Charles Bradley: Soul of America Page #3

Then my brother Joseph, he came to hospital to see me

and he reached over and he kissed me.

He said, "Charles, no, no."

He whispered in my ear. He said, "Bro, if you don't want to live for yourself, please live for me."

He said, "Charles, I love you. You're my heart."

I said... I said, "Joe, I'll fight. I'll fight."

My brother just told me.

He said, "Charles, do something that you want to do. Follow your dreams. You love music. Do it."

I said, "Joe, I'd like to be someone like you." He said, "You don't want to be me. Be you."

He said, "Cos I can't do it like you do it."

I remember when I was a kid, when I was in Florida, Joseph was going to piano school,

and how I learned these little things I'm playing on the piano by watching him.

I was trying little tunes myself.

He said, "Follow your dreams and your music."

And he said, "Take one of these rooms in this house and fix it up."

He gave me this room. "People can come here for a rehearsal." And that's what I did.

Joe was like a father and a brother. He was a beautiful brother.

Yeah, sit down, Charles, and eat.

You know, I'm not hungry,

but you eat and then we'll start slowly talking about what you did.

- OK, I'll leave this here for you.

- That's fine.

'I'm tutoring Charles.'

He's at kindergarten or first grade reading level

and reading comprehension level.

"Other writers interested in my story."

OK, you sounded it out. Did you understand everything that you read?

Um...

- Yes and no.

- Yes and no.

I think his number one goal is for him to be able to write his lyrics down fast

when they're coming into his head because he's got a lot of words up there he wants to get out on paper,

but he doesn't know how to do it.

You didn't spell "an" right.

- Oh. Two N's?

- Just one N, no D.

- Oh, "an"...

- "And" is like when you put two things together like...

- Right, OK.

Fish AND chips.

- Thank you.

- Bye, Charles. I'll see you next week. Thank you.

You got it? You can read it later.

- Wrap it up. Get started.

- Get outta here.

You know I own you. You know I'm the boss.

- I bet you wish you were.

- Thank you, Mr Brown.

'Charles used to wear his James Brown wig all the time.'

Right? All the time.

'As the record draws near, it's like, "You've got to present yourself as Charles Bradley." He had a hard time.

'He wanted to come out with the cape and the James Brown thing.'

That's what he's used to getting up on stage and doing and we did not want that.

We wanted Charles to be Charles and it took a lot of convincing.

Charles has a record coming out January 25th,

so now starts the promotion leading up to the record coming out.

I'm going on tour with Sharon Jones to open up for her.

Sharon Jones is giving me a chance to expose some of my music,

to let the world know who Charles Bradley is.

It's real exciting for us as a label to be able to present these kind of packages

and Charles is the perfect guy to add to any of the shows

and get his name out on the heels of some of the other bands that have had success up to now.

If we go some place and we have 1,000 people come to see Sharon,

to be able to put him in front of that audience is a huge head start.

Sharon Jones and The Dap-Kings has been our most prolific artist and our most successful artist,

the artist that's been around the longest, toured the most and sold ten times as many records.

He hadn't had a proper show in about a year or so.

You know, to also put that in context, he hasn't played a lot of gigs as Charles Bradley.

Working with Bradley live is a little stressful because he can go off in a song at any time.

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

America!

We've got to make this world a better place.

Come on, Tommy, bring it all in!

# No time for dreaming

# Dreaming, dreaming

# Gotta get on up, gotta do your thing

# No time for dreaming

# Dreaming, dreaming

# Gotta get on up, gotta do your thing

# Hey!

# Hey!

# And get...

# Why don't ya? Yeah!

# No time for dreaming

# Dreaming, dreaming

# Gotta get on up, gotta do your thing

# No time for dreaming

# Dreaming, dreaming

# Gotta get on up, gotta do your thing

# Do your thing...

# No time for dreaming

# You gotta get on up

# And do your thing... #

CHEERING Love you!

I love you too.

- I love you too.

- I love you, Charles.

I love you too!

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

Put your hands together and give it up for Charles Bradley!

Show some love for Mr Charles Bradley!

OK, you're smarter.

- That was better than last night.

- Yes, it was.

- Killed it, Charles.

It was.

I know I made a few mistakes tonight, but I'm getting better.

The audience didn't see it, but I know it and Tom knows about it.

So the last one I was good on.

'Then there was one I made a mistake on, but I'll get better on it. I promise you that.'

We can't believe they didn't put you on more! Why didn't you come back on at the end?

- Tell her.

- That's the space they gave me.

- I don't care. We want more!

More of Chucky.

Thank you, my man. Thank you. You got the juices flowing for all of us.

You just blew the roof off the place. Unbelievable. You're going to be huge, man.

I don't understand what people mean about diva. That diva word sometimes can be wrong.

- No, but it's right for you.

- Diva means...

- It all depends.

Yeah, when it's coming from love you gotta consider the source.

- Which one was yours?

- You didn't say "To Charles".

To Charles... How do you spell Bradley?

- B-R-A-D-L-E-Y.

- ..L-E-Y.

- Cool.

- You're a star.

- I love you.

- I love you, too.

- I wish the best for you.

- I wish the best for US.

- If I don't see you on the top, I will see you in heaven.

- You'll see me on the top AND in heaven.

- You'll see me down here, too.

- I love you, Sharon.

- Love you, too, Charles!

Poughkeepsie.

'I'm gonna stop by and visit some old friends

'I haven't seen in years.'

Hey, hey, hey!

How are you doing?

- I said, "God, I hope they're still there."

- Yeah. We're still here, bro.

Man, this smells good!

- What's going on, buddy? How you feelin'?

- It's been years!

- You look well, man.

- You look good.

Is that Jackie coming?

Ah! Look at Jackie!

How you been?!

My God!

I knew this guy, I know Ernest Washington, since 1968.

And you'd throw that cape off

and I don't know if one of us went and picked the cape up and laid it back on your shoulder...

- Yes, I remember that! I remember that.

- That's right.

You'd never know you went that far.

- God, I thank God I didn't give up.

- Thank God.

Let me speak to Tom. Tell Tom to put Mr and Mrs Washington on the guest list.

I found my friends.

They are totally my family. We maybe go away for so long,

- but eventually I'm going to find you. You know that, Jackie.

- We've been friends for a long time.

I get goosebumps thinking about that.

- I'll see you guys. I'll see you tonight.

- Take care. I'll see you tonight.

- Right, bud.

Oh, my God...

That's memory lane.

- #

- I...I...

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