We recently passed the one-year anniversary of David Bowie’s death, and the 12-month marker for Prince’s arrives this April. After a long period of mourning and reflecting on the two icons, Yale University weighed in last week with a multi-disciplinary celebration of both. There were lectures and roundtable discussions, but for a more visceral celebration of Bowie and Prince, New York art rock vets TV on the Radio ended the four-day (Jan. 25-28) event with a concert, which, like the rest of the extravaganza, was free and open to the public.
Below, watch TV on the Radio perform at “Blackstar Rising & The Purple Reign: Celebrating the Legacies of David Bowie and Prince,” where they put their spin on “Nothing Compares 2 U.” The classic ballad came to national prominence as a No. 1 Hot 100 hit by Sinéad O’Connor in 1990, but it was actually written and composed by Prince half a decade earlier.
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The New Haven, Conn. event also included speakers like Solange, Questlove, Sheila E. and Donny McCaslin, the jazz bandleader who collaborated with Bowie on 2016’s Blackstar.
According to Setlist.fm, the rest of TVOTR’s set consisted of their best-known originals, like “Wolf Like Me” and “Staring at the Sun.” This wasn’t the first time the group has covered The Purple One, though; we leave you with their rendition of “Purple Rain,” from a Minneapolis show in 2015, back before everyone was doing Prince.