Vic Mensa’s Slave Tattoo Was Inspired by Prince’s Battle With Warner Bros. Records

In 1993, Prince found himself in a battle with his former label, Warner Bros. Records, when a large backlog of his music was released. The fight with the record label led to Prince appearing on live TV with the word "slave" written on his face.

The move became one of Prince's wildest moments in his career and during a recent interview with GQ, Vic Mensa revealed how The Purple One's battle inspired one of his many tattoos.

Like Prince, Mensa has the word "slave" written on his body but his is tattooed on his arm. "At some base level, we're all slaves to something," the Chicago rapper said. "Whether it's slaves to our iPhones or Yahoo and Google, there's very few of us living a free life."

Tattooed in the same style that Prince had it written on his face, Mensa said the tattoo constantly makes him question who is really free. "Sometimes I drive by a homeless man and wonder who's more free," he said.

Mensa's love for Prince doesn't stop at a tattoo. In December, The Autobiography rapper made it known that if a Prince biopic gets the green light, he would like to play the legendary artist.

"I think I should play Prince in the biopic," said Mensa, who previously paid tribute to Prince by dressing up as the singer for Halloween in 2016. "Prince is one of my biggest idols of all time and he's the real King of Pop. Some people will be mad that I said that. The reason why I'd be able to kill the role as Prince is because I got that mouthpiece. Prince was butter smooth with it and I feel like I could do it."

On April 21, 2016, the day Prince died, Vic shared an Instagram image of himself showing off the tattoo with a poignant caption. "we're still slaves," he wrote. "to the industry. to consumerism. to racism. misogyny. homophobia. rest in peace to the love symbol. one of the greatest to ever do it."

Check out Vic Mensa's interview below.

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