I’m listening to “Raspberry Beret” by Prince.

I’d just gotten off stage in Hamburg, Germany when I heard that Prince died. We sat together as a band for several hours, sharing stories about the Purple One and what his music meant to us.

I mostly listened. I came to soul and R&B later in my musical life, and of course I was a Prince fan, but his music didn’t shape my formative years the way it did the rest of the band. Passionate recountings of unrequited love, first bands, and wrapping one’s head around mercurial genius poured forth, informed by the exasperated disbelief that yet another cultural icon was gone too soon.

The next day, we performed at the Paradiso in Amsterdam, where Prince played so many historic gigs over the years. The exterior was bathed in gentle purple light, the mood reverential, and it sunk in not only how brilliant Prince was, but just how much I had to learn, from his stubbornness, audacity, and utter fearlessness, along with the numerous demons that keep company with genius.

Prince is an inspiration to keep pushing, work insanely hard, and unblushingly share art however the fuck I feel like.