Chaka Khan takes a pause, then, at a volume barely above a whisper, says: “I can’t say I was shocked… But I was definitely hurt, disappointed.”
The big-voiced, big-haired, larger-than-life disco diva is feeling very raw.
It’s not the gloss of showbiz sympathy in her voice, it’s a very real pain.
The cause is her late friend Whitney Houston’s daughter Bobbi Kristina, who’s been on life support in a coma for two months after being found face down in a bath – a chilling echo of her mum’s death at a Beverly Hills hotel three years ago.
Chaka has known Bobbi Kristina, 22, since she was born and has been a close friend of Whitney, her ex-husband Bobby Brown and her mum Cissy for decades.
She even let Whitney cover her own hit song I’m Every Woman.
Like Whitney, Chaka has fought drug addiction and has seen her family suffer the same fate – explaining why her first reaction to police finding drugs at Bobbi Kristina’s home was one of being let down.
“I’ve been in conversation with the family,” Chaka says.
“Everyone’s devastated, everyone. I love Bobbi Kristina, I love Whitney, I love Bobby Brown. I love Cissy – I love them all.
“But we just have to wait for what happens next. All I want to do is be there for them. I just need to pray.”
Chaka, 62, was among the mourners at Whitney’s funeral after she died in 2012, aged 48, and she knows how her close friend would feel about the tragic situation.
“Whitney would be devastated. I wish she was here,” says Chaka, quietly.
“You really don’t know what this is like for a mother until it happens to you.
“I think I’m pretty close to feeling what she would have felt and what she’s feeling right now, wherever she is.”
In public, Chaka is the loud, brash, don’t-mess-with-me queen of funk.
She boasts 10 Grammys, 42 years in the business, 18 albums, a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, and has produced anthem after anthem, including I’m Every Woman, I Feel for You and Ain’t Nobody.
But away from the limelight, Chaka has been fighting a long battle with drugs and booze. Her dad Charles used heroin and Chaka openly indulged in drugs until the 1990s.
She once almost died after accidentally mixing cocaine and sleeping pills. Then she later struggled with alcohol abuse before going sober in the early 2000s, only to get hooked on painkillers after an injury.
Chaka – real name Yvette Stevens – has been trying to stay off all kinds of stimulants since June 2013.
Giving her only British interview ahead of her appearance at the Love Supreme Jazz Festival in East Sussex this summer, she says: “I call myself an ex-addict. For years I was having fun and it all made fun more fun for me. But life changes.
“As entertainers, we are highly sensitive people and there’s no way things can’t get to you. But you have to find ways to protect yourself from that crap.
“I’ve cut back on a lot of friends because they’ve got problems. You have to hand pick your situations.”
One accidental slip up came a few weeks ago at rapper Snoop Dogg’s party.
She laughs: “The place was filled with marijuana smoke. I was there for four hours and it took me two or three days to recover just from breathing in there!”
Part of her determination to stay sober is granddaughter Daija.
Her son Damien, 36, was cleared of murder after accidentally shooting a friend in 2004, but went on to face more personal struggles, meaning Chaka was given custody of his daughter, now 14, in 2011.
“I just look at it like I’ve got another chance to do a better job at raising a child,” beams Chaka.
“To pass on my wisdom.”
She raves about Daija wanting to be a doctor, her high grades and the shih tzu toy poodle she bought for their shared birthday last week.
What’s more, she’s confident Daija won’t fall foul of the family curse of addiction.
“She’s seen enough addiction at her young age,” says Chaka.
“There’s more than one addiction in my family and she’s seen the worst of it, even when she didn’t know what it was. She’s aware, astute and her eyes are wide open. She’s totally anti.”
Yet Daija has never heard her gran sing. Chaka laughs: “She does give me advice though. She’ll be like, ‘Nanna, I think you should do something with this guy!’”.
It’s advice Chaka’s taken. One surprising new friendship is with man-of-the-momentSam Smith, who she met after he described her as his icon. The pair now plan to collaborate.
“Sam and I have become pretty fast friends,” smiles Chaka.
“We text every day. I send him motherly advice. He’s filling an important slot since we lost Luther Vandross. He’s got a long career ahead.”
Chaka has warned him about the “tough industry” but it’s with matters of the heart that she’s most concerned about newly-single Sam, and she speaks from experience.
By the mid-1980s, Chaka had already racked up two failed marriages to Hassan Khan and Richard Holland.
While she had her children Indira, now 41, and Damien, she struggled to find someone she could really trust – for a long time, love and fame seemed incompatible.
“Now that Sam’s a big star it’s going to be even tougher to find love,” she warns.
“One never knows if a person loves you, or the artist. It’s awful, ghastly.”
Another close friend in the same situation is Lindsay Lohan. Chaka was wrongly accused of feuding with the actress when they met in rehab in 2013, but they were actually very close.
“She’s one of the most beautiful, eloquent people I know,” says Chaka. “It makes me very sad people are horrible to her.
“Her heart is looking for love, that’s all. Maybe she’ll find somebody to be good to her – I pray for that.”
Born in Chicago to a beatnik dad and the eldest of five siblings, there’s not much Chaka hasn’t seen. And she feels no need to pretend she’s something she’s not.
She confesses she’s not much of a fan of modern music, except for Sam.
“I don’t play music in my house. I don’t listen to music in my car unless I have to,” the singer says frankly. “A lot of music today, I can’t stomach.”
Instead, she loves locking herself away watching crime shows in her Los Angeles home – a “sanctuary” that’s not decorated with any of her 10 Grammys.
“They’re at my mum’s house,” she says. “I’m not a flaunter. I want comfort in my home. I don’t want to look at flipping Grammys.”
And don’t get her started on celebs who glamorise gun crime.
“Anybody who has a gun tattoo or wears a gun necklace is someone who wants to be something they’re not,” she states. “A real gun carrier, nobody knows he has his gun on him.”
She knows what she’s talking about. Chaka was part of the militant civil rights group the Black Panthers in the late 1960s – until the day she was given a gun.
“The Black Panthers was all about self-defence and defending yourself against the powers that be,” she says.
“I was just a kid, so I guess it made sense to me and it still does. But it made me sick carrying a gun. If you have a gun you have to decide you’re going to use it.”
Chaka threw the weapon in a lake, quit and started singing in clubs. That decision led to a phenomenal career, but also that certain loneliness. “Is it hard to find to find good friends? Absolutely,” Chaka admits.
“I have two or three friends. Just two or three. It’s about being around the right people – the people you feel love you for who you are.”
One good friend is fellow legendary singer Joni Mitchell, 71. Chaka’s even making a tribute album next month.
“She’ll come round my house and we just talk s***,” laughs Chaka.
“She’s a great teacher and philosopher, it’s mostly about the state of the world. I’ll sing her songs to her that she’s forgot. It’s funny.
“We don’t talk men though, she ain’t interested and I ain’t interested.
“Would I change anything in my life? I don’t think so. I’ve no regrets. The good and the bad, the cuckoo and the uncuckoo has made me the amazing woman I am today
Chaka Khan Wasn't "Shocked" By Bobbi Kristina Brown News: "Whitney Would Be Devastated"
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