The “I’m Every Woman” performer also revealed she’s planning to release an album of music made with Prince
Chaka Khan’s memory is a little fuzzy.
In a new interview with The Guardian, the “I’m Every Woman” icon, 72, recalled time spent working with Prince — and revealed she can’t remember details of one particular night spent with him and George Benson.
Fans submitted questions for the interview, with one noting they attended an afterparty for Prince’s 1995 show at Wembley Arena held at the Astoria Hotel in London, where Khan and Benson joined the late “Purple Rain” singer for a performance around 4 a.m.
“Four o’clock in the morning? No one’s doing anything but craziness at four in the morning! So I’m sure it was like a wild, wonderful night,” said Khan.
When it comes to looking back, the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductee advised the fan not to “look for the little details” and rather “remember the big feeling you had.”
“That’s how I handle my memories. I don’t remember a lot of what I did,” added Khan. “And thank God! I’m a “next!” person. Life is about what’s happening now, what’s coming next.”
She continued, “I’ve done a lot in my life, and over half of it I don’t remember. Did I ever keep a diary? Oh, hell no. That takes a special kind of patience.”
Elsewhere in the interview, Khan opened up about the experience of performing alongside Prince. “It was like working with myself, more than anyone else I’ve worked with,” she said. “Sia’s bringing up a close third, behind Prince and Miles Davis. Quincy Jones, too: he oozed inspiration and shared it.”
The “Ain’t Nobody” artist detailed, “Prince just grabbed ideas out of the air and left you wondering: ‘Where did you get that?’ He was a really deep and beautiful thinker.”
Khan then dropped some news. “We worked on a lot of songs, and they’re all going to be on a CD I’m soon to release – there’s a lot of red tape that’s been in the way, but we’ve cleared it. It’s him and me and Larry Graham, together,” she said.
Next month, Khan will embark on The Queens Tour alongside Patti LaBelle, Gladys Knight and Stephanie Mills. Kicking off May 9 in Las Vegas, the tour will make 20 stops at arenas throughout North America and wrap Oct. 5 in Cleveland.
“Sharing the stage with my amazing sisters is an absolute honor,” she said in a statement about the tour. “Music is about connection, and this will be a celebration of the joy, power, and love that it brings to us all.”