” who is the lead singer of the band The Revolution.
Prince had a great career with his band that he referred to as the Revolution as well as finding success as a solo artist. In 2013, Prince started to preform with 3rdeyedgirl as his backing band.
Prince was not only musically involved, but socially involved. After the death of Freddie Grey in Baltimore last year, Prince released a single titled “Baltimore”. He also held a surprise rally in Grey’s memory at his estate called “Dance Rally 4 Peace”.
Prince has inspired countless artists that are successful in the music business today. Justin Timberlake says that all of his songs have a Prince element to them in some way. In his tribute to the late entertainer, he retells a story of him at a tender age of four hearing “Raspberry Beret” for the first time and instantly loving it.
Even President Obama paid respects to a Prince:
Countless other celebrities and artists took to Twitter to remember him.
https://twitter.com/ParisJackson/status/723226529304453121
Prince, NOTHING COMPARES… #RIPPrince… https://t.co/KAserIRfgD pic.twitter.com/6qyF7VqNtV
— Justin Timberlake (@jtimberlake) April 21, 2016
Stunned by Prince's passing. He was an incomparable, all-round musician with incredible talent. One of a kind.
— Jermaine Jackson (@jermjackson5) April 22, 2016
I never met Mozart, I never met Duke Ellington or Charlie Parker
I never met Elvis
But I met Prince – Bono pic.twitter.com/ruD6Su3aMh— U2 (@U2) April 22, 2016
Woke up to the atrocious news. Prince was a modern Mozart. Watched him play any song that came to mind for 4 hours straight once. Damn.
— josh groban (@joshgroban) April 22, 2016
An entire book series could be written about Prince. His talents, his songs, and his musical abilities could be discussed for hours and hours.
A true visionary. An exceptional artist. A creative soul. The world is a little less full now that he is no longer in it. He will be missed.
*Due to Prince’s copyright laws with YouTube, I cannot give you links to his songs. Therefore, you should look him up on Spotify or iTunes if you can. Your ears will thank you.
To soften the blow, please watch this skit of Prince and the Revolution being parodied by comedian Dave Chappelle on his show Chappelle Show. The quality isn’t the best but it’s worth the watch.
