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Soul man Charles Bradley sounds better late than ever

By James Sullivan

 |  Globe Correspondent  

  February 04, 2012

Few late bloomers bloom as late as Charles Bradley. The singer, who headlines the Brighton Music Hall tonight, spent most of his life working odd jobs as an institutional cook and a handyman, in outposts from Bar Harbor, Maine to Alaska. Though he picked up bar gigs with R&B bands along the way, he went all but undiscovered for decades, despite his obvious passion for music. He’d been living on his own since he was 14, sometimes in abandoned buildings.

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