Earlier this year, Sade announced the launch of her Soldier of Love tour, which is her first world tour in over ten years. Fortunately for me, I was able to secure a ticket to one of her U.S. shows! There has always been something about Sade’s music that has always inspired me and I knew that this was a unique opportunity that I didn’t want to pass up.
When reading Sade’s “Bio” page on her web site, it appears that this interest is perhaps more relevant to me than I originally thought. Here are a few excerpts to illustrate why.
Integrity
Soldier of Love is only the sixth studio album the band Sade have released during their 25 year career, and the first since Lovers Rock in 2000. For Sade herself, as the lynchpin of the group’s songwriting effort, it’s a simple matter of integrity and authenticity. “I only make records when I feel I have something to say. I’m not interested in releasing music just for the sake of selling something. Sade is not a brand.”
Reinvention
“I never want to repeat myself,” Sade herself says. “And that becomes a more interesting challenge for us the longer we carry on together.”
Persistence
Somewhat to her surprise, she found that while the singing made her nervous, she enjoyed writing songs. Two years later she had overcome her stage fright and was regularly singing back up with a North London Latin funk band called Pride. “I used to get on stage with Pride, like, shaking. I was terrified. But I was determined to try my best, and I decided that if I was going to sing, I would sing the way I speak, because it’s important to be yourself.“
Priorities and Timing
For most of the past 20 years, Sade has prioritised her personal life over her professional career, releasing only three studio albums of new material during that period. Her marriage to the Spanish film director Carlos Scola Pliego in 1989; the birth of her daughter in 1996 and her early 21st century move from North London to rural Gloucestershire, where she now lives with a new partner, have consumed much of her time and attention. And quite rightly so. “You can only grow as an artist as long as you allow yourself the time to grow as a person,” Sade says. “We’re all parents, our lives have all moved on. I couldn’t have made Soldier of Love any time before now, and though it’s been a long wait for the fans – and I am sorry about that – I’m incredibly proud of it.“