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The plan is to meet Bobby Charles in his hometown of Abbeville, Louisiana at a local restaurant. He usually sits at the third table. Unfortunately, it doesn’t open until 5 p.m., so we meet in a Lafayette Copeland’s—not as picturesque, but there’s something poetically odd in the juxtaposition of Austin Powers’ Goldmenber on the television behind the bar, Sheryl Crow singing about soaking up the sun over the in-house PA and one of rock ’n’ roll’s legendary songwriters telling the story of Bob Dylan hunched over on the floor of his house copying down lyrics during a break in the Rolling Thunder Revue tour.
“Better days,” he says. It has been his toast for years, and he raises his water glass. He’s had them. He walks with a cane because of his bad back, and when moves a children’s CD from one hand to the other so he can shake, he briefly loses his balance. He’s down a kidney from cancer, but that has been in remission for the last five years. The morning of the interview, he fell getting out of the shower and had a hard time getting up.
But life wasn’t always this hard. Hearing Charles talk, though, you get the impression he’s had his share of adventures. His stories are peopled with known rogues and hellraisers. When I mentioned Bobby Charles to songwriter Dan Penn, he said, “Bobby Charles, Bobby Charles,” and you could hear the smile on his face. He said it with the slow cadence you use to call someone a son of a gun admiringly.
“He’s a warm cat.”
Where are you living these days?
I got a little farm right outside of Meaux, Louisiana. Thank god because when I got wiped out of Holly Beach, man, I had no place to go. I had to buy myself a trailer and get that hooked up and that took god knows how long. I had to stay in Lafayette with a couple friends of mine for about two months.
I know you lost your house in Holly Beach. Is part of Holly Beach actually gone, too?
The whole thing was wiped out. The only thing standing was one of my palm trees. I had two double palm trees planted in the front yard and banana trees. It really looked tropical, man. Great place, beautiful, right off of the beach. I could see all the birds and the shrimp boats at night. It was beautiful. Some days were better than others, but you could catch redfish man, twenty pounds. I could go right in my backyard, when I first moved there, before I had cancer, and I’d go fishing everyday to catch myself speckled trout and cook them for dinner.
That’s gone and now they want us to build 20 feet up. I can’t climb 20 feet up. It’s impossible. I can’t do it. They want to operate on my back but I had this friend of mine who is a nurse and a specialist. She worked for some doctors in New Orleans, and she said, “Whatever you do, don’t get a back operation because 75 or 80 percent of our clients come back with problems.” She said it’s very dangerous surgery, a back operation. And I live alone. I don’t have anybody to help me; I’d never make it. I can barely make it now. But some people just don’t understand. We all know what cancer is, you see it every day on TV. But until it hits home, you don’t realize what it does to you. And I had to have my teeth pulled. One thing after another, the day before I had an appointment 12 years ago, didn’t think hardly anything and then my house [in Abbeville] burned down.
I heard about that.
I had to move to the studio and stay there because I had to be in the studio that night anyway. I was working on a record. I was doing anything and trying to keep my mind off of what has happened to me. You don’t know what it is to lose everything until you do lose everything. That happened to me twice.
I don’t want to live next door to you.
I’ve seen fire and I’ve seen rain, man. It’s something you just don’t get over, you know? You have to start all over buying everything—clothes, towels. I had just finished spending over $20,000 remodeling my house when Rita hit.
That’s one of the things I don’t think gets talked about enough, the damage Rita did.
That’s right. All they talk about is Katrina. A Funny story: I called Fats Domino the night before the storm. And I always sing him a little song every time I call him and talk to him. I called him and said, “Hello Domino / you better pack your clothes / maybe go to Las Vegas and do some shows / ’cause you don’t want to be around when Katrina comes to town,” and we laughed for about a half hour. Then I said, “This is no laughing matter. I’m serious, you better get out of there” He said, “My wife won’t get out the front door for nothing, and my youngest daughter is staying there with her. I can’t leave my wife and my daughter.” I said, “No man, you’ve got to make them leave. You have got to get out of there.” He told me he wasn’t leaving and when I saw what happened, I said, “Oh shit, man. He must be gone.” I had one of my kids call the state troopers and tell them who I was and I wrote some songs with Fats and he was a friend of mine, and I would appreciate if they would check his house and see if he was alright. And sure enough, they got him out of the water. He wouldn’t have made it if they wouldn’t have went. They were far from there. It’s a sad situation.
Tipitina’s Foundation is leading the effort to rebuild his place. They’ve got it gutted and are in the process of rebuilding. They took it down to the studs and are putting it back together.
It won’t ever be the same. The whole town will never be the same, except for gambling and gangs. That’s it man, people getting killed.
I was glad to see your name on the Jazz Fest lineup. I didn’t get the impression you wanted to play anymore.
Well, I don’t really, but I was going to do that because I’ve got this new record [I’m working on]. I wanted to do whatever I could do to move the record.
Did you record it at Dockside Studios?
Yeah, because I can’t even drive to New Orleans anymore. I can’t sit down for a long period of time. I can’t walk far. It’s unbelievable, living in pain.
Nothing messes you up like your back
People don’t understand pain, and that you can’t do something. They will not accept that. They just don’t fucking know. To them, it’s just another word.
I’ve been having problems with my back for a long time, man. But it’s getting worse. I can’t believe I slipped off the damn tub in the shower. I had soap in my eyes. It was just… well, I made it. Here’s to better days (Clinks glasses).
It can’t get tougher, that’s for sure.
Well I’ll tell you, sometimes…I just wish it would hurry up. Get it over with. I don’t know how much more of this I can take.
But, I’m going to keep trying. My last visit to the doctor, my oncologist said, “You’re a walking miracle, Bobby. I can’t believe you’re still alive.” I said the will to live is a mighty strong thing. Anything living doesn’t want to die.
Obviously, you’re still writing. Do you write often or regularly?
Just when I get an inspiration. I have to be inspired. I’m working with Dr. John right now on his new album. We’ve got a song in a movie. I said, “What is the movie about?” He said this young guy in high school that was a nerd, and he couldn’t get any or go out with anybody, and he was madly in love with this major model and then he scored her, and then 30 years later, they meet again and he scored her again. I said, “Well, I know the name of the song—“How Lucky Can I Get.” We wrote the song right there and it’s going to be in the movie.
I’ve got another movie coming out called Everybody Wants to Be an Italian, and they are finally going to use me singing “But I Do.” That was sheer luck. I couldn’t believe something lucky was happening for a change. After 50 years in the business, man. On an almost all-black label [Chess], I could never get any accolade off a white station, not even in my own hometown. That is very depressing
You are one of those people who show what a brutal business the music business can be.
It’s horrifying. You know, though, I was born with the gift of music. I just finished writing one song, and I liked it so much I kept singing it myself trying to remember the melody because I can’t read or write music. I can tell when you hit a wrong chord or wrong note; I can hear it all up here.
One time I couldn’t remember a melody, so I had to call [manager] Jim Bateman’s office to put it on his answering machine because my little cassette player wasn’t working anymore. Sure as shit, I dialed the wrong number. I dialed Ben Keith’s number in Nashville, a good friend of mine, a peach of a guy. Ben’s wife Elizabeth gets on the phone, and I’m, like, “Oh my god. Elizabeth is the kind of girl who when she gets on the phone, she keeps talking. I said, “Elizabeth, I’m sorry. I dialed the wrong number, I’ll call you right back.” She says, “What, you don’t want to talk to him? You don’t love us anymore?” I said, “Elizabeth, you don’t understand” and she said, “I know you, Bobby Charles. You want to put the song down, so you don’t forget the melody.” I said, “That’s right, so let me go and I’ll call you back.”
I finally got her off the phone and called Jim’s office and sang the song on his answering machine so he could know the melody for me. Because they come and go so fast. A lot of my melodies are real simple, but as simple as they are, the easier they are to forget. Some of them stick with me and I can never forget them.
That’s what makes them a good song?
That’s right. The melody
Can you go a month without writing a song?
Oh, yeah. Sometimes I’ve gone two or three months without writing a song. As soon as I get an inspiration, that’s it. It doesn’t take me but 20 minutes to write the song.
Do you ever worry that when you hit a slow spell that you’ve written your last song?
No. I know that it’s a gift from God. It’s not going to happen. And I don’t try to force myself. I used to try to do that.
What can you tell me about when you were performing in the 1950s.
I was the only white one on the bus. I played in black clubs. I’ll tell you what—I got an education that you could go to college for a hundred years and never get. And they all accepted me that was the nice thing about it. The Platter, Frankie Lyman and the Teenagers, B.B. King—I played with just about everybody.
Did you know then that you didn’t really want to perform?
Yeah, I didn’t like it. Really strange, man, like when we’d get to Mississippi and Alabama and people wanted to kill me. They tried to shoot me and they tried to beat my ass up. I said, “Nah, no more of this shit,” you know? I said I’ll just put the songs down and let somebody else do it as long as I can make a living.
Did you like being on stage?
It was all right when I first started, but after a while, when people start trying to kill me, that’s not fun anymore. I made up my mind I wasn’t going to do it. Once in a while I’ll get onstage, like when Willie [Nelson] comes around.
I’d imagine when there were days or nights when you had to pretty much sneak out of town.
I was riding with Chuck Berry on one tour, and Chuck Berry loved them white girls, and they loved him. And one big football player from Mississippi didn’t go for that at all. I was just lucky that everybody on the bus liked me and they protected me, really. They were the ones that saved my life I don’t even know how many times. But after that, I’d had enough. I never wanted to be a star really.
Being a star sounds like a lot of work.
You have got no idea of how people treat you. You have no privacy, I mean even today people still bug the shit out of me—“Man, my kid just wrote 20 songs I want you to listen to them.” I said, “I don’t listen to 20 of my own songs.” That’s why I don’t tell anybody where I live because they just don’t stop. Unbelievable.
