80s Madness: Prince’s Purple Rain Claims Championship

For the second year in a row, Hector Alfonso of Espinosa Cigars has claimed the Battle of the Bands title. In one of the most stunning matchups in Battle of the Bands history, Prince’s Purple Rain, the winner of Hector’s bracket defeated Metallica’s Master of Puppets 60% to 40%.

Hector won the 2022 Battle of the Bands 90s Madness competition with Nirvana’s Nevermind.

The matchup was bizarre. Purple Rain built up what seemed to be an insurmountable lead with 16 hours to go, moving up to about a 63% margin and 7 vote lead.  Master of Puppets mounted steady comeback and took the lead by one vote with about 12 hours to go.  Prince then mounted a second surge, and that was enough to cruise to a 9 vote victory.

Master of Puppets has been a big story in this tournament. Metallica’s Master of Puppets, an 8-seed opened the tournament with a shocking upset over top seeded Michael Jackson’s Thriller. What followed were dominant wins over Bon Jovi and ZZ-Top to win John’s bracket and advance to the Final Four where it defeated AC/DC’s Back in Black. Master of Puppets knocked out two of the biggest albums in history with Thriller and Back in Black.

We will be tallying the entries and selecting our prize winners sometime in the next week. We will be planing a special show for Prince featuring our four panelists sometime in the upcoming weeks. Winners will be contacted and we will announce as well.

The following was Prince’s Purple Rain’s run to the Championship.

• Prince Purple Rain 85.7, Madonna Like a Virgin 14.3
• Prince Purple Rain 70.6, Rush Moving Pictures 29.4
• Prince Purple Rain 51.6, Beastie Boys Licensed to Ill 48.4 (Won Hector’s Bracket)
• Prince Purple Rain 58.5, Guns N’ Roses Appetite for Destructio 41.2 (Advanced to Finals)
• Prince Purple Rain 60, Metallica Master of Puppets 40 (Championship).

To view our brackets see below.

• John’s Bracket
• Hector’s Bracket
• Dave’s Bracket
• Coop’s Bracket
• Elite 8 Overall