First of December:Bryan's Journey

“Purple Rain” Prince & The Revolution [Warner Bros. Records]

Instead of me giving you facts about the recording of this album and movie, which is something that I could easily do from the purple notebook that Prince first started jotting down ideas for the movie to the infamous “Lake Minnetonka” scene being filmed in 20 below weather and how they had to film it two parts, her jumping in the lake in Minnesota and her coming out of the lake a couple of weeks later in Los Angeles. I could talk about how the song “Purple Rain” came about and how there was a homeless lady outside of the Revolution’s rehearsal warehouse who single handedly witnessed the birth of this phenomenal song. I could even talk about how Prince fired Jimmy Jam & Terry Lewis from The Time during the filming but I am not gonna do that. I’ll just tell you my personal experience and attachment to this movie and soundtrack:

The year was 1984, I was 6 years old and had just come back from living with my grandparents for a year in Miami to Houston to be with my mother. My mom had a best friend at the time whom I called Auntie LJ. Auntie LJ had a son who was probably 10 years older than me. This particular night my mom and Auntie LJ went out and of course Tajee who was my Aunt’s son was left to handle the babysitting duties. So my mom and Auntie LJ dropped us off to the movies [Cinema 6, for all of my Missouri City, Tx. people!] to see Breakin’ [part 1]. Of course I thought that movie was incredible. Turbo & Ozone killed it in that joint. But I REALLY wanted to see Purple Rain, but there was no way my mom was going to let me see that movie at that age. BTW, at 6 I was completely obsessed with Prince & Michael Jackson! So after Breakin is over, we go outside to see if our parents had come back for us. We waited a little while and then Tajee turns to me and asks me the very question I had been hoping he would ask me all night, “Say little man, you wanna go see Purple Rain?” I couldn’t say yes fast enough. So we snuck back into the movies to watch Purple Rain. First of all, it was like being at concert! The theatre was packed and people were on their feet the entire time!!! Just imagine my second two movies in a movie theatre were Breakin’ & Purple Rain! [My very first movie was Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan] Nevertheless, it was felt like my first concert. My first crush was in full effect [Appollonia]. And I knew right then and there that this was my destiny. Music. As an adult now I see all of the references he made to God, and of course now we know that this movie was really based closely to his life. Funny how certain things will always stay with you. My Purple Rain experience is one of those things!!!

God. Love. Life. Music. [& my Darling Nikki]
-BMC