Almost every member of my inner circle was picking up the guitar, and friendly competition for alpha male status became largely determined by who could rock the hardest. It is possible this clip landed in my lap at just the right moment. The key moment was my discovery of the 2004 Rock and Roll Hall of Fame tribute to George Harrison (if you do not know what I am referring to, watch it IMMEDIATELY here: ). Getting 3121 for my thirteenth birthday marked the first time I really paid attention to Prince’s music and shocking versatility, but it remained for the early days of video streaming to push me over the cliff into the realm of super-fan screaming in the streets. Such an interaction served as the capstone in a long journey…a journey starting with my first exposures to “that guy who sounded vaguely like Al Green” in middle school. This was in response to my posting of his 2008 Coachella cover of Radiohead’s “Creep” on YouTube ( ), to the tune of nearly 7 million hits as of this blog entry. In December of 2015, less than six months before his fatal overdose, I was tweeted no less than three times by Prince himself. I was only ever in the same room with him twice, though his music has been on continuous loop in the same room as me for the last decade. My relationship with the late Prince dates back to 2006 and extends far deeper than most. It was a masterpiece, plain and simple, never appreciated thoroughly enough, never before duplicated, and never again to be equaled.Īnd as the latest lip-synched, screeching fembot on lead breasts takes the stage tomorrow, it’s worth a look back at our new American tradition’s finest hour. It made me question the real meaning of cool and what it means to “find your calling.” It helped me figure out what is important in my life and in so doing, it’s inspired the lives of those around me.
Prince one nite alone live blogspot how to#
It helped me decide that I would figure out how to master the guitar some day. The only thing is that there is no better way of getting the point across. I know, in saying that it shook me to the core of my being at the impressionable age of thirteen, that I run the risk of sounding pretentious. Yet in the midst of such a setup, it emerged as a defining moment of the decade. At any moment, the entire thing could have blown sky high from massive electrical failure or Prince breaking his neck on wet stage tiles. It was pouring rain from start to finish. It was the intermission for a final contest between two teams I don’t recall, in a season I didn’t watch a single moment of, sponsored by a soda company that has never seen a dollar of my money.
On February 4 th, 2007, ten years ago tonight, Prince Rogers Nelson played center field at Dolphin Stadium before a televised audience of 140 million. I’m referring to the Superbowl XLI halftime show, where the greatest artist in recorded musical history sealed the case for the rest of my life in twelve minutes. Because for all its faults-for all its cynicism and for all the flakes it turns up-there is no way around the fact that football’s grand spectacle was responsible for what was, beyond all reasonable doubt, the most spectacular entertainment spectacle ever aired on mainstream television. Yet I will also be the first to admit that it’s not all bad. Naturally, such a position comes at a social cost-particularly at this time of the year, when all thoughts, all conversation, and all jokes are directed towards the mandatory fun of Superbowl festivities. This is your sacred right, but count me out. Maybe you are one who devotes his winter weekends to tailgating, Maybe you are one of those who paints his mobile home with the colors of your favorite football team, then destroys it when said team fails to make the playoffs (as happened twelve blocks from my front doorstep twelve years ago). I know next to nothing about how football works, and I don’t care to find out. I could not possibly hope to care less about football. Let’s start this off with an American blasphemy on par with Communist Party membership and scientific literacy. “I only play the piano, but tonight God is in the house”
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