Nothing compared 2 U: Prince’s versatility combined a universe of pop in one star

Pick a sub-genre and Prince was not only fluent in it, but at his best could surpass that style’s top creators.

The artist, who died at his home in the Minneapolis area on Thursday at age 57, was among the most versatile and restlessly experimental pop artists of our time. A crafter of melodies and lyrics whose early work connected disco and synthetic funk and whose fruitful mid-period merged rock, soul, R&B and synth-pop, Prince’s muse as it matured contained multitudes.

Prince, genre-defying music genius, found dead in an elevator at age 57

Whether hardened protest soul of Sign o’ the Times, the catchy new wave of When U Were Mine, the psychedelic pop of Raspberry Beret or the bawdy bathroom ballad Darling Nikki, Prince explored the breadth of American music, in the process uniting generations and connecting disparate fans who otherwise didn’t agree on much.

During the decades in which he made music, Prince lorded over a pop landscape that was increasingly fractured, and he alone seemed to understand how to unite it all under the same house-quake roof.

Balladry? Nothing compares to Nothing Compares 2 U, his heartbreaking song about a lost love that Sinead O’Connor turned into a hit. Prince’s version is more minimal than hers, but the impact of its kicker line — “All the flowers that you planted, sugar, in the backyard/All died when you went away” — is as devastating as they come. Not only a human heart but nature itself has been destroyed by a lover’s departure.