Celebrating the legendary Candi
Musician Candi Staton (circa 1970) is still touring and she is now into her 80s.
Her personal story is inspiring too, and she has survived domestic abuse, alcoholism, and a number of marriages. Survive she did and her career still continues to this day.
Back in 2016 I wrote a column here about the greatest living music artists, where I talked about the likes of Prince, Stevie Wonder, and Aretha Franklin. Unfortunately, Prince died the day it was published, which none of us expected, so I don’t want to further curse the likes of Candi and other similar legends now. Aretha died a couple of years later in 2018 and but I’m grateful that so many wonderful artists are still with us.
At All Together Now recently, many of the music arenas reverberated with the sounds of Sinead O’Connor, who had sadly just passed. I played her music at each of my own performances but on the Saturday of the festival, during a show at the Grub Circus, where we matched music with wine, the most popular track was the evergreen classic by Candi Staton, ‘Young Hearts Run Free’.
We ran a little competition, won by Pascal Rossignol of Latitude, where ‘Young Hearts Run Free’ proved to be a key component in getting the crowd up and dancing, and as I prepared to spin it I couldn’t help but think of the outpouring of love that Sinead was receiving after she had now passed.
I spoke about how we should celebrate our legends more while they are here and Candi Staton is one such legend whose music I will always play.
In my 30 years of DJing I don’t think ‘You got The Love’ or ‘Young Hearts Run Free’ have ever been too far from my sets at clubs, festivals, and radio, and these are just a hint at one tiny part of her career.
Young Hearts Run Free rejuvenated an already distinguished career in the ’70s as her music took a more disco orientated edge but long after disco disappeared from fashion she was still filling dance-floors too.
In the ’80s and ’90s disco emerged once more as house music and the source mix of ‘You Got The Love’ married Candi’s incredible vocal to the groove from ‘Your Love’ by house godfather Frankie Knuckles.
It’s the best mix of a song that still works well today and even credible covers by the likes of Florence and the Machine can’t come close to touching Candi’s track.
Thus she became a survivor on the dance-floor and in life itself and it’s great looking at her regular facebook updates these days, as she continues to tour for the last time. Post ’80s and ’90s her career, which started in the 1950s, has again developed with a number of heralded, critically acclaimed projects, and as always a variety of styles were at play (Americana, r&b, blues, and country).
When I was co-running the Pavilion nightclub we hosted Candi and I also interviewed her on my show on Cork’s RedFM. Collecting her from the train station in Cork with my baby daughter Lola in the car I was apologetic that she might be inconvenienced with the extra company, but she couldn’t have been more down to earth and friendly, and she was delighted that her own granddaughter was with us too.
I can’t speak highly enough about her great company in Cork, and as always she blew us all away on stage too. I’ve seen her many times live in Ireland and she always kills it.
Last weekend I appeared at a festival for my friend Siobhan, who has used the ‘Young Hearts Run Free’ moniker for many years, to celebrate all the best in music and arts and culture in Ireland.
Candi’s live performances will soon be over, but she has promised that she will still write and continue to be active. She has survived not only domestic abuse and alcoholism but breast cancer too, and she is an inspirational person even outside of all the music.
Her dad was an alcoholic and Candi admits to many mistakes with men, and she was also exploited by a cruel music industry many times. Her music means so much to many of us and I’m delighted to be celebrating Candi Staton here today.
