Goodnight Sweet and Dirty Prince

Author by indaburgPosted in Baseball, Music

purple-rain-bike

This year has brought us the deaths of so many greats. David Bowie. Alan Rickman. Merle Haggard. I can’t even list them all–too many. I am telling you now, I am on Betty White Death Watch, and when she goes, I am going to be in a deep funk. I love her so much. I will need bereavement time.

Early this morning, at about 0630, I finished a recap for our humble blog. It was about craziness, a humorous take on a serious issue, and I knew I wanted to end my post with my favorite musician of all time, Prince. I will save the Twins for last, I thought. Let’s Go Crazy. I quoted the opening stanzas because they were perfect for what I was trying to say. When life hands you shit, go crazy. We’re in this together. Lock hands. Celebrate life. The doctor is gonna try to give you meds. Take them or ignore them. We’re ultimately on our own–on the same journey of virtual sanity.

Dearly beloved
We are gathered here today
To get through this thing called life
Electric word life
It means forever and that’s a mighty long time
But I’m here to tell you
There’s something else
The after world
A world of never ending happiness
You can always see the sun, day or night
So when you call up that shrink in Beverly Hills
You know the one, Dr. Everything’ll Be Alright
Instead of asking him how much of your time is left
Ask him how much of your mind, baby
‘Cause in this life
Things are much harder than in the after world
In this life
You’re on your own
And if the elevator tries to bring you down
Go crazy, punch a higher floor
When I hear this song, I go crazy dancing. I love it so much. I, of course, had no way of knowing that just a few hours later, I would be crying over his untimely death at the age of 57. I was shaking. I felt like I had been punched in the stomach. How prescient that quote would be. He is my generation’s James Brown and Jimi Hendrix rolled into one sexy little high heeled strange symboled package. He taught me about sex and life. School taught me the anatomy of sex. Prince taught me the details. He was dirty. Raw. Real. Strange. Beautiful. Androgynous. He made that guitar scream and moan like a lover. With apologies:

Darling Nikki, you are one sexy mother fucker who makes me cream, soft and wet. You could never take the place of my man but nothing compares 2 U with your dirty mind and delirious thoughts. If I was your girlfriend, I would Kiss, Feel U Up, and Gett Off  because I Love U in Me in this Erotic City. I’ll wear nothing but Diamond and Pearls even though Money Don’t Matter 2 Night. It’s clearly a Sign O’ the Times when the Pope is so cool.

That is what Prince made me feel.

I have many goals in this crazy life. One is to visit all 30 ballparks. I am well on my way. I will visit five this year, Jobu willing. The other, to see Prince live. I can’t do that latter one anymore. I am devastated. I never got a chance to see my musical idol play live, in the flesh. I love music so much–I am the daughter of a musician, I was named after Bach, and I play the piano (badly)–and I missed this opportunity. I will never let this happen again.

Prince was reportedly not much of a baseball fan. The vertically challenged one preferred basketball, a game I really don’t enjoy, except for the last 5 minutes. However, the Twins play hometown hero Prince’s “Let’s Go Crazy” after home runs. As a native of Minnesota, Prince understandably has a special place in their heart. Thank you for sharing him.

Rookie Twins players are required to sing Little Red Corvette as a ritual. This is a good ritual, lol. True fact. As opposed to those false ones. A friend of mine many years ago nicknamed me Little Red Corvette. I am little, and I like to go fast. I drove a red Corvette briefly… a gorgeous C4 that purred under my thighs. Presto. Baby, you’re much too fast. You got to slow down. Why? Life moves pretty fast.

Country music fans, classical, oldies, hip-hop, rockers–everyone agreed, Prince was great. My co-worker from Kentucky who mainly listens to country: Prince fan. My favorite doctor, 63 year old New York Jew: Prince fan. I remember the Super Bowl show he played. It was the only time the everyone in the room said, “The show is over already? That was the best half-time show I have ever seen.” I will raise my children right. They will love him too.

I am still in shock writing this. None of this makes sense. He can’t be gone. It can’t be true. This is a nightmare. Please wake me up.

I Could Never Take the Place Of Your Man is probably my favorite song. I love the juxtaposition of the happy, peppy music with the tragic lyrics. A slightly pregnant woman on the prowl for a one night stand, and Prince honestly telling her, yeah, I’ll bang ya, but I can’t be your man. I like the brutal honesty.

A few months ago, @longfootlefty asked if there was a song we could instantly know without having studied. This was one of my choices. I used it again in one of my blog posts a couple of nights ago. If I ever get tired of hearing this, I know my soul has died.

Thanks for reading, and enjoy the following.

16 thoughts on “Goodnight Sweet and Dirty Prince”

  1. My favourite Prince moment was at the 2004 Rock and Roll HoF induction ceremony (when Prince was inducted along with the late, great George Harrison) during “While My Guitar Gently Weeps”. You have guys like Tom Petty, Steve Winwood, Jeff Lynne, even Dhani Harrison in the background, looking like George 2.0, but they all just sort of cease to exist once Prince starts his guitar solo. George would have approved and today he’s probably telling Prince, “You kicked ass, kid! By the way, your guitar stand is over there in the corner, between Stevie Ray’s and Jimi’s.”

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  2. I remember reading about how in 1998-9 whenever Jeff Beck put out the album that I wasn’t too fond of as I never bought it but he’s in my pantheon of guitar God’s.
    Anyway, he brought it to Minneapolis to get mastered and proofed and he is at the soundboard with whomever was engineering and in walks Prince who is basically his employer, and after greeting Jeff Beck and exchanging pleasantries, he goes back to talking to the tech.

    Jeff Beck then relays how he….fucking Jeff fucking Beck became tongue tied after meeting Prince and he was glad when he left because he didn’t want to disapoint ” the little fucking purple guy”😊 Totally blew my mind reading that. The music I love and play and occasionally write…..you can’t dance to it! I’ve always respected Prince as a superb musician, I don’t like his hits. After reading the Beck article I went out and borrowed a bunch of CDs of his stuff and gave them a good listen to and some of the non radio stuff is glorious.

    Long story short, too sad, too soon and I’m too sorry I never got to see him live, I turned down free ( probably shitty )tickets to see him and his all female band that opens for him in 94.

    Regrets? I’ve got a few. I’ll tell you what… I’m gonna go see the Beatles before anything happens to them !

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    2. My dad took me to Strawberry Fields in Central Park after Lennon was shot. I was a little girl but it was such a sweet memory of mine, communing with people, singing the songs.

      Ah, you made a huge mistake, slappy. His hits were great too, but you’re human. I make mistakes every day. I love live music.

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      1. Yeah I’m well cognizant of the fact. You wouldn’t believe the amount of free shows that I was offered tickets to. You only have SO much time and I was trying to be my own version of Prince. I was also working as a fry cook at the time and making great money for the job. I could have been the Sous chef but I needed certain days off and having to do all the extraneous garbage that goes with it? Fuck it….Old Slappy is gonna be a rock🎸.

        20/20 hindsight being what it is? If old man me time-traveled back? HELL yeah! I would still do it over! Maybe it would have worked out better? I’m guessing that I could have easily sold those tickets for about 120,000$ if I had the time to scalp them. Had I known any of you, and had the internet, Craig’s blog…etc. You guys would have seen pretty much every major band from 91 until maybe 97 give or take a year. How do you like me now?

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        1. Shit, you know me… I type stream of consciousness ( poorly, as I always and leave out the important thing) Why are you still up? I got home around Oneish, I need to comment because I like to be involved, you’re already involved.

          Stop it! Respond to my response during your break tomorrow. Go to bed!

          Spoilers below!!!!!!

          More spoilers!!!!!!!!!!

          Unless you’re still awake, then validate me !!!!!!!!

          Like

  3. I saw Prince during his Purple Rain tour @ the Forum in Los Angeles. I never liked the sound @ the Forum and this show was no exception, but it was a great performance. Being 19 years old around all those women who attended the show in lingerie was also quite an experience.

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      1. It was a trip. Countless women strutting around in revealing lingerie looking at you like, “Yes, I’m being openly sexual. Can you handle it?”

        I remember Prince laying on the ground at one point, telling the crowd, “Bathe me in screams.” We happily obliged.

        But again, the acoustics at the Forum just never worked for me. The one good thing about living outside Los Angeles is there were so many venues to see concerts within easy driving distance.

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