Chaka Khan never phones it in, even when she’s on the phone with Jamal Ahmad

The Queen of Funk plays WCLK-FM’s fundraiser concert at the Cobb Energy Centre on April 4

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“Oooh, I’m so excited!... Is that goofy?”

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Like eavesdropping on a down-to-earth diva. That’s how it felt to listen in on a recent conference call as Chaka Khan made radio drops for WCLK-FM and fielded Atlanta journalists’ questions from Lord knows how many miles away. I’m not sure where she was calling from, but she did say she was getting her nails done. Something that instantly reminded me of the ’80s, probably for no other reason than the fact that my mom used to get her nails done on the regular back then, around the time when “I Feel For You” served as Chaka’s calling card to a pre-pubescent hip-hop generation still too young to boast the tag. It took a few more years before Chaka’s pre-’80s discography would register with me. The ’70s funk classics with Rufus. The brightness in her voice rising like the sun. And all that happy hair filling up the TV screen on every one of her videos and classic YouTube’d performances.

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Take 2: “Hi, this is Chaka Khan, and I want you all to come out and join me at” — and this is where she accidentally flubs the name of the Cobb Energy Centre for the second time — “I just can’t wait,” she says, minus any bit of the canned energy one might expect from an icon who’s been doing it so long.

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“The Cobb Center? Oh, OK, I’m sorry. ... Cobb Synergy Center? Oh, come on y’all. Cobb. Energy. Center. OK. 3-2-1.”

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Take 3: Hey this is Chaka Khan, inviting you all out to the Cobb Energy Centre on April 4th — Comeondown! laughs I don’t know what to say?

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The conference call, shepherded by Jazz 91.9’s afternoon drive-time host and soul guru Jamal Ahmad to promote Chaka Khan’s station fundraising concert at, yes, the Cobb Energy Centre on April 4, turned into an off-the-cuff convo as Ahmad recalled the time he threw his back out at a party while dancing to Khan’s self-penned “I Know You, I Live You,” click the link for a live performance of her playing percussion and talked to Khan about what’s lacking from today’s vocalists, staying relevant in a what-have-you-done-for-me-lately industry, her relationship with Whitney Houston, who recorded background vocals at age 14 on Khan’s self-titled solo debut in the late ’70s, and the need to contribute something meaningful to the times.

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On contemporary music and the dearth of true talent:
It’s frustrating sometimes because everybody and their mother and their grandmother wants to be a singer. And sadly, we have the technology to make a dog bark sound like a song. There are a lot of gimmicks and gadgets right now that have, I think, taken people off their true path and true calling. Some people should just go on and be a model. Some people have truly missed their calling. And those are the ones that frustrate me.