Big Brother was supposed to take over in 1984 — not a 5’2”, 26-year-old musical polymath from Minnesota. But with the June 25, 1984, release of Purple Rain, Prince took his throne as a global pop star.
The album “was like a magic bullet,” Revolution guitarist Wendy Melvoin tells Billboard ahead of Celebration 2024, a five-day Minneapolis party with performances from The Revolution, Morris Day and New Power Generation. “He knew there was lightning in a bottle.”
Purple Rain, which will turn 40 in June, poured onto Billboard’s pages as soon as it came out.
‘WET’ BEHIND THE EARS
When Prince released his debut album, For You, the April 29, 1978, Billboard hailed it as “a one-man gangbuster” from an “18-year-old musical phenomenon who goes only by the name…