“Candy girl
All I want to say
I need your love
Each and everyday”

New Edition – “Candy Girl”

Pop acts and boy bands tend to fade after the initial glow of a music fad starts to wane.  Only a few bands have escaped such ill-fated pop history, The Beatles, perhaps… maybe *NSYNC, even if they haven’t performed together in years.  But one band sticks out in the minds of 80s R&B and pop music lovers: New Edition.  Paving the way through the 80s and 90s for boy bands like the previously  mentioned *NSYNC, Backstreet Boys and New Kids on the Block, New Edition took their hip-hop infused harmonies straight to the charts, giving a steady dose of ear candy to listeners around the country.

The group got its start humbly enough.  Bobby Brown, Michael Bivins and Ricky Bell grew up in the projects around Boston, Massachusetts.  The friends came together in 1978, forming their own singing group, hoping to make a little side money.  They quickly hooked up with a local group manager, brought in Bell’s best friend Ralph Tresvant, and then later Ronnie DeVoe.  They were known as New Edition, and were in the process of creating a unique blend of R&B and rap that would eventually carry them to the top.

In their early years, the band performed around the state, eventually landing in a talent show produced by Maurice Starr in 1983.  They only took second place, but Starr saw something in the five of them and offered to have them come down to his studio the next day.  There, they recorded their debut album Candy Girl.  The title track went to #1 on the R&B charts both in the U.S. and the U.K., and another single “Popcorn Girl/Jealous Girl” went into the Top 40.  Another track “Is This the End?” also found a good deal of play on R&B radio.  With their newfound success, New Edition took their act on the road touring the U.S.  Once the tour was over, the five of them were dropped off at their homes in the projects and given $1.87, with the explanation that tour expenses were the reason they weren’t paid more.  Soon, New Edition realized that they weren’t even signed to MCA – they were in some convoluted contract with an outside company that had a deal with the record company, but not actually with them.  MCA wanted them, though, so when they gave the group an opportunity to get out of the mess, they took it up, fired Starr and started working under MCA.  Now watching New Edition’s success from the sidelines, Maurice Starr formed New Kids on the Block, which featured five Boston-area kids, modeled after New Edition. 

Their self-titled second album and MCA debut produced a string of charting hits including R&B chart-topper, “Mr. Telephone Man,” written by the man behind the hit theme song for the movie Ghostbusters, Ray Parker Jr. and “Cool It Now,” which went into the Top 5.  New Edition were fully fledged stars, and they were growing up fast, shedding their teenage image in favor for the more grown-up fare that would appear on their next album, 1985’s All For Love.  The album was a blend of funk and seriously romantic ballads, and produced R&B hits with “Count Me Out,” “A Little Bit of Love (Is All It Takes),” and “With You All the Way.”  They also made an appearance on the 1985 movie, Krush Groove, performing their song, “My Secret.”  By the end of ’85, the group released a holiday EP, Christmas All over the World.

At what seemed to be the height of their career, with an endorsement deal with Coca-Cola, it appeared that Bobby Brown found increasing dissatisfaction with the band.  By 1986, whether by being forced out, or making the choice on his own, he left the band to embark on a solo career, becoming one of the most successful solo acts of the time.  Now down to a quartet, New Edition recorded an album of covers, 1986’s Under the Blue Moon, which featured The Penguins’ hit “Earth Angel” which they recorded for The Karate Kid, Part II.  They also appeared on the hit TV show, Knight Rider, where they performed “Knight Song.”

The following year, New Edition brought in Johnny Gill as co-lead vocalist.  Two years later, the group debuted their new sound on the album, Heart Break.  They brought in hitmakers Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis as producers, and the extra attention to the album paid off, giving New Edition a total of five hits, “If It Isn’t Love,” “You’re Not My Kind of Girl,” “N.E. Heartbreak,” “Crucial,” and the chart-topping “Can You Stand the Rain.” 

Following the success of Heart Break, the group decided to take a break.  Gill and Tresvant went onto start up their solo careers while the other three formed a new trio, Bell Biv Devoe.  (… and now you know.)  Perhaps one of the best things that came out of this for everyone in the group was that they all found success outside the group and around the world.  New Edition gave fans an unexpected surprise with 1996’s Home Again, their reunion album that went to #1 on the charts and gave them two more hits with “I’m Still in Love with You” and “Hit Me Off.”  With their re-found success, the band went back on tour, but within a short time, old rivalries struck up once more, causing the tour to end early and on worse terms than when it had started.  By 2004, it seemed that they’d put their differences aside as they released One Love. 

With the release of Candy Girl 25th Anniversary album, and with news that they’re in the studio once again, New Edition has proven themselves to be one of the longest-lasting boy bands the world has ever seen.