DeBarge came out of Detroit and later Grand Rapids, Michigan. Their mother, gospel singer Etterlene Abney, married the older Robert Louis DeBarge Sr. at 17, and the marriage, which lasted until 1974, was defined by control and physical abuse. Several children later accused their father of sexual abuse, and Bunny described abuse from ages seven to 13. Older brothers Tommy and Bobby of the Motown group Switch bought instruments for Randy, Mark, El and Bunny, and by 1979 the younger siblings were singing and playing on Switch records. In 1980 El played piano for Berry Gordy and won a contract for the DeBarges.
The 1981 debut flopped. In 1982 the group added James, shortened the name to DeBarge and broke through with All This Love. From 1983 to 1985 they earned gold albums, toured with Luther Vandross and peaked with Diane Warren’s Rhythm of the Night from Motown’s film The Last Dragon. As drug use spread, Motown routed resources to El, who left along with Bunny for solo deals, and dropped the remaining brothers in 1986. The 1987 album Bad Boys on Striped Horse failed to chart, and the group was finished by 1989.
- James DeBarge eloped with 18-year-old Janet Jackson in 1984, and the marriage was annulled in 1985.
- Bobby and Chico DeBarge were arrested for drug trafficking in Grand Rapids in 1988 and sent to separate prisons.
- Bobby died of AIDS complications in hospice, and Tommy died of kidney failure in 2021.
- Bunny’s 2008 memoir The Kept Ones, and a 2020 book under the same title that El called fiction, set off a family feud.
- The Notorious B.I.G. sampled Stay With Me, Ashanti reworked it for Foolish, and Tupac interpolated A Dream on I Ain’t Mad at Cha.
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