Legendary musician Prince tragically passed away in 2016, and now, 10 years after his death, his former bandmate is speaking out regarding something that happened in the months leading up to his overdose.
“I knew something was wrong,” BrownMark told Page Six. “Something was not right with his memory and his behavior.”
BrownMark served as the bassist in the pop band Revolution from 1981 to 1986, working closely with Prince.
BrownMark Reveals The Exact Moment He Knew Something Was Wrong
The two had not been in touch over the years, but BrownMark received a call from a mutual friend, Jim Lundstrom, who was a janitor at Paisley Park.
“He says, ‘Mark, I have a feeling that [Prince is] going to get in touch with you because he won’t stop talking about you,’” BrownMark recalled (per Page Six).
And shortly after, BrownMark received a call, with the singer asking him to fly to Minneapolis as he was, “putting some things together. I want to see if you want to be involved.”
He immediately flew to meet with Prince, but when he arrived, the musician said that he “forgot that he brought me there.” As a result, BrownMark spent days in his hotel waiting before running into drummer John Blackwell Jr. in the lobby.
“I don’t have a bat number. I don’t know how to get a hold of [Prince]. I’ve been sitting here. I don’t know what’s going on,” he remembered telling Blackwell.
Blackwell then went to Prince to remind him that BrownMark was at the hotel, but Prince’s response was, “What? What’s he doing there?” After he was reminded that he brought the bassist to Minneapolis, he responded, “Oh, I forgot.”
For Brownmark, that’s when he new something wasn’t right.
BrownMark Moved To Minneapolis For Prince
GettyBrownMark still decided to relocate from California to Minneapolis because he and Prince spoke about forming a new group. But, when he arrived at Paisley Park, he remembers Prince’s initial reaction.
“You could see the panic in his face because you can see he just remembered what he had done: ‘Oh man, wait a minute. I moved him here,’” BrownMark said (per Page Six). “His memory was like really, really shot at that point.”
BrownMark went on to talk about how Prince’s short-term memory was impacted by his drug use.
“[Pills] just clouds your memory,” he explained. “And I think that’s what was happening with him because he was heavily relying upon opioids for his pain, for his hip.”
