Chuck Brown: Evolution from Three Different Angles

In this special holiday package, we target the Godfather of Go-Go, Chuck Brown from three different angles.

The first angle, “A Conversation With The Godfather”, by Richard O’Connor, is from an interview that we conducted with Chuck during the Christmas season 10 years ago.

The second angle, “A Moment In Time With Chuck Brown”, also by Richard O’Conner, is a directed look into the personification of Chuck 10 years later.

And the third angle, “The Evolution”, by NVLP, are a series video clips of Chuck himself in depth about his entire life’s story.

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FIRST ANGLE: A CONVERSATION WITH THE GODFATHER:

by Richard O’Connor
(Originally published in 1999):

“Blow Your Whistle.” “Game Number Seven.” “If It Ain’t Funky.” “Bustin’ Loose.”
“Back It On Up.” “We Need Some Money.” “Sure You Right.” “Run Joe.”
“It Don’t Mean A Thing If It Ain’t Got The Go-Go Swing.” “Hoochie Coochie Man.”
“Stormy Monday.” “Moody’s Blues.” “2001.”
What does all of these songs have in common?
They are just a few of many classic recordings of ‘The Godfather of Go-Go’ Chuck Brown.

There are many different versions of when, where and how this legend created the phenomenon Go-Go style music. So, what better time would there be than the beginning of the new century to finally clear the air and set aside the assumptions?

I caught up with Chuck during the Christmas holiday while attending an autograph session at Tower Records for his latest Christmas release, and we just chatted.

RICH: Chuck, this Christmas album has been a long time coming.

CHUCK: Yes Indeed.

RICH: Why did you finally do it now. Why not ten or fifteen years ago?

CHUCK: It took me a long time because I wasn’t inspired to do one and I didn’t have the insight on the material I wanted to do. But Ms. Eva Cassidy gave me all the insight and encouragement and motivation that I needed. She had picked some songs, I had picked some songs and they all came together very well. Now, we started in ’93 but I couldn’t finish it because we were into so many other different projects, but then after ’96 when she passed
(Eva Cassidy died of cancer in the summer of ’96) it took me quite a while to get back into it but I finally finished it. I’m sorry that we only had a chance to do two Christmas tunes together.

(young lady approaches Chuck to sign her CD)

YOUNG LADY: You know when I was 15 years old, I’m 31 now, I used to dance on stage with you at the Black Hole.

CHUCK: (laughing) Yeah, I remember. You were just a little girl about this high. You and your friend. (Chuck acts as if he has just found one of his long lost nieces. His laughter with her is warm and genuine)

RICH: This CD (The Christmas CD) is it available internationally?

CHUCK: Definitely. And you know Eva’s CD – the one she did on her own – sold all over the world.

(Chuck is signing autographs)

FEMALE FAN: Thank you Chuck Brown.

CHUCK: Thank you darling, happy holidays to you too.

(Another fan approaches)

CHUCK: Hell-O!! (in only that way that Chuck can say it) Talk to me baby!!!

FEMALE FAN #2: Regina.

CHUCK: R-E-G-I-N-A Regina!!! I’m so glad I seen her (this was one of Chuck’s famous lines from back in the day when a girl named Regina used to be a regular at all of his shows)

FEMALE FAN #2: Alright now.

RICH: You’ve raised over three generations of people on your music.

CHUCK: Tell me ‘bout it (laughing)

RICH: I can remember, when I was little, my parents partying to Bustin’ Loose. That was the main joint back then. I was only about this high. Now, I’m 32, and there’s another generation of youngins coming behind me.

CHUCK: Yeah, that was the biggest joint. I was inspired to write that, but the one that came four or five years behind that “We Need Some Money” that was the easiest song in the world that I ever wrote in my life, and the quickest that I ever wrote. I wrote it in about ten minutes. You know how I did it?

RICH: How?

CHUCK: I looked in my pockets (laughing). Wasn’t nothing in there. You’ve got to be inspired to write. When I did “Bustin Loose” everything was uptight. All this disco was going on. You could walk into a cabaret and you’ve got one DJ sitting up on the stage with some records and the place packed – and people daning – and the bans weren’t working. I’m just trying to give a little insight on the Go-Go thing which had been catching on since 1976. Then when I cut Bustin’ Loose, it really just bust loose.

READ THE REST OF THIS INTERVIEW HERE

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SECOND ANGLE: A MOMENT IN TIME WITH THE GODFATHER

by Richard O’Conner

It was a rare Chuck Brown show for a cozy gathering of nearly 200 appreciative fans. Orange Ball Billiards Cafe in Rockville, Maryland is not your typical live music venue. Matter of fact it’s not a music venue at all. It’s a sports bar with over 30 pool tables, and too many plasma and projection TV’s to count. It’s a place where the female bartenders are cute and ordinary people come to hang out after work, for games, darts, beer pong, and pay-per-view events.

The patrons are an interesting mix of men and women, black, white, Asian, Latino, young, middle age, and old timers. It’s the kind of place where you can strike up a conversation with a stranger as if he were an old friend.

On this cold snowy night in December, however, it was transformed into the luxurious “Club O” with tables, chairs, and sofas neatly placed in front of the stage area, an arrangement for which many of us in attendance were grateful. When you hit mid-life it’s harder to be on your feet all night the way you did as kids.

Although Chuck performs annually at Strathmore Hall, in Bethesda (the suburban Kennedy Center), this is his first real club gig in Montgomery County Maryland in nearly fifteen years. With that in mind I expected Orange Ball to be filled to capacity, but the weather had given us the first real taste of winter that day with snow and slush quickly turning to black ice by night. This contributed to keeping many at home.

The fact that the show was well below club capacity only added to the unique flavor of the night. Instead of being at a club you felt like you were at a private party with Chuck as the special musical guest. This intimate gathering was treated to a show that became a journey into and through time. While I have seen Chuck in recent years at the 9:30 Club, in Washington, D.C., I have seldom seen him look more relaxed, comfortable and in his element.

The first set began promptly at 11:15 as those of us who were scattered throughout the spacious venue converged on the stage area which felt more like a living room with Chuck as the warm fireplace. Not even us 40 and 50 “somethings” were too proud or too old to chant “wind me up Chuck, wind me up Chuck” as we had done in our teens, decades earlier.

As I am watching Chuck warm the crowd with one of his jazzier renditions I couldn’t help but appreciate the larger significance of this moment. We sometimes forget that he is a highly regarded contemporary of James Brown, Little Richard, Sam Cooke, and Johnny Cash (with whom he might share the most notable similarities).

We can be spoiled by the fact that we had the opportunity to grow up on his musical home cooking. For many he has been the one constant in our ever changing lives. Watching Chuck perform that night I was overcome with a sense of awe that I had not felt since the first time I saw him play at the Washington Coliseum in 1984. You could tell that, to him, we were not just 200 hundred fans. We were part of his musical family.

I live within walking distance of Orange Ball so I couldn’t turn down this opportunity to meet Chuck in person. I figured my best chance would be to ask him to autograph a couple CD’s for me.

I have met The Godfather of Go-Go on as many as four occasions throughout the last 14 years. I even interviewed him for tmottgogo.com at a CD signing ten years ago when The Spirit of Christmas was first released. He has always been accessible, approachable, warm, and friendly. But his most endearing quality is that he looks you in the eye, listens, and responds to you as if you are kin.

I cannot imagine the constant demands made on him by appreciative fans that cross as many as three generations. We all want the opportunity to be close enough to shake his hand, dap him up, show him some love. Despite our previous meetings I certainly didn’t expect him to remember me. After all, I’m neither a musician nor a colleague, just a lifelong fan.

What is also remarkable about my encounters with Chuck is that his kindness is changeless. Even when I was a struggling and insignificant freelance writer in the mid 90’s he always took time to return my phone calls. While living in New York back in ’95 I was pleasantly shocked one night to receive such a call. Polite and professional, as always, Chuck was calling me Mr. O’Connor. Are you kidding? I’m not worthy!

So on this occasion I’m looking for my “in.” How can I get a moment with Chuck? I see his manager, Tom Goldfogle around the stage area. Like the character Tom Hagen, in The Godfather movies, he serves as Chuck’s consigliere. No one gains access to Go-Go’s Godfather without first going through him.

I approach Goldfogle and mention that I have been looking for Chuck’s The Spirit of Christmas CD and have been unable to find it anywhere — true story. Borders and Barnes & Noble don’t have it in stock. I have two of my own which I bought ten years ago, autographed as gifts for two friends. I got greedy and kept them for myself — one for the car, and the other for the house. So clearly I don’t need another. But I have to ask Chuck to sign something. It’s the only way I can ask for a meeting.

So I think of Jack, a fellow school teacher who has the patience to listen to the poetic but lengthy waxings of my life on the Go-Go scene. Poor guy, he asked me a simple question two weeks ago and I took him on an hour long trip down memory lane. For that alone, I figured, I should get him an autographed copy of The Spirit of Christmas. But this only hides my real motive, which is quite simply to share a brief moment in time with the Godfather and to say thank you.

After explaining to Tom that I can’t find the Christmas CD anywhere he directs me to a booth set up near the entrance. It’s basically a Chuck Brown one-stop shop with CD’s t-shirts, and teddies. He asks me how many I need. Too embarrassed to say just one, and certain that one will not be enough to get my meeting with The Godfather, I go into “big baller mode” and say “I want three, and can I have them autographed?”

So it’s in the bag. I’m going to meet The Godfather. All I have to do is wait for intermission. This was actually the easy part. Now comes the hard part. How do I prevent myself from saying something embarrassingly stupid? I do it all the time. Being cool doesn’t come naturally to me. Truth is it doesn’t come to me at all. I’m all Steve Urkel on the inside with a tendency to say and do awkward things when I’m nervous.

Like the time I wanted, so badly, to meet Black Panther co-founder Bobby Seale that I followed him into a public restroom and waited for him to, well you know, finish relieving himself. Before he could even zip his fly and wash up I had my hand extended ready to give him some dap.

That kind of awkward is typical of me. You have no idea how many job interviews I had in the bag only to botch them at the end, or how many first dates never led to second dates because of the things I might say. And here I am about to be in the presence of the man who defines “cool.” It’s the perfect set-up for disaster.

So I’m picturing in my mind exactly what I’m going to say. Kind of like the opening scene of The Godfather when one of the not too smart bosses is rehearsing exactly what his is going to say to Don Corleone. The wait is killing me. Maybe I should go to the bar and get another drink. NO! That can only make it worse. “Stay cool. Stay very cool. “

Still standing in the general area where I met Tom, I’m doing my best to not look pressed or anxious. He knows where I am. No need to hassle him. “Stay cool brah,” I keep telling myself. Yes, the little voice in my head calls me brah, sometimes. That’s how I know I’m in cool mode.

Before starting the second set Tom signals me over. To my credit I avoided the temptation of explaining to Chuck all the other times we had met. There was simply no need. He loves all of his fans totally and equally. It would have made no difference. His warmth, kindness, and appreciation were exactly as I remembered.

As he sat down on a couch to sign my CD’s I dropped to one knee, partly in reverence and also in the hope that my words could be easily heard. I told him that the CD’s were Christmas gifts for friends. He signed them, after which comes the part where I usually botch all good things. But something special happened this time. I didn’t say anything stupid.

Well, I did say “I think you could do this for another 30 years,” which got a chuckle. I also couldn’t resist the opportunity to mention that his music has been an integral part of three generations of my family. Even my eighteen year old daughter wants me to take her to a Chuck Brown show. And with that I thanked him and left so that two other fans could have their moment with The Godfather. As I walked away all I could think was, “Man, how cool was that? I’m 42 years old and still have an idol worth looking up to.”

Timeless, in his seventies, The Godfather of Go-Go is a one of a kind story with new chapters still being written. He continues to dispense musical inspiration and personal wisdom while exemplifying what it means to be SUPREMELY COOL. Huh-Man!

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