I was at work and trying to not cry as I was looking at TMZ’s first reports that Prince was dead. I’m a fan, and I can’t believe that he has been gone ten years.
Prince grew on me later when Diamonds And Pearls came out. A group of my friends from work would hang out on nights we didn’t go out. We would play UNO, poker, blackjack, etc. We always went to the same friends’ apartment because him and his brother had the biggest one. He was also the first person we knew to have a computer, CD player, etc. When we weren’t listening to the radio, we would take turns picking CDs from his collection. I always picked Diamonds And Pearls as my first choice.
One time while we were there, my friend said I should bring a blank CD and he would burn it for me. This was in 1991 and I did not have a CD player. He knew I would eventually have one. My car at the time had a cassette player. I kept that CD (I still have it) and ten years later in 2001, I finally got a car with a CD player. That CD was in constant rotation. I never got tired of it. It’s one of the CDs I would listen to without skipping songs.
I was driving home for lunch, and the local Minneapolis FM station KDWB was airing one Prince song after another. Then one of the hosts came on and said, “We’ll let you know when we hear more about the death of Prince”, and went back to playing more of his songs. Throughout the week, every highway video billboard posted tributes, and every bridge and building with LED exterior lighting proudly displayed purple. It made me proud of Minneapolis and Minnesota.
One of my favorites.
Another one.
