The Kept Ones by Bunny DeBarge

Author:Bunny DeBarge [DeBarge, Bunny]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781664141223
Publisher: Xlibris US
Published: 2020-11-15T05:00:00+00:00

Chapter 23

After the Dance

Our second album, All This Love, went gold, and we did not miss a beat. Right after Motown 25, we were summoned back into the studio to begin working on our third album. Our release date was scheduled for some time in September 1983. We were elated when El was tapped to produce the album. This would give us more creative control than we had had on the previous albums. It also allowed us the freedom to do things the DeBarge way. El hired Barney Perkins as our recording engineer. We had become great friends with Barney after meeting him when he assisted other engineers on our previous albums. At the time, Barney was just learning studio work alongside each of us. Now, we all had the opportunity to put the skills we had learned to good use. He suggested we work at Kendun Studio in Burbank, California, and Westlake Audio in West Hollywood. We were individually and collectively on the grind with writing new material. It was an opportunity for us to showcase the DeBarge sound on each track. We would be able to critique our own music and determine if it made the final cut.

Bobby had finished his solo project. Both he and Larry Blackmon had produced the album. The final production was great, but Motown put a halt to its release. Bobby returned to California to take pictures for the album cover. However, it had become evident to Motown that he was still struggling with addiction. Unwilling to spend money on promoting the album, Motown dropped Bobby from the company. Afterward, I watched as my brother’s life spiraled downhill. He became severely depressed and no longer interested in the music business. Bobby’s drug addiction further escalated. He had gone from abusing Tussionex pills to drinking a cough syrup named Citra Forte. Bobby never went back to smoking cocaine, nor did he touch heroin again. The cough syrup he was abusing was based with morphine. It had the same effect as heroin and was just as damaging. My brother enjoyed being sedated. This was truly his preference, which is why he used sedative medication as opposed to drugs that increased his energy level such as cocaine. Bobby believed the Citra Forte calmed him down and sedated the pain torturing him mentally. He had never dealt with the pain of our childhood. Then to add to the pain he was enduring with the lifestyle he had chosen made life for him nearly unbearable. Bobby talked to me often about his tortured soul—but not without being under the influence of the medication he was abusing. He was caught up in a vicious cycle. He was now hooked on the syrup and big-time. He would purchase bottles and bottles of syrup at one time. He started out taking just an ounce. By now, though, it had intensified to ounces at a time. I was truly afraid for my brother’s life.

No longer with Motown, Bobby did not have the money to finance his addiction or lifestyle.

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