Prince's songs see massive 815% spike in sales after 'Let’s Go Crazy: The Grammy Salute to Prince'
'Let's Go Crazy: The Grammy Salute to Prince', the CBS concert special has gotten a significant boost in sales since it aired on April 21. The special tribute, which was taped in January, celebrated the legacy of the iconic artiste after his fourth death anniversary.
The two-hour special featured a host of performances from some of Prince's famous friends and collaborators such as John Legend, Beck, Gary Clark Jr and Mavis Staples. They too are now benefiting from a spike in sales. We witnessed some supercharged back-to-back performances from Prince's catalog of songs as we joined the audience amid loud cheers and emotional moments.
The show began with a high-energy jam by Gary Clark Jr.'s rendition of 'Let's Go Crazy' with Alicia Keys on the guitar. Later, performances included 'Nothing Compares 2 U' by a shirtless John Legend, Miguel pulling some sexy moves and singing 'I Would Die 4 U' and a spicy performance by the show's host Maya Rudolph who sang 'Delirious' with her Prince cover band Princess.
After Rudolph's 'Delirious' rendition, the second-to-last performance was a particularly notable one as it featured 'Purple Rain', the iconic number by The Purple One off his album of the same name which released in 1984. Soul singer Mavis Staples gave a powerful performance of the Prince classic along with Prince's former band The Revolution.
As they rightfully deserve, Prince's catalog of songs along with the songs that were performed by the tribute's guest artists, earned an 815% sales gain on April 21 in the US, according to initial sales reports to Nielsen Music/MRC Data, Billboard reports. The songs sold just over 10,000 downloads — up from their 1,000-mark on April 20.
Prince's songs that gained the most sales on April 21 were 'Purple Rain', 'Let’s Go Crazy', 'Little Red Corvette', 'I Would Die 4 U' and 'Kiss'. In honor of the great funk legend, let's hope to see more success for the special tribute.
Read our article on Prince's usage of symbolism, his sexuality and how he influenced the funk genre here.
Check out the Pandemic Playlist of our favorite Prince songs here.