Prince, who died suddenly Thursday at 57, transformed the music landscape with his infectious funk before becoming a reclusive rebel who brazenly challenged industry conventions. The so-called Kid from Minneapolis created 1984's "Purple Rain," which regularly tops lists of the greatest albums of all time, but he was so startlingly prolific that he entered a legendary feud with his label as it tried to rein him in.
Prince became famous in his later career for eccentricities that included changing his name to an unpronounceable "love symbol," announcing his concerts at the last minute and refusing to let reporters take notes on -- let alone record -- encounters with him.But beyond the oft-satirized public persona, Prince was universally acclaimed as one of the most gifted artists of his generation, mastering a versatile electric guitar that he could play behind his back or blindfolded, and singing in a distinctive falsetto that showed no signs of fading with age.
Ever-clad in purple, Prince stood just five feet two but endured for decades as a style and sex symbol, wearing everything from frilly jackets to women's underwear to nothing at all on the cover of his 1988 album "Lovesexy." Prince recorded albums in a state-of-the-art studio at his home in Paisley Park, near his hometown of Minneapolis and also threw public parties, the last of which took place Saturday. He kept his back recordings in the studio's vaults and, as it turned out, died at the compound.
Born as Prince Rogers Nelson, the future pop icon grew up in Minneapolis with parents who were both jazz musicians, his father a pianist and his mother a singer. Prince was eventually shuttled between different homes after his parents split, but to the surprise of some fans had in many ways a conventional upbringing that included playing basketball in high school. He had his start playing in bands as a teenager and eventually landed a record deal with Warner Brothers. He temporarily moved to California to record and played every single instrument on his 1978 debut "For You." His self-titled second album -- foreshadowing Prince's future work ethic, he recorded the album within weeks of his first release -- marked the start of his commercial success with instantly danceable tracks such as "I Feel For You," later re-recorded with Chaka Khan.
Prince put out a string of hits in the following years including the album "1999," whose title track's science-fiction lyricism -- "Tonight I'm gonna party like it's 1999" -- became an anthem of sorts two decades later at the turn of the millennium. But Prince won his greatest acclaim with "Purple Rain," which was accompanied by a semi-autobiographical movie in which "The Kid" fights to play at the legendary First Avenue club in Minneapolis against a rival band led by the brash Morris Day. The album, recorded with Prince's backing band The Revolution, generated hits such as "Let's Go Crazy," "When Doves Cry" and "I Would Die 4 You," along with "Darling Nikki," which like many of Prince's songs oozed sexuality.
Prince followed up "Purple Rain" with a series of hit albums including "Sign o' the Times," "Graffiti Bridge" and the soundtrack to the 1989 movie "Batman." But Prince also grew increasingly estranged from his record label, Warner Brothers, which tried to rein in his knack of constant releases. In the early 1990s Prince -- in a charged gesture for an African American -- wrote the word "slave" on his cheek to protest his conditions and changed his name to the "love symbol" as he sought to record on his own. Prince went on to experiment widely on ways to release albums, putting out a total of 39 studio works during his life and winning seven Grammys. In the last two years of his life, Prince put out no fewer than four albums. He also toured widely, announcing tickets at the last minute to evade resellers.
Prince, who struggled with depression early in his career, suffered a personal tragedy in 1996 when his then wife, dancer Mayte Garcia, gave birth to a boy who died a week later from a rare condition. Like his contemporary and sometime rival Michael Jackson, Prince always guarded family details, but Garcia said the baby's loss contributed to the breakdown of their marriage. A second marriage, to the Canadian businesswoman and philanthropist Manuela Testolini, also ended in divorce.
Prince recently announced that he would finally tell his story in his own words with a memoir, named "The Beautiful Ones" after his song on "Purple Rain," to come out in 2017. But Prince died just one month later, meaning he may remain elusive after all.
