A year ago this Labor Day weekend I was wrapping up a whirlwind weekend in Minneapolis/St. Paul with my friend Blake, trying to process a whole lot of emotions. Besides spending time with a close friend, which is always a good thing, I got to get some closure on Prince’s passing. To some, this might be silly, but Prince was one of three guiding musical influences in my teens that helped make me who I am. If you had told me that before the age of 50 that I would lose all three of them (Michael Jackson and George Michael were the other two), I wouldn’t have believed you. But here I am, still moved every time one of them pops up in daily life. While George was the one I related to personally, MJ and Prince brought joy and passion to the plate in ways that changed the music industry and influenced future generations.
Why am I writing this now? Besides the one-year mark, I need to get some of this out. I have about 10 blog posts from over the past two years that have never seen the light of day because I either wasn’t driven enough to finish them or I felt like I couldn’t do them justice. I was deeply moved by much of the stories and art I saw on the fence at Paisley Park, and yet, for a while there, anything I came up with to relate my story felt inadequate in comparison. Even my year-end compilation was over a month late this year.
I can’t make any promises because I’ve broken a few of these in the past, but if nothing else, I want to finish those posts that make sense to finish. If nothing else, it’s time I pay proper tribute to my personal Holy Trinity. Stay tuned…
It’s funny how different groups of friends will ask about different aspects of the London trip. Work folks tend to ask about monuments and sights, family asks about the quality of the trip and whether I enjoyed it, and blogger friends ask about what I bought at the record shops.
While it wasn’t my plan when I went in, I ended up finding CDs for other friends that I was going to give as souvenirs, instead of shot glasses or thimbles. One friend who is a huge ABBA fan is getting an Agnetha CD and a pre-success ABBA CD (“Ring Ring”). Another friend from Indiana will be receiving a Hoosiers CD. Those of you in the US should understand the joke; for those outside of the US, Indiana’s population is referred to as Hoosiers.
I was thinking that me trying to stay away from blogging for a whole week would be difficult, given how music-centric this trip was going to be, but I stayed busy enough that it wasn’t an issue. There will be several posts upcoming that were inspired by the trip, but here are some quick thoughts and observations.
T-minus 10 days until my departure for London, and I am already partially incapacitated with excitement for the trip. England has always been my #1 destination, and now that I’m approaching the next decade of my life, it’s finally going to happen. I’m trying to leave as much of the planning up in the air as possible, but things are starting to firm up. Of course, I scheduled a trip down to Stonehenge on 12 May (have to get into that habit for a week or so), and then found out today that Paolo Nutini will be playing in London that night as I return. Argh. Would love to see some of the new material live.
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