He’s recognized for his ballads and winning smile– however the singer has also had a ringside seat to background, from the civil liberties battles in his indigenous Alabama to the rise and fall of pop’s biggest superstar
Lionel Richie walks into the resort conference room at 6.20 pm and extends his arms out large. “Good morning, everyone,” he says in a southerly drawl as smooth as whipped cream. He’s not kidding. Richie, 76, is exploring below in Budapest, and he’s on rock ‘n’ roll (well, fabulous spirit balladeer) time. The singer-songwriter, who has marketed greater than 100m documents over his six years in the business, has simply risen. “That bed was saying to me, ‘Stay here, Lionel, you’re looking goooood.'”
He presents me to his girlfriend, Lisa Parigi, a Swiss business owner. Parigi is in her mid-30s, beautiful, pleasant, and young adequate to be his child– or granddaughter at a press. To be fair, however, Richie looks magnificent. As a boy, he was all chin and tache. Currently he’s just normal handsome, surprisingly high, with a bearing that verges on the military. Parigi leaves us to conversation.
Source: The Guardian