There are still a lot of questions surrounding the death of Prince, and these questions are not for me to answer. The only question I have been thinking of is: What’s a world without Prince? Prince was always the older brother I never had, turning me on to new types of music on each record. From the sexual angst of a teen listening (and then buying) “Little Red Corvette” and 1999 to the neighborhood dance parties with Purple Rain, to getting older and discovering his early records while still paying attention to newer stuff as his career progressed, Prince always had something new in his bag for me. Yes there was mystery, yes there was seclusion, but he was Prince. When I interviewed Questlove for the Dust & Grooves project, it was evident that Prince had a huge influence on Ahmir. As we went through the Prince section of his record space, his encyclopedic knowledge of the artist was just as enthusiastic as his story of getting a whipping from his dad for getting caught listening to Prince’s music as a teen. That’s the thing, Prince reached just about everybody in a different way. His genius, I feel, was still not at its full potential, and we will never know what could have been. But alas, almost forty albums later, and whatever he has locked up in his vaults at Paisley Park that will hopefully come out at some point, I’m sure we haven’t heard the last of him. As for the question of: “What’s A World Without Prince?”, I have one word: sad. However, we still have his vast music catalog to console us, as well as the plethora of songs he wrote for other artists as well. So if you’re just sumping into Prince right now, just do us a favor. If you want to go out and buy Prince records, don’t get duped to spending your life savings on them. You can find a lot of his back catalog at a flea market, yard sale, or boot sale for a low cost. The cost is cheap, but the music is not. #RIPrince.

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