Comeback records always worry me, especially when they're made by one of my heroes, and I'd heard stories about Gil Scott-Heron recently, about drug arrests and prison terms and other troubles. I wasn't prepared for the ravaged shakiness of his voice on this record or the raw spoken word pieces or the dark electronic backgrounds.
There's very little I can sing now. When I asked my first voice teacher, who was the best one, "When will I know when to stop singing?" he said, "Your voice will tell you." And it is very, very difficult to sing now.
As you get older one tends to develop what I call a wobble. I would rather eat glass than let that happen to my voice.
I think that if my voice for some reason changes - because your voice does change - then it's time for me not to sing.
It's not that I always had this impeccable voice. Some 15-18 years ago, I started noticing that I could not reach higher octaves.
Time is my enemy. Time will catch up with me vocally. And I dread that. I dread to think about life without singing.
It's amazing to hear, as a voice matures and then starts to decline, what kind of emotion is still conveyed by a really good vocalist.
I don't sing anywhere as good as I used to, and I feel sincerely that it's getting worse.
You know, your voice can only last for so long. It's a muscle and when you get older it sort of fades away.
My voice had a long, nonstop career. It deserves to be put to bed with quiet and dignity, not yanked out every once in a while to see if it can still do what it used to do. It can't.
My singing days have passed. My voice is gone. My throat is worn. And my lungs are going fast.
The people that can't sing anymore that had great voices are the people that went away for five years and then just decided to come back. And you just can't make a comeback. Comebacks are no good. You have to just keep singing. Or keep dancing.
