Legendary artist Prince made a rare appearance this week on PBS's Tavis Smiley show, where the notoriously private singer revealed a childhood battle with epilepsy, growing up with a demanding father and why he didn't vote in this year's historic election.
"I've never spoken about this before, but I was born epileptic," he told Smiley.
Of his adolescent struggles and being teased, Prince said: "Early in my career I tried to compensate for that by being as flashy as I could and as noisy as I could."
There to promote his latest release, LotusFlow3r, the icon talked to Smiley about his father's tough love approach.
"My father, he was so hard on me. I was never good enough. And there was something about that ... it was almost like the Army ..." he said. "I think from him being so hard on me, that the one thing I got out of it is that I understood in his harshness, he wanted me to excel."
The singer does not vote as he is a Jehovah's Witness, but said of President Barack Obama: "he seems like he means well."
To see clips from the two-part series, visit Tavis Smiley's site on PBS.
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