Catching Up With... Solomon Burke

Paste: Over the years, you’ve come to be known as a skilled interpreter of people’s songs...
Burke: Blessed!

Paste:...so speaking to all these things you were just talking about, that sort of philosophy and attitude—does that inform the songs you choose to record? Are you looking for some of these things to decide whether you want to sing it; what do you look for in a song?
Burke: I’m looking for that special, special, special message of the times, and I’m looking for the times of the future because we don’t know the day or the hour, we just don’t know. We have no idea what’s going to happen. But if we read and study what life has been about, then we understand that it’s a circle, and we have to come back to the circle. Everything is based upon mathematics and time. And God is time and mathematics, he’s love, and we look at love and it’s a complete letter, it’s four letters that mean so much to us, and we all need that, we all have to have it, in some kinda way. We’ve got to send that message out and keep sending it out to take away all the negativity and hate and confusion because, if not, the world is just gonna walk away from us. Our children need so much attention, love needs to be put back into the homes. You know, it needs to be taught not just in the schools, but in the homes and the schools so that our children are more respectful. Education is so important ... these are things we need to think about. There’s a saying, ‘Charity begins at home and spreads abroad.’ We need to take care of home. This is the greatest country in the world? It should be all of that and some more, in every way. We shouldn’t have to have a section of a city where people are poor and destitute and hungry and on the street, without food and without clothing. There’s no way that floods should not be taken care of by our people—we have engineers and people that do that. I sit and watch TV sometimes and I watch these shows where they, ‘BUILD A HOUSE IN SEVEN DAYS!’ Why don’t we have 50 companies like that? Building 50 houses in seven days? You know, I think it’s so great when it’s happening on TV, but there’s so many other hearts out there that need to be mended. And so many homes that are lost and destroyed.

Paste: I was just in New Orleans this weekend, and it’s still a mess. It’s unbelievable.
Burke: It’s heartbreaking. And then what happens—God’s sending a message, ‘OK, you’re not cleaning up this? Here’s another mess for you to clean up!’ And there’s lives that are being lost, families that are being destroyed. There’s something we’re not doing that we’re supposed to be doing. We’re not coming together and helping each other like we should. And it’s about the Red Cross and the Salvation Army and all these people who are helping, and Feed The Children, which I think is a great program, but we need to feed each other; we need to strengthen each other. Can you imagine people marching on a town, rebuilding a city within a month? If we all got together, if we released our soldiers from battle, and had our engineers come into these cities and towns—this is what entertainers should be talking about. This is the voice that we should be crying out for.

Paste: Do you feel that Like a Fire speaks to this in any way?
Burke: I think it’s a beginning; you have to keep pushing it out piece by piece. Have you been to a party and the hors d’oeuvres just keep coming? And you say, ‘The hors d’oeuvres are so good, man, I don’t wanna eat all those hors d’oeuvres ’cause I don’t know what they’re gonna have for dinner.’ You gotta keep doing that, you gotta keep setting out those great hors d’oeuvres so when the dinner comes you can really enjoy it, or you’ll be so full on the hors d’oeuvres, you’ll realize, ‘This was the greatest party I’ve ever been to.’ And we have to make this the greatest country in the whole world 10 times 10 times 10. But we gotta do it in unity and harmony with one another, we gotta start with our kids, our families, our homes—and the music is the only healer that gets through all the barriers. There’s no discrimination in music. Just separation of thought and taste. But it still gets through, doesn’t it? It still makes its way onto an iPod or Myface or MySpace or whatever—internet. It still gets through. It’s still there. I mean, you’re able to listen to something and say ‘I like it’ or ‘I don’t like it,’ and that’s wonderful, that’s exciting. And I’m preachin’. I’m supposed to be talking about the record. ... It’s important that we communicate with these songs, it’s important now, especially for me. I’m not out there making a record for people to jump up and down and do a new dance and have 16 dancers shakin’ it. I’m out there to try to put a song in your heart where you whistle and you hum, and when you feel good, you sing that song, or when you’re riding along in your car and you say, ‘Man, let me put on some music to keep awake or to relax me, or I had a stressed day, let me deal with this, put this on my iPod, I’m gettin’ on a plane and I need to relax, I’m going down the highway or I’m coming home and I don’t wanna watch the same news on TV, I wanna hear something that soothes me, soothes my soul.’

Paste: Do you feel like when you were younger, back in the ’50s and ’60s when you were recording, I mean, obviously people think about different things at different periods of their lives; were these things always on your mind, or is it more as you’ve matured and gone through life? When you were younger, were you, ‘Hey, I just wanna make a fun song for people to dance to?’
Burke: Well, I thought in the earlier years that it was important for me, being a minister, starting from the ministry as a child, I’m always interested in making music with a message, but the message has to be stronger and has to last longer. I mean, we’ve made songs about “You Can Make It If You Try,” “Goodbye Baby Goodbye,” “The Price,” “If You Need Me,” “Cry To Me,” “Down In The valley,” “Everybody Needs Somebody.” I’ve recorded songs like “What Am I Living For,” “When I Lost My Baby I Almost Lost My Mind”—I seen so many people go half crazy because they were in love, to me that makes sense, you know? “I Can’t Stop Loving You.” And you just go on and on—“Got To Get You Off My Mind.” You think of all these songs, “Don’t Give Up On Me”—to me, these are messages that just constantly have to be set down so people know that there’s support and that there’s somebody standing by and that you’re not alone. You’re not alone. The pain that you’re going through, the confusion that you’re going through. And it’s important to know that you’re not alone, and this is what happens to a lot of our young people—they feel they’re alone, they’re by themselves, and they get into drugs, they get into things that they can’t control. And not just our young people, the older ones, too. Heartbreak, pain, suffering, loneliness is a waste of time. That’s what it says in “Cry to Me”: “Nothing sadder than a glass of wine alone.” And all of these little blips to go out are messages of comfort, and that’s what I’ve been trying to do all these years. And try to make the #1 record, the record that’s the one in your heart and mind, somewhere.