It seems today that easily the most commercial Prince offering is not music or a movie, but rather the omnipresent Purple Rain t-shirt.

It's out there on almost the same level as the Nirvana, AC/DC shirts or whatever else people buy at Target.

So when I see people wearing this version of the Purple Rain t-shirt this I assume they're not really fans, but they bought the shirt ecause it was there and other people wear it.

So, cut to the chase....

I'm at my local dispensary this week wearing my Paisley Park purple hoodie and some guy says something to the effect of "Purple People" and it takes me a second.

A fellow Prince fan; a sort-of next-level Prince reference.

Very cool.

Ever happen to you?

Meeting a fellow fan in the wild?

---------------------

These are the days of wild!!

No, but I don't think I'd walk up to them either way. I got a Prince shirt custom made a few months ago and have worn it twice so far but nobody said anything.

whenever I run into someone with a pocket full of Trojans i'm like

I was recently gifted a Purple Rain t-shirt by a friend, and it took some inner adjustment before I could wear it unironically. Such a cliche, but still, a great album, eh? He does have other albums, though . . .

I once got a "Woah . . . that's rare" with a smile of wonderment, in the summer of 2014, from a man near Union Square in NYC, over my Lotusflow3r t-shirt, which I'd gotten unexpectedly in the mail, as I recall, because a batch were sent to those who'd bought the Crystal Ball set a few years earlier.

And it was a moving experience to take the metro to the Prince memorial shortly after he died, and see more and more Purple People in the buses and train cars converge onto Los Angeles City Hall with you, wearing every kind of Prince gear: sometimes it wasn't anything specific or even purple but you could tell from the overall look that you had something in common.

I had people stare at the various Prince shirts I wear around town and even a gasp at the symbol bomber jacket I got from the Immersive Experience store, but noone has approached me as of yet. The reactions do make me chuckle, tho.

Oh, I've had MANY experiences over the years, both with people complimenting my gear, or me noticing someone else's. Most recently, I got into a conversation with a vet tech when I took my dog in for her annual exam. I was wearing a Prince shirt (Sign O the Times), and she lit up "oh, you like Prince?". We talked for a while, and she told me to check out her car on the way out, which was decorated with a couple stickers and a symbol license plate frame.

ShellyMcG said:

Not personally. But I remember a friend of mine telling me that when he was in New York he was wearing a Prince symbol T-shirt and some homeless guy approached him and talked to him for ages about Prince and the homeless guy was telling him all about how to access bootlegs online of the Sign O' The Times rehearsals.

Well that's "interesting".

In 1997, at the Jam Of The Year concert, I was wearing a custom-made T-shirt and was approached quite a few times asking me which kiosk I bought it from (because they wanted one).

But right after Prince passed, I was wearing the Starfish and Coffee T-shirt that Susannah put out, and I got a lot of people who recognized and liked that T-Shirt.

paisleyparkgirl said:

ShellyMcG said:

paisleyparkgirl said:

Well that's "interesting".

Honestly, the most interesting part is how a homeless guy was able to acquire bootlegs of anything. What with him being homeless and all.

That's what I found interesting. How are you homeless but you still prioritize getting Prince bootlegs ?

oh yeah!

about 15 years ago i was at a small music fest here in Germany and a friend told me, "hey, there's another american here, do you know him?" (racist, i know )

so, then i go search the guy out and see a black dude with huge dreadlocks, no shirt and think "gotta be him" (super racist, right )

as i walk up, i then notice one of his tattoos that read "friend, lover, sister mother/wife"

i said, "nice to meet you" shook his hand and then said, " track twelve, cd two!"

it was cool to hang out with the guy and laugh about everything, but, after that fest, never heard from again.

On another note, we saw Judith Hill last fall in a small venue.

Before she began to play a song from 'Back In Time' (can't remember which one ),

she told a short story about the writing process, and that Prince made her go and write the lyrics in a different room than his room and he called her ten minutes later and said he was already finished!

That's when i threw my jacket up!

Judith just glanced away

paisleyparkgirl said:

FragileUndertow said:

I usually dont approach people, but I have a few times. Nothing too interesting to share but here goes.. I was at some concert a year or 2 ago. The guy sitting next to had a Purple Rain shirt on. I said You are a fan of prince. He was like yeah. I said "cool I've seen him like 7 times" he nodded at me. End of conversation. I thought this fool is no fan He is probably just wearing the shirt because he thinks it's cool Some woman came into my work place with a Paisley Park shirt on. I said I love your shirt, I'm a big fan. she went on how she seen him multiple times, etc. she went to Paisley Park, how I should go some day.

To be honest I've kind of pulled back in social situations when another Prince fan instantly pulls the "I've seen him __x__ amount" because I never saw him live and I get a little self-conscious about it.

One time I was at CostCo and the customer and employee in front of me were going off into another dimension. Like both had seen him live 30-40+ times and were like upper echelon card-carrying fanatic level, like trading war stories from attending multiple dates of the Lovesexy tour etc.. I didn't even bother to interject once, I felt like a Purple Rain n00b next to these two, like what would I even add,

"uh yah. ever seen Rave un2 the year 2000 DVD? That was cool."

I've never had a ton of merch, but the only item that anyone has ever commented on is a Purple Rain shirt I bought at Paisley Park.

I have a black hoodie that has "Coachella" in white letters across the chest, but the "o" is replaced by the Prince symbol, colored purple. It's my favorite Prince gear. Outside of my friends and a coworker, no one has ever said anything to me about it. I wore it to a concert the night that Prince died to honor his memory. Fortunately, my motivation wasn't fishing for acknowledgment, because I received exactly none. But I'm comfortable chalking that up to a "please don't talk to me" vibe that I must give off, versus the public's indifference to Prince.

I only have two Prince t-shirts that I wear out in public and I like them for opposite reasons.

The first is the standard black Purple Rain album cover art shirt that everyone has and I like that I can be kind of like an undercover fan in it because it's so ubiquitous and other fans won't bother me. Having said that, I was wearing it in the airport in Athens, Greece last year when another American sees it, runs up to me excitedly and says, "I love your shirt! And that's true because I have around eight of them." And then she walked away. That totally caught me off guard, having just arrived in the country.

The second is a black Under the Cherry Moon shirt which I love because it's not one I've seen anywhere else and I really like the movie (unlike most people) so I consider that one special. I wore it once to an FKA Twigs concert and had multiple people there approach me commenting how cool they thought my shirt was.

CAL3 said: