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Charlie Wilson Fills the Gaps in His Life's Winding Road

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Full circle: Charlie Wilson shows the alley he slept in as a homeless person after his Gap Band days in Hollywood. Wilson has renewed his life and career.

HOLLYWOOD “This building wasn't here," Charlie Wilson says, waving at a high-rise condo under construction along busy La Brea Avenue. “It was a parking lot for U-Hauls. I slept under them when it rained. So did a lot of other crackheads."

He brushes a tear from his cheek. Revisiting the haunts of his darkest days is distressing for the R&B legend, who led the Gap Band to international stardom in the '80s and rebounded to solo glory in recent years. In between lies a desperate stretch of addiction and homelessness that took the singer from a posh Hollywood Hills manse to seedy alleys.

Strolling a narrow road behind a pawn shop, he points to the grassy spot he frequently staked out while living on the streets from 1993 to 1995.

“I slept in that deep corner there," he says. “When I come through this area now, I get all tensed up. A lot of people who sink that far into depression, drugs and street life don't come back. A lot of people I knew then are dead."

Wilson, who turns 57 on Friday, did more than survive. He just had the most successful year of his 43-year career. The singer is up for two Grammys: R&B album for fourth solo effort Uncle Charlie and R&B vocal for hit single There Goes My Baby, which spent 10 weeks atop Billboard's adult R&B chart. The album entered the R&B chart at No. 1 and the pop chart at No. 2, a career peak. He's also nominated for an NAACP Image Award.

Nobody is more astonished by this resurrection than Wilson, who returns to the mileposts of his downfall with humility and gratitude. He starts a walking tour at the former location of the Total Experience studio, where the Gap Band, his trio with brothers Robert and Ronnie, recorded from the mid-'70s to the late '80s, generating a string of platinum albums and such hits as You Dropped a Bomb on Me, Party Train, Outstanding, Burn Rubber on Me and Shake.

Unable to revise their label and publishing deals, the brothers first talked of splitting in 1986, and Wilson surrendered a stately home and half-dozen cars in 1987.

“They weren't in my name," he says. “We went from rags to famous, from famous to rags. We never got the riches. It took a toll on us, and we decided to quit."

His money dried up and an existing drug habit worsened, until Wilson landed on the streets with only the clothes on his back.

“I had no home, no money," he says. “You could still hear my records on the radio. People gave me drugs because they thought I was still on top. Nobody knew I was down and out."

On Hawthorn Avenue, he finds another former hideout, but the shrubs he slept behind no longer line the wall. He points across the street to an apartment house, where a sympathetic landlady let him hole up when she had vacancies. A homeless couple who camped near trash bins in the back often let him curl up in a makeshift shelter of shopping carts and plastic tarps.

“Cardboard for a bed and a brick for a pillow," he recalls. “If they had a sandwich, they shared it with me."

Hiding his pain

During his three years adrift, they were the only people he confided in. To others, he bluffed the part of a big shot trolling Hollywood's underbelly for cocaine. He avoided soup kitchens and shelters, cut ties to former associates and, if recognized, feigned a lost weekend.

“I'd say I just got out of the studio or was on my way to the office," Wilson says. “Nobody knew I had sunk this far. I was really bitter about what I didn't have. And embarrassed. Even when I was getting high, I'd pray, asking God not to let the devil kill me before I got on my feet again."

Eager to leave these grim lairs, Wilson quickens his pace and says, “Woo, it's hard emptying out. I tried to put all this behind me. I had to start over. That road was tough, but I love this music so much that I let nothing stand in my way back to the top."

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