Sade Soldiers On

“Soldier of Love,” Sade

I used to work out of this coffee shop in Bed-Stuy that was always playing 80s/early 90s urban adult contemporary over the speakers: Anita, Toni, Terence Trent, Whitney, Chaka, Luther, Sade. You could look out the window, across the street, at run-down old Brooklyn storefronts, the signs unchanged since the days of “Sweet Love,” and for a few seconds it was possible to feel like it was 1985. Then some new, incredible song would come over the speakers, and I would snap back into the now, Google the lyrics, download the shit out of that song, and, when I got home and was confident I was alone, sing and dance along to it, loudly, perversely, in a way that would frighten you.

I mention this because Sade’s got a new album coming out next month, and the single’s dropped, and – big surprise – it’s another perfectly executed epic love song. Ain’t nobody in the game can touch Sade on a track like this. Nobody. As befitting the lyrics, the song has a militaristic aesthetic. (This vibe is getting a little played out but I give it a pass because 1. The instrumentation is varied and innovative, and 2. This is Sade we’re talking about here.) The mood is tragic, like we’re marching down some perilous path, our lives uncertain. But this is how Sade has always seemed to view love – as a deadly serious endeavor. Even if you don’t agree, it’s hard not to get swept up in the way Sade presents it. As ever, her voice is rich, thick, pure, haunting, angelic: beautiful in every way. She looks and sounds just as she did in 1985,  when I was three years old, a period of my life I don’t remember but have the pleasure of imagining when I hear Sade Adu’s voice.