Rolling Stone writer Brian Hiatt visited Prince at his Paisley Park compound in 2014 for a cover story which got eventually got scrapped and never released.
But in wake of the icon’s death, the magazine has now unveiled the lost story for their latest issue. There’s a lot of interesting talk in the chat which takes place during the course of almost one full day at Paisley Park.
One of the highlights is when the Purple One reveals that he wanted to mentor Chris Brown. Prince said he wanted to the young singer, who he’d invited to meet at Paisley Park. When Hiatt pointed out that many people considered Brown “unforgivable” following his 2009 assault on then-girlfriend Rihanna, Prince replied: “Unforgivable? Goodness. That’s when we go check the master, Christ. … Have you ever instantly forgiven somebody?” When Hiatt shook his head, Prince said: “It’s the best feeling in the world, and it totally dismantles that person’s whole stance.”
Later in the piece, Prince seemed uncomfortable talking about Michael Jackson’s death, saying he was “too close to it.” He continued: “He is just one of many who have gone through that door—Amy Winehouse and folks. We’re all connected, right, we’re all brothers and sisters, and the minute we lock that in, we wouldn’t let anybody in our family fall. That’s why I called Chris Brown. All of us need to be able to reach out and just fix stuff. There’s nothing that’s unforgivable.”
When Prince plays a sweet throwback song “Stopthistrain” with vocals from 3rdEyeGirl drummer Welton and her husband, Josh, the writer suggests that the song might fare best on the charts if no one knows of its Prince connection. Prince replies, “That’s kind of the blessing and a curse these days,” he says, “that I’m competing with [my] older music. And I don’t know anybody who has to do that. They always play Beyoncé’s latest track. But I go on Oprah and they want me to play what they remember.”
That song did not end up making the cut on PlectrumElectrum or Art Official Age.
Read the full story here.
Discussion about this post