Artists Honor Prince With Concert Covers
A number of artists who were on the road when the world received word of Prince's sudden passing decided to honor the late icon by taking a few moments to offer performances of his classic songs.
Slipknot and Stone Sour vocalist Corey Taylor happened to be booked for a show at First Avenue in Prince's hometown of Minneapolis the night the news broke, and as you can see in the fan-shot footage above, he altered the evening's set list to include a show-opening acoustic cover of Prince's 1984 hit "Purple Rain." "In a world where so many people treat music as a commodity, it was always refreshing to know that it was always Prince," he told the crowd. "He may be gone, but we have a lifetime of music." Taylor also included a cover of "Little Red Corvette," which you can also check out.
Elsewhere in Minnesota, Mumford and Sons treated the crowd at their gig in St. Paul to a performance of "Nothing Compares 2 U," the Prince composition that Sinéad O'Connor turned into a massive hit in 1990. You can watch that performance too.
Singer Alicia Keys, who scored a hit with her cover of Prince's "How Come U Don't Call Me" in 2001, made room for the song during her set at the Highlife Ballroom in Manhattan on April 21. According to Billboard, Keys offered praise for Prince from the stage, telling the audience, "We lost someone very special. Prince showed me what it means to be an artist ... how to be bold and brazen. ... There was nobody like him before, and there’s not going to be anybody like him after."
Prince's influence was also felt on the Broadway stage, with singer Jennifer Hudson taking the stage after a performance of The Color Purple to offer a cover of "Purple Rain." "He said his music will live on and he will live through his music," Hudson told the crowd, "so we want to keep him alive today with this song." And at a performance of Hamilton, the cast honored Prince with a suitably energetic cover of "Let's Go Crazy" that doubled as a dance-off.
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