Lead singers going solo from their group is nothing new. Sometimes the solo venture happens when they are still with the group; other times, they wait until the group is on hiatus. Jordan Knight was the primary lead vocalist in the massively successful New Kids On The Block pop group. With a falsetto style modeled after the legendary Russell Thompkins Jr of The Stylistics, Knight led his group to numerous top-ten hits.
Knight wouldn’t release his debut solo album until five years after the group released their vastly underrated sixth album, 1994’s Face The Music. Boy bands had seen a resurgence in the late nineties as groups like NSYNC and The Backstreet Boys were dominating airwaves, so from a business standpoint, it made perfect sense for Knight and his bandmate Joey McIntyre to kick off their solo careers.
Knight’s self-titled debut album hit record stores on May 25th, 1999. For the first single, “Give It to You,” Knight linked up with the legendary Jimmy Jam & Terry Lewis and a then-unknown Robin Thicke. Knight was near his sound with the New Kids with the production of Jam & Lewis. However, Jordan was now 29, meaning he could get a bit more risqué. Knight never goes into the territory of a disgraced R&B singer, but he does make his intentions known to the young grown woman he’s singing to.
The album’s second & final single was a considerable risk, and Jordan decided to cover Prince’s hit “I Could Never Take The Place of Your Man.” Jordan worked exclusively with Robin Thicke, and the duo turned it from a club banger into a tender ballad. Those who know the song can attest that it’s about a man initially letting a woman know he’s wrong for her, but Knight sells the material. Jordan’s voice makes the song his own without losing the message of a woman who lost her partner to abandonment.
The remainder of the album is an overall solid effort, with the producers getting the best out of Knight’s voice with creative production. “A Different Party” flips Sugarloaf’s Green-Eyed Lady into a funk number while guitar Kansas’s “Dust in the wind” gets the ballad treatment on “Close My Eyes.” Knight even finds time to link up his former bandmate Donnie Wahlberg for “Don’t Run.” A known Hip Hop Head, Wahlberg, Knight, and Thicke effectively sample “Shook Ones Part II)” by Mobb Deep on the track.
Although the album has a bit of filler, Knight’s vocal performance more than compensates for any clichés, if Knight’s goal was to prove that there is life beyond being a teenage idol, he succeeded.
Final Grade: B
Jordan Knight is available on all streaming platforms.
There are some albums you revisit because of nostalgia, and then there are albums you return to because they remind you just how high the standard used to be. Anita Baker’s Rapture falls into that second category. Released in 1986, the album did more than make Baker a star. It helped define what sophisticated, grown R&B could sound like without losing any soul, sensuality, or personality.
Gwen Stefani had already established herself as a significant force with No Doubt when she released her debut solo album, *Love. Angel. Music. Baby* in 2004. This week, while my iPod was on shuffle, one of my favorite songs from that project, “The Real Thing,” came on. Although the original version has an upbeat new-wave feel, the Slow Jam Mix takes it to another level and is the perfect choice for this week’s Slow Jam Saturday.
Unless you’re a music purist, mentioning Randy Jackson from the famous family is likely to elicit a joke. However, any serious Jackson fan knows that Randy had musical achievements long before the punchlines. Before he was old enough to buy a drink, he had already co-written “Shake Your Body (Down to the Ground)” and “Lovely One” with Michael Jackson.