The Tragic Truth About Bobby Caldwell’s Final Years

Blue-eyed soul icon Bobby Caldwell should have been celebrating his 75th birthday on Aug. 15. Instead, three years after his death, his family is sharing the tragic truth of how the “What You Won’t Do for Love” singer spent his last six years trapped in relentless agony after taking a common prescription drug.

Though the New York native’s iconic voice fooled generations of Black music lovers who assumed the soulful crooner was one of their own, his world came crashing down in 2017 after a routine visit to urgent care ended up altering the course of his life forever.

In January 2017, Bobby was gearing up for a trip to Japan when he came down with a cough and runny nose, his widow, Mary Caldwell, recalled in a multi-part docuseries on his official Facebook page. A quick trip to urgent care resulted in a prescription for cough syrup and an antibiotic. One week later, the nightmare began.

“Seven days later I had got up early, went out, [and] came back, he’s still in bed. And he says, ‘I can’t stand up. I can’t walk,’ and his ankles were swelling. And I grabbed the bottle and started Googling and my heart sank,” Mary recalled. “I began to read about this particular antibiotic, Levaquin [and] the potentially horrifying side effects.”

Levaquin is a fluoroquinolone antibiotic used to treat different types of bacterial infections, and is encouraged to only be used for infections that cannot be treated with a safer antibiotic, according to Drugs.com.

The antibiotic, which was discontinued by Janssen Pharmaceuticals in December 2017, while the generic version, levofloxacin, remains fully available on the market, can cause serious side effects. They include damage to your aorta— which could lead to dangerous bleeding or death—nerve damage, serious mood changes, and the swelling or tearing of a tendon, per Drugs.com—a devastating reality Mary says the “My Flame” crooner suffered firsthand.

“While he slept, his achilles tendons literally ruptured in his sleep,” Mary said. “He never walked ever again without a cane, a walker or holding on, never walked without assistance.” And the damage was far worse than a typical tear.

Related: Have You Heard of Bobby Caldwell? This Soulful Singer Had Black Folks Fooled for Decades

Bobby’s stepdaughter, Katie Moriarty, recalled in the online series how his achilles tendons “didn’t rupture the way they would typically rupture if you were playing a sport. They frayed like a rope, like they were eaten away by this antibiotic.”

Beyond his ruptured tendons, a far more insidious horror soon followed: neuropathy, when nerve damage leads to pain, weakness, numbness or tingling in one or more parts of your body, according to the Mayo Clinic.

“He had horrifying pain in the bottoms of his feet, his ankles, up his legs and as time wore on eventually it affected his hands,” Mary remembered. The same hands that wrote every song on his second album, “Cat in the Hat” in 1980 via TK Records, including the soulful single “Open Your Eyes,” and played guitar for Little Richard’s band in the 1970s.

They were the same hands that took the stage in Cleveland, Ohio, where fans first discovered the shocking truth, that the legendary voice behind the hit song “What You Won’t Do For Love” belonged to a white man. Yet, even as his body failed him, Katie recalled how her stepfather fought with everything he had to keep performing in some capacity.

“It was so heartbreaking knowing how he [once] was onstage and how that was like his life; his music, his band, his best friends, we were one big family. And seeing how he was onstage and then I remember watching him after being floxed, it was absolutely devastating to see,” Katie said.

Mary referred to her husband’s condition as getting “floxed“—an informal medical term used to describe severe, long-lasting side effects from a specific antibiotic—and emphasized it was incurable.

“The injury was so deep seeded right down to the level of the mitochondria in your cells,” Mary said. “From the day the side effects kicked in, he never played guitar again. And then we would basically hide him behind the keyboard [because] he couldn’t move. And then when it started affecting his hands he said, ‘I’d be up there just hoping I’d hit the right keys’ because he really couldn’t feel his fingers.”

According to Katie, he was frequently seeing doctors for help, but they told him, “‘This is the hand you’ve been dealt.’” Choking up, Katie recalled witnessing the devastating toll the side effects took on his sleep and his eating habits.

“He would be like, ‘I’m so hungry, I want something.’ And then he’d be like, ‘Can you make me a hot dog?’ And you make it for him, and he’d be in so much pain he’d take a bite if he could, and then he’d be so frustrated.” The mother-daughter duo began coordinating their work schedules to care for him in shifts—watching over a man whose entire life had been upended in what felt like a blink of an eye.

“It went in six years, lightning speed, to like, here is this wonderful guy who’s on stage and vivacious and the life of the party and the show, and just the most wonderful guy in the world, to suffering to such a devastating level that just rocked our lives completely. And seeing him in pain every day, there’s no words for it,” Katie said.

After a legendary career spanning more than four decades, a double-platinum debut album, No. 1 hits, and sold-out arenas across the globe, Bobby Caldwell died on March 14, 2023, in the arms of his wife.

“The road ended right in my arms,” Mary said. “Now the other goal in life for me is to make people aware of what’s going on, and especially physicians. It destroyed Bobby and ruined my life. So what’s left of my life? I plan on speaking up. […] It’s something that for the rest of my life that will always be, not just in the back of my mind, in the forefront.”

Related: How Bobby Caldwell Inspired Common’s Biggest Rap Song

For Mary and Katie, paying tribute to the late singer has become a daily ritual. “Every day my mom and I pull into the cemetery and we drive up to Bobby’s grave. And it’s not just honoring the music, but the legacy he left behind and especially the love he left behind.”

Decades later, Bobby Caldwell’s musical influence remains untouchable. The visionary songwriter behind hits like Roberta Flack’s “Never Loved Before” and Al Jarreau’s “All or Nothing at All” created a sound that still defines soul today—influencing singer like Eric Benét, who calls Caldwell one of his biggest inspirations.

His 1978 masterpiece “What You Won’t Do for Love” continues to be reimagined by everyone from Natalie Cole and Peabo Bryson to Snoh Aalegra nearly 50 years after is release.

“We miss you Bobby,” Katie said. “Every moment of every single day.”