Prince: His Purple Reign is over but the song lives on forever

Last night, when the news broke that Prince, he of the legendary monikers and equally brilliant songs, had passed away at 57, and was joining David Bowie somewhere in a tin can far above the world, there was only one thing to do — play Purple Rain full blast.

Sure, there are tonnes of other songs by “The Purple One” — I Wanna Be Your Lover, Darling Nikki, When Doves Cry, Cream, Kiss to name a few — that broke the mould when they were released, but it his title track from Purple Rain, his debut film in 1984, that may help his fans begin to make sense of this irrevocable loss. (Read: Prince dies at 57, here are the Top 10 songs of the pop superstar)

That The New Yorker magazine has announced the cover of its forthcoming issue, an artistic representation of Purple Rain, ahead of publication, goes to show that you can’t remember of one of rock music’s most original musicians and not think of his iconic song that continues to defy easy catergorisation.

The original track for the rock musical drama was about 11 minutes; Prince would perform a four-minute version for his live shows. Legend has it that Prince initially asked Stevie Nicks of Fleetwood Mac to write the lyrics. “It was so overwhelming, that 10-minute track… I listened to it and I just got scared,” she said later in an interview. “I called him back and said, ‘I can’t do it. I wish I could. It’s too much for me.’” (Photos Purple Rain Fades To Black: Pop Icon Prince Dies At 57)

You can’t blame her. The cine-version of Purple Rain begins with a lone guitar, quickly followed by drums accompanied by an organ, evoking images of the Church (Prince was a devout Christian), of retribution and redemption. Three verses, each one about his character, The Kid’s relationships with his family, girlfriend and band members, build up to a emotionally-charged guitar solo that cemented Prince’s status as one of the world’s greatest guitar players of all time. He took elements from gospel music, pop and rock and served up a rock power-ballad that became his signature tune.

Purple Rain is perhaps also the key to understanding a man who created his own monikers and labels because the existing terms of engagement had become increasingly insufficient to contain his genius.

By the time Purple Rain hit the screens in July 1984, smack in the middle of America’s AIDS crisis in the 1980s, it didn’t matter whether Prince was a man or a woman, gay or straight. A petite man, he dressed flamboyantly, or not at all; his band, The Revolution, featured Wendy and Lisa, women guitarists, pianists and co-songwriters, in addition to backing vocalists and dancers; in 1993, when he changed his name to a symbol, it was a combination of signs for male and female. When he mixed genres, tangling up soul and funk and rock, jazz and pop, he created desire, and a way of being free.

If Bowie was a chameleon, Prince was an enigma. Listen to the way he sings Purple Rain — his voice low and almost-gravelly in the verses before he reaches the end of the chorus, and follows it up with a series of gravity-defying notes — a plea, a prayer. Just the way the track incorporates and enmeshes multiple genres, bypassing brackets, similarly, the vocal arrangement of this song toys with sexuality — Prince’s falsetto chides you for reducing music to gender binaries.

But then he shakes you up with that gut-ripping guitar solo. In live performances over the years, one can see the elaborate designs of the neck and fretboard of Prince’s electric guitar, now a phallic object thrust high into the air as the song reaches its climax. There is more than one way to be a man and a woman, and it doesn’t matter as long as it’s your own way, he seems to say.