Minneapolis Mecca Prince visit for Remembrance day
On Thursday, Emily & I visited Paisley Park for my 33rd birthday, 4 days before Remembrance Day and the 9th anniversary of Prince Rogers Nelson's early death at 57 due to the failure of the United States and the world to reconcile with humanity's love for drugs and altered states of consciousness. Prince himself may not have been a vocal advocate for drug use, but digging between the cracks reveals suggestions of early psychedelic use, ecstasy, cocaine, and ultimately the opiates that took his life… You can’t tell Prince’s full story without mentioning drugs. Opium has been a mainstay of human existence for thousands of years and a staple of the American diet since we first fought off the British, licking our wounds as we earned our sovereignty. If it weren’t for the process of colonization and the subsequent imperial quest to prohibit plant-based substances around the world along the lines of association with racialized others, Prince would probably be alive today. What form would his art have taken if he hadn’t had to speak out in 1987 about drug addiction, HIV, and nuclear war with Sign of the Times? Would he have lost his edge if American culture hadn’t forced him to call for keeping the children free in 1986 on the track America? Is all great American art a response to trauma?
The pills that killed Prince were offered to me in 2016. They were filling a void on the street left by doctors' sudden change in prescription patterns. “These blues look a little funny, but they are $5 less,” I remember being told (I turned the pills down) shortly before quitting prescription pain medication circa 2017. Prince’s death and the above incidents were wake-up calls, as all of a sudden, if you wanted to stay high, people were switching to heroin or fentanyl. The opiate overdose epidemic, which caused death and ruptured communities in its wake, didn’t have to happen. If plant-based medicines were legal and never criminalized to the point of nonavailability, as with coca, poppy, and formerly cannabis(driven by the Western world), would as many young people ever try heroin or methamphetamine? I know Prince sings of gateway drugs and the progression from “reefer to horse” and not needing margaritas or ecstasy to dance in the sunshine, although his rumored use of MDMA is said to have informed his decision not to release the “cursed” Black album. Prince’s relatively anti-drug attitude is in and of itself a sign of the times; it’s not a nod to Reagan-era mandates but a tragic reflection of communities torn apart, akin to NWA and Public Enemy-type messages. Paisley Park, sung about in 1985, designed in 1986, and realized in 1987, was a magical tour through the brilliant mind of a brand of American autor that no longer exists.
Thinking about Prince’s legacy and the idea of Paisley Park as an all-in-one home, music studio, film/video site, night club, source of inspiration, and now a museum of Graceland like character is in and of itself psychedelic to me. I asked my tour guide, who was great, if he’d heard any stories of Prince using LSD, and his guess was as good as mine, but he agreed with me that the odds Prince experimented with psychedelics in the early-mid 1980s were highly possible. He did confirm he had recently bought a vinyl copy of the “cursed” Black album that Prince’s MDMA experience told him not to release and that it was in fact quite good. To me the anthropomorphism of Doves, the unique phrasing, and the descriptive adjectives of the Purple Rain-Around the World in A Day era suggest that there was some experimentation going on behind the scenes. Further evidence comes in the innovative production style of 1984’s Purple Rain featuring fusions of electronic synth, drum beat compiling, with Prince’s multiplicity of influences from R&B, Funk, Rock, Pop, to Joni Mitchell’s unique voice. The energy in the building at Paisley Park is “alive” like nothing I’ve ever felt; I’d like to think that Prince was there with us yesterday, as the setup for Remembrance Day on April 21st was quite special. His office was where the magic was the strongest for me, and Emily felt it the most in the studio. I don’t want to spoil anything else about the experience and rate our visit a 10/10 (at sold out capacity). Go visit Paisley Park and pay homage to an American hero!!! RIP Prince
If LSD can be likened to the Philosopher’s Stone as has been done by psychedelic visionaries such as Alex Grey, I would argue that Prince found the elixir of life. Prince constructed his Mecca with a level of intention fitting an Egyptian king. His energy will live on as long as Paisley Park stands and fans lend him their heart.
LEGALIZE PLANTS CHANGE DRUG CULTURE THEN LEGALIZE ALL SUBSTANCES