It's a little hard to believe but it's been a week now since Prince's sudden death on April 21. Like a lot of you, the Entertain This! crew has been going back and listening to a lot of His Royal Badness' material from across the years, and it's dawned on us that he left behind some pretty solid advice for how 2 live your life.
1. Men aren't as into the Lolita thing as you may think they are
The lyric: "Act your age, not your shoe size"
The song: Kiss (1986)
Prince basically told women to forget everything Cosmo — and society in general — had been telling them about what how to attract a man and just be who we are.
2. Don't let life (or the haters) drag you down
The lyric: "If the elevator tries to bring you down, go crazy, punch a higher floor"
The song: Let's Go Crazy (1984)
When I was new at USA TODAY, I realized that the elevator light indicators turned white if the car was headed up (to heaven), and red for down (to hell).
(I won't even get into the "life imitates art" aspect of Prince dying in an elevator.)
3. Enjoy your time while it lasts (before it's party over, oops, out of time)
The lyric: "Life is just a party and parties weren't meant to last"
The song: 1999 (1982)
And anyone who's out of their 20s can tell you that partying all the time is just exhausting. Just ask Sia.
4. Look around at how lucky we are to be alive right now
The lyric: "Them kind of cars don't pass you every day"
The song: Sometimes It Snows in April (1986)
This track, which came from the same album as Kiss, finds Prince mourning a friend he lost to drugs, but he chooses to be happy the friend was in his life at all. And given the date of Prince's death, Sometimes It Snows in April has takes on a whole new dimension.
5. Breaking the rules is so much cooler when you know which ones you're shattering
The lyric: "Make the rules, then break them 'cause you are the best"
The song: Cream (1991)
Prince has often told audiences that he wrote this as a pep talk to himself. But how many episodes of Project Runway or Top Chef have we watched where the winning contestants were praised for showing they knew the rules before proceeding to break them?
6. Kill the girl and let the woman be born
The lyric: "Women, not girls, rule my world"
The song: Kiss (1986)
Maturity is sexy, dammit. Prince said so.
7. Be careful about the people you give your heart to
The lyric: "The beautiful ones, they hurt U every time"
The song: The Beautiful Ones (1984)
We've all fallen for someone really pretty knowing full well from the outset that we were gonna get destroyed.
8. It's all about attitude (which you can have even if you don't watch 'Dynasty')
The lyric: "We will smoke them all with an intellect and a savoir-faire, no one in the whole universe will ever compare"
The song: Seven (1992)
This track, which referenced the Bible's Book of Revelation, was one of Prince's more religious — and inscrutable — songs. People have argued whether Prince was talking about the seven deadly sins, the world's seven major religions or the seven assassins from 3 Chains O' Gold, a direct-to-movie he wrote. Who cares? This early '90s track song oozed confidence. It also was overlooked in most discussions about his best music over the last week but it belongs in the conversation.
9. Be an optimist
The lyric: "If you don't like the world you're living in, take a look around, at least you got friends"
The song: Let's Go Crazy (1984)
This one doesn't require much translation: Look on the bright side and appreciate what you have. And if you don't like your situation, do something about it.
10. Embrace change
The lyric: "Honey, I know times are changing, it's time we all reach for something new, that means you, too"
The song: Purple Rain (1984)
In the context of the Purple Rain film, he was both telling a woman that if she didn't choose him, their friendship was over and putting Morris Day and the Time on notice that he was the new thing, but it's also a reminder that change, while scary, isn't always bad.
