The Prince and 👁️
Like most boys, I grew up idolising my dad. By any measure, he is a man worth idolizing. A hometown hero, he was born in Stoke and went on to play for Stoke City over 400 times. I’ve met Stoke fans who have his face tattooed on their arm.
Norman ‘Bite Yer Legs’ Hunter (the infamous Leeds United hardman) once famously said, ‘If you think I’m hard, you should have a look at that nutter at Stoke’. My dad was a hardman’s hardman. (To spoil the narrative somewhat, this wasn’t my experience, he’s a big softie who loves his family).
So obviously my formative years were spent watching my dad play football in the 70s in front of huge adoring crowds. Never one to shirk a battle, he broke over 28 bones in his body during his career. Blood and Thunder. No Guts, No Glory.
I spent my teenage years though, idolising a very different man. A god in my eyes. The antithesis of hyper-masculine working-class 70s football. That man was Prince.
It’s only now that I look back and realise what a contrast this is. Prince hit me like a bolt of lightning and I became obsessed.
My teenage years coincide perfectly with Prince’s imperial phase, just look at this run of albums:
Age 13 - 1999
Age 15 - Purple Rain
Age 16 - Around the World in a Day
Age 17 - Parade
Age 18 - Sign O The Times
Age 19 - Lovesexy
If you were born in 1969, how were you not a Prince fan?
I saw him live 4 times during the 80s/90s (and it would have been 5 if he hadn’t cancelled the London leg of the Sign O The Times tour). Wembley Arena - 1986 and 88, NEC 1990 and Earls Court 92. For the 88 Lovesexy tour, my friend Richard made us both custom t-shirts with the ‘YES’ logo from the album.
Richard and I would spend whole days at a small shop in the small town of Otley, West Yorkshire. That shop was The Revolution, dedicated to all things Prince. It was run by a guy called Chris who dressed like Prince and, I believe, used to run the official UK fan club.
I bought everything that my pocket money allowed. Imports, rarities, albums by related artists. I had every release by The Time, Morris Day, Jesse Johnson, Mazarati, Madhouse, Vanity, Vanity 6, Apollonia 6, Sheila E, Wendy and Lisa, The Family, Jill Jones and many more besides.
Prince is the ultimate pop star, he famously wrote, performed and produced all of his albums himself, playing all the instruments. But he could also put on a show, he was cool, he was sexy.
I plastered my bedroom walls with posters of him, when I went to university my economics degree folders were covered in Prince pictures.
He wasn’t just a pop star though. He represented so much more. This otherworldly, gender-defying, stunning rockstar taught me that there was so much more to life than my life up to that point had shown me.
I could still love my football but don’t believe that it is everything, there’s a whole kaleidoscope of possibilities out there and Prince was here to show you all of them.
For me, the pinnacle of Prince’s output is Sign O The Times and we’ve just recorded a special bonus edition of The Long Play talking about why I love it so much.