Your music is so authentic and it’s so personal and so spiritual, and vinyl is the best way to preserve that authenticity and that honesty, so it makes sense that is the medium most closely associated with your music and label. One of the first scenes that embraced your music and the Daptone world in general is the jamband scene. Is there a particular show or festival you played that helped you cross over into this new audience?
All of those festivals, I never knew about those before we played. Once you go there and you see how many people come out at the festival… Even backing up Phish [at Festival 8], I didn’t know the band. I was older than those guys—I was older than everyone in the band. I didn’t know who they were. I picked up so many fans being at that Phish concert, being on that video. People still say to me, “Oh man, I never knew who you were until I saw you with Phish, and I’ve been a fan of yours ever since.” We were with Tedeschi Trucks Band last year, and we picked up their fans. Even over the years, things are just going great and the movie is now out. People who never even came to see one of my shows are seeing the movie for the first time and learning about us for the first time, too.
Miss Sharon Jones is the most in-depth look into your career and has started to bring you to an entirely new audience: the film world and also a segment of arts patrons who don’t seek out live music on a regular basis. Knowing you had this different medium to explore, were there any specific messages you hoped to get out?
No, I never even thought about it. All I knew was that some of the songs in there, like “Get Up and Get Out,” take on such a different meaning, because I get to break it down. It just came to me one night while I was on the stage. When I was in the hospital, it was like, “Cancer, you get up and get out.” I’ve always had the shouting thing in my work—that’s part of my repertoire. I get to show people my lungs and the energy I have and how much I love doing that by shouting. But to be able to do that in that song, it took on a different meaning for me. We changed it—we had to change the music in order for it to have the feel of [what I am going through]. We would just change it around and give it a Tina Turner feel, and I would just yell. “Get Up and Get Out,” that was my song that took on a whole different meaning with me and my band. I showed them when I shout, I got that energy, some stamina left in me. It went that way for me, to tell the cancer to get up and get out.
The other song was “Stranger to My Happiness.” Doing that video, recording it when I was bald, at first I did not want to go and do it. Then I said, “No, do this video. This is so my fans can see me and see that she’s strong enough to do this video.” So, those songs had a different meaning, because I was a stranger to my happiness. My happiness knew that I was getting ready to go on the road, and the album was coming out, and then I get sick, so my happiness went away. All those months I was down and out, I didn’t listen to any music, so when they came to me to learn that song “Stranger to my Happiness,” it took on a different meaning. Every time I see the video now—no one knows the pain I went through to get that video. In between each take, I had to sit down and cover up. When I see it, I’m like, “OK, that video went to my fans, and they saw that I’m okay.“
I know you’re on the road now this summer with Hall and Oates, how are you feeling now?
It’s a struggle with the chemo. I get certain effects, like neurology in my feet when I’m standing. It came back in three different spots, and they had me on the patch, Fentanyl. The Fentanyl made me really sleepy and high. This is where I’m at now, and I’m getting ready to cut back on a lot of the pain medication I’ve been taking. That’s the difference—I’m doing these shows, feeling a little loopy and really lethargic. I had talked to the doctor, tonight were going to cut the medication from 50 to 25.
You mentioned that seeing that video reminded you of your struggle and inspired you to get back to see your fans. Has seeing the documentary inspired you in a similar way?
Being able to see this movie is getting me through this battle again, because, the other day, I was like, “I can’t do this.” I have to allow myself to have a pity party. I have to allow myself to cry. I have to allow myself to feel bad. But when the medication starts to affect me vocally, this is what I’m doing. My energy—I dance, I get on stage. If I can’t do that, I feel I don’t need to do this. But, seeing that movie, I said, “Oh Sharon, get on up, get back out there. You still not in pain if you got that energy. Get on stage and do the best you can.” That’s where I’m at now. Now all you guys asking the questions about the movie is good for me right now; it’s my new therapy, and it’s getting me back out here, giving me that extra boost.
Are you working on any new material that maybe talks about your struggle, or are you letting the movie feel that void in that sense?
We ain’t working on anything else right now. I’m just concentrating on getting through these shows and getting through the movie and then we’ll see what’s next, try to get another album out.
Bringing things full circle, you are from the same town, Augusta, SC, as James Brown. How do you feel your upbringing shapes your music?
You know what, the only other bands from my hometown that inspired me were people like Mickey Murray and stuff like that. He did that “Shout Bamalama.” He was from my hometown. Back in the ‘60s, I was inspired by so many different things. I was a kid—in ’66 I was 10 years old. I would just hear what was on the radio, and we would dance and see what the latest crazes were. To go home and see how big James Brown was in your hometown… I didn’t even think about James Brown anymore up until recently, when one of his songs made me miss my hair and be proud of who I was—my blackness: He said, “Say it loud, I’m black and I’m proud!” He would always come out telling kids, “Don’t be a dropout, education is important.” Those little things coming up, that’s part of me, but I never thought that I’m gonna sing soul music and be like James Brown. Later on, Aretha Franklin inspired me and a lot of the female groups inspired me. Motown, anybody from them back in the days, that was my inspiration in the ‘60s and stuff. But, to go home know that somebody from your home was doing good deeds, that was a good thing.
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