Sasquatch! Saturday got off to a gut-wrenchingly good start, with a beautiful performance by Charles Bradley & His Extraordinaires. Before Bradley took the stage, his band opened up with a short instrumental solo, then one of the members stepped up to the mic and growled, “Are you ready for the Screamin’ Eagle of Soooooul?”
Bradley sashayed out and barely hesitated before launching into the somber “Heartaches and Pain,” a track dedicated to his brother, murdered years before. The devastating loss of his brother is one of many painful occurrences in Bradley’s life, and he’s stated to the press that he finds healing in putting music to his stories.
As he howled out those songs, however, his face revealed each and every emotion the music was trying to convey. Then the set’s mood changed, and Bradley seemed ready to give us his more upbeat tracks--meaning things were about to get sexy. Prior to the love song in which he sang “I need you so…got to got to have it,” Bradley busted some serious dance moves, and girls thirty years his junior went wild with catcalls.
Near the end of the set, the band got serious again, with Bradley stretching out the lyrics to, “Why Is It So Hard?” for maximum effect. Behind him a trumpet and saxophone moaned in accord, and when Bradley told us, “There’s one thing life gives us…and that’s love,” he was met with a wave of agreement from the crowd.
