Tomorrow, pop-country overlord Shania Twain will release her new album Queen Of Me. (Allow me to recommend her single “Giddy Up!,” a very silly song that is also a banger.) To promote the album, Twain recently sat down for an hour-long interview with Apple Music’s Zane Lowe. During that conversation, she said that she’s once gotten a truly wild offer from Prince, a story that opens up all kinds of theoretical what-if possibilities.

In 2008, Shania Twain and her husband and producer Mutt Lange went through a messy and lurid divorce. Lange had been having an affair with Twain’s best friend Marie-Anne Thiébaud. Three years later, Twain married Marie-Anne’s ex-husband Frédéric Thiébaud. In conversation with Zane Lowe, Twain said that Prince called her while she was going through her divorce and that he invited her to come to his Paisley Park studio and record “the next Rumours album” — the Shania Twain version of the Fleetwood Mac blockbuster that captured and chronicled that band’s many breakups and infidelities.

Shania Twain was in tears when she told the story about Prince. After Zane Lowe made a point about Shania Twain as someone who was never concerned about genre boundaries, he said, “I’m amazed that there wasn’t a Prince/Shania Twain era.” (This was a truly goofy thing for Lowe to say, and I’m guessing someone prepped him to set up the Shania/Prince story.) Here’s Shania Twain’s response:

I missed out on that because Prince called me when I got divorced. We’re on the phone, and he said, “Shania, why don’t you come to Paisley Park? I want to make the next Rumours album with you.” And that was the weirdest thing he could’ve ever said because Mutt’s standard on where he thought I could live as a standard was that album, the Rumours album. He said that to me.

So when Prince said that to me, I’m like, “Aw man, I’m not even divorced yet! I’ve been dumped, but there’s no divorce yet. This is way too ironic, what you’re saying.” And I’m such a major Prince fan. And on top of that, I hadn’t found my voice yet. I was still working on it. I was so far from finding it, still. I was writing, but I was too insecure to get with Prince in the studio. I was too insecure in every way.

Plus, I’m on the phone with him, and I’m swearing, like I always do. He says to me, “Well, if you do decide to come to Paisley Park, there’s no swearing allowed here.” So that was another strike. I’m like, “Oh no, I love you so much, but I don’t think I could get through writing and recording an album without swearing somewhere along the way! What are you going to do to me if I swear? I’m going to have to stand in the corner or something!”

I wasn’t sure about that. I don’t think I was ready for what all that was going to mean for me. I didn’t give up on it or anything, but then he died.

So the Shania Twain/Prince versions of “Second Hand News” and “Dreams” and “You Make Loving Fun” and “The Chain” and “Gold Dust Woman” will have to live in our imaginations. Here’s that part of the interview:

@zanelowe Shania Twain shares an epic and ultimately heartbreaking story about missing an opportunity to work with Prince #shaniatwain #prince #music #story #fyp ♬ Morning with U – Tollan Kim

And here’s the full Shania Twain/Zane Lowe interview:

Queen Of Me is out 2/3 on Republic Nashville.