Why Is It So Hard?

Life hasn't been easy for Charles Bradley. Watching the 2012 documentary, The Soul Of America, you see a man desperately wanting to provide for his mother, to get out of his apartment in the dangerous Brooklyn projects and to get by as a performing artist.

For years he'd work odd jobs before going into bars at night to perform as James Brown impersonator Black Velvet. Eventually, he met Daptone Records' Gabriel Roth and, aged 62 in 2011, released his debut record, No Time For Dreaming. A critical hit it saw Bradley traverse the globe performing his impassioned brand of deep soul.

“I love what I'm doing, but it is bittersweet,” he admits when asked how he's enjoying success. “I've been wanting this dream and wanting this chance for a long time and at the age of 62, somebody finally found me and gave me a chance. If it happened a long time ago there would be more love in the world, because what I give out is nothing but love.”

Asked whether success lives up to his expectations, Bradley begins what will become a theme throughout our conversation: the need to be honest and true.

“I tell you, the music road is a hard road, it's not all about the glitz and glamours and how you look on stage. You got to learn to keep your health up, your integrity, you got to be honest with your spirit and you got to go out there and give it from the heart.”

In Bradley's eyes there'd be no use having success if you didn't get it honestly. “If I never truly got there, I could at least rest and feel peace in myself and say that I didn't give up.

“I gave my heart, I got on my knees, I did everything – I washed toilet bowls – anything to keep my honesty. I didn't lie or cheat to get there; I did it from the soul of my heart.”

Years on the streets, as a teenager, almost dying after an allergic reaction to penicillin, and waking up to police surrounding his house after his brother was shot and killed are just a few of the rough situations Bradley has found himself in. While the music helps, sometimes it's hard to get it out.

“Heartaches And Pain [from No Time For Dreaming]. I haven't been singing that for a while because it still bothers me. My music, what it does when I sing it, it opens up the spirit and opens up the moments that I was going through those trials and tribulations. That's why sometimes it's hard to sing it, because behind every lyric, behind every word, there's a picture in my brains that I see, that I been through, and I have to learn how to deal with seeing that picture again.”

He's returning to Australia with His Extraordinaires, a great backing band, but one Bradley doesn't see himself working with in the long run.

“I want a universal band; I don't want just one race, I want to mix them up, I want everybody to come in and I want to hand pick them. I want people who been through a lot of hardships in life and kept their love and capacity strong, because I know when I get that feeling behind me, when the guys' getting on stage, they're gonna rock my soul. That's one of my dreams.

“When the spirit hits me I want to get out of that box, but the music won't let me get out of that box. When my spirit opens up it opens up to give. If the band don't know how to capture me and follow me and give me the soul I need, I have to come back and then the music starts being drawn out and I don't like what I'm doing, I just want to stop.

“You can go to school and learn about music theories and music your whole life, but if you ain't got that deep spirit of music inside you that you were born with, nuh-uh, you're not gonna get real music, you're gonna get music that you were taught in school to do.

“I ain't sayin' it's that wrong, there's theories in music that, when I sing, I have to learn myself, but when I get into the spirit, it seems like my spirit already knows those things. People tell me 'Charles, I thought you said you didn't know that'. I don't know what I did, but I did it! I just let my spirit free.”