This is a pretty recent photo of Prince sporting his timelessness.  When one thinks of “pop” music, it is often a baffling image of superstardom achieved through the practices of mediocrity in the realm of what the status quo or populous hails as music, but there are a few whose embodiment of work defy that trend, and of those few there was the artist known as Prince.  Sure, he drew aplenty from Jimi Hendrix, but he welded together the funk, soul, and electrical boundaries of the guitar to lay down the most amazing anthology of music that has stretched through decade after decade and remained as the pinnacle of his signature footprint of sound: timeless electronic music with plenty of soul.  A rare feat, to say the least, with over a hundred million albums in sales.

Known all over the world and well respected from the young and the old, when one thinks of purple, you think of Prince.  There are not many people in history who can embody a color, but his purple reign during the eighties would probably be his most visceral moment during his musical journey.

As a DJ for many years, I have built a pretty hefty stash of his records, but he did lose me a bit the last fifteen years as I slowly tuned him out.  I guess I never gave enough of my time to figure out where he was going and what he was trying to say to all his listeners, but he did manage to stay as fresh as ever in every wave of his return to every new generation of listeners.

It is still a bit confusing to question the demise of his health after seeing him deliver countless performances and continue onward with his last project: A Piano and A Microphone.  As his soul lives on, all we can do is listen and remember this pioneering pop genius.  “The beautiful ones you always seem to lose…”

I hope we will have many purple sunsets and many more paisley moons.  Goodbye my friend, and thank you.