‘Purple Rain’: The anthem that scared the life out of Prince
It’s the one thing everyone is chasing: a sense of pure pride, pure satisfaction. Everyone, no matter what field they work in or what talent they boast, is looking for that moment where you know, for sure, that you’ve done something really good. For creatives, it’s a magical, almost spiritual moment where inspiration strikes. What often feels like only seconds later, you sit back and look at what you’ve made, hopefully buzzing with excitement. It’s a moment that makes you feel powerful, but when Prince sat back and looked at this creation, it seemed to scare him. There seemed to be something about ‘Purple Rain’ that felt too powerful for it’s maker to initially handle.
By now, the world knows ‘Purple Rain’ as the ultimate Prince song. From the minute it was released in 1984 through to his final ever gigs before his tragic death, it was always the finale moment. It’s a song so anthemic that it had to be the end so no other track could possibly follow its rousing and electrifying power. It’s a song so epic that it sometimes even seemed as though the earth itself tuned in as nature transformed itself into staging, creating moments like the 2007 Superbowl where a rain storm started up as the song kicked into high gear, creating an incredibly cinematic moment. To put it simply, it’s one of the greatest songs ever written, existing in a special rank of untouchable tracks that serve as prime examples of the majesty of human creativity and talent.
But while some artists would create a song like this and be ecstatic, knowing that they’d just done something rare and special, there was something about the song that seemed to intimidate Prince, as if it was too much for him to handle as he knew he was on the brink of unleashing something special.
That sense of unease seemed to start early. When he began writing the track, he tried to give it away. Initially, he wanted to provide the song for Stevie Nicks, an artist he deeply admired. Maybe he felt like the song was too good to be true, or at least too good for him, as he got in contact with one of his favourite artists and tried to lay it at her feet. But luckily, Nicks wouldn’t let him. Even she knew that he had something special on his hands, sharing in this almost frightened sense of awe as she recalled, “I listened to it, and I just got scared.”
After receiving a ten-minute-long instrumental of the song’s initial bones, she knew it was too powerful for her and that Prince had to be the one to finish this song. She said, “I called him back and said, ‘I can’t do it. I wish I could. It’s too much for me.'”
Then, after he finished the track himself, the sense of it being just too good to be true lingered. Prince tried to kill it again, convincing himself he’d stolen it from a Journey track and seeking the band out as if he was hoping that they would pull the plug on it. Again, the universe was forcing him to keep on track with it as the band refused to curtail the song. “I thought it was an amazing tune,” singer Jonathan Cain said, “And I told him, ‘Man, I’m just super-flattered that you even called. It shows you’re that classy of a guy. Good luck with the song. I know it’s gonna be a hit.’”
Once again, left along with this incredible song, Prince still seemed stuck in this odd, uneasy place with it, as if the weight of its greatness was too heavy to hold. It could even be argued that the whole conception of Purple Rain as a film was another way to try and hold it back. Rather than just releasing the song as it was, he put it on what is essentially a soundtrack album and demanded to shroud it with a film that, let’s face it, isn’t great.
The film itself speaks to this theory. In the movie, Prince once again gives away the credit for the song as in the narrative; it’s half written by his bandmates Wendy and Lisa and half taken from one of his fictional father’s compositions. So much of the film’s plot also centres around him ignoring or brushing off the track, trying to push it from his mind. But eventually, it gets its moment.
In the film, as in life, Prince finally surrendered to the song. It’s the central moment as the artist takes to the stage and wows his audience with an incredible and moving performance of the full, nearly nine-minute-long track. Just as his crowd in the film does, the whole world reacted with the same kind of awe as this powerful song that once scared the musician was finally unleashed into the world, proving itself to be the stroke of genius he seemed to fear it was.
