Feature Article |
Is This Kid About to Be a Star?
The guys who made Gnarls Barkley into the hottest musical act of 2006 think they can work the same marketing magic on an unknown 22-year-old from Chester. A slowly dying record industry sure hopes they’re right
By Jessica Pressler
- Photo by Marina Chavez
IT'S WEDNESDAY AT noon at the Jamaican Jerk Hut near 15th and South, and Kevin Michael is smiling. And what a smile! So wide and toothy and open it reminds you — even though Kevin is a guy and by his estimation “75 percent black” — of Julia Roberts, back when Pretty Woman was in theaters and the excitement of being young and living a dream was buzzing through her and radiating out onto her face.
Which is kind of like Kevin Michael right now. He’s 22, and everything is happening! Not so long ago, he was just a kid, a self-described nerd from Chester, PA, singing Jody Watley in front of the TV. This weekend he’ll fly to Hamburg, then to Paris, then on to London. In each city he’ll be introduced to the international heads of Warner Music as the Next Big Thing from New York-based Downtown Records, arguably the hottest label in the business, the one behind last summer’s megastars, the duo known as Gnarls Barkley. When Kevin returns from Europe, he’ll do a couple of dates for Courvoisier with Musiq Soulchild, fellow son of Philadelphia. Then Los Angeles! San Francisco! Portland! And soon he’ll have to go back to Los Angeles again, to record a video with Lupe Fiasco! Man, “busy” isn’t even the word to describe my life right now, sighs the message on Kevin’s cell phone, which still has a 610 number, even though he’s been living out of hotels for months. If he’s this busy now, what will it be like when his EP, YaDig?, debuts on iTunes? Or later this summer, when his as-yet-untitled album is released?
He’s not worried. Kevin has been training for pop-stardom his whole life, the way a figure skater trains for the Olympics, and he’s prepared to do the things he has to do. “I’m really focusing on branding myself right now,” he says, between bites of beef patty and sips of ginger beer. “There’s so much to do. You can act, model, start fashion lines, sell things on QVC. The possibilities are endless.”
Kevin wants to be the next Prince, he says, and he has no apparent anxiety about the possibility of it not working out. Fallback careers include ninja and chef. “Plan B,” he says, “is for losers.”
Even now, after Justin and Britney and Beyoncé, it’s strange to hear a musician talk with such business savvy — surely Prince never spoke of QVC? — and single-minded confidence. Especially one whose most visible credit thus far has been a commercial for the local website PhillyCars.com, wherein he sang the somewhat ridiculous lyrics “Phil! A! Del! Phi! A!/That’s where I come from/Phil! A! Del! Phi! A!/’Hoods and mansions, baybaay” in a soulful falsetto while Mummers bobbed in the background.
But then again, what Kevin Michael does isn’t just music. It’s an amalgamation of art and commerce lately called “content.” And the PhillyCars.com commercial wasn’t just a commercial meant to sell used cars to Philadelphians. It was part of a multi-layered marketing extravaganza, the opening salvo in a campaign to sear Chester’s Kevin Michael Seward onto the consciousness of the fourth-largest media marketplace — and eventually, the world’s! It’s the sort of campaign that, as the music industry moves into the digital age, we may see a lot more of, at least if what Downtown Records calls “the Kevin Michael Project” is as successful as they say it will be. And there are an awful lot of people watching to see if they’re right.
Which is kind of like Kevin Michael right now. He’s 22, and everything is happening! Not so long ago, he was just a kid, a self-described nerd from Chester, PA, singing Jody Watley in front of the TV. This weekend he’ll fly to Hamburg, then to Paris, then on to London. In each city he’ll be introduced to the international heads of Warner Music as the Next Big Thing from New York-based Downtown Records, arguably the hottest label in the business, the one behind last summer’s megastars, the duo known as Gnarls Barkley. When Kevin returns from Europe, he’ll do a couple of dates for Courvoisier with Musiq Soulchild, fellow son of Philadelphia. Then Los Angeles! San Francisco! Portland! And soon he’ll have to go back to Los Angeles again, to record a video with Lupe Fiasco! Man, “busy” isn’t even the word to describe my life right now, sighs the message on Kevin’s cell phone, which still has a 610 number, even though he’s been living out of hotels for months. If he’s this busy now, what will it be like when his EP, YaDig?, debuts on iTunes? Or later this summer, when his as-yet-untitled album is released?
He’s not worried. Kevin has been training for pop-stardom his whole life, the way a figure skater trains for the Olympics, and he’s prepared to do the things he has to do. “I’m really focusing on branding myself right now,” he says, between bites of beef patty and sips of ginger beer. “There’s so much to do. You can act, model, start fashion lines, sell things on QVC. The possibilities are endless.”
Kevin wants to be the next Prince, he says, and he has no apparent anxiety about the possibility of it not working out. Fallback careers include ninja and chef. “Plan B,” he says, “is for losers.”
Even now, after Justin and Britney and Beyoncé, it’s strange to hear a musician talk with such business savvy — surely Prince never spoke of QVC? — and single-minded confidence. Especially one whose most visible credit thus far has been a commercial for the local website PhillyCars.com, wherein he sang the somewhat ridiculous lyrics “Phil! A! Del! Phi! A!/That’s where I come from/Phil! A! Del! Phi! A!/’Hoods and mansions, baybaay” in a soulful falsetto while Mummers bobbed in the background.
But then again, what Kevin Michael does isn’t just music. It’s an amalgamation of art and commerce lately called “content.” And the PhillyCars.com commercial wasn’t just a commercial meant to sell used cars to Philadelphians. It was part of a multi-layered marketing extravaganza, the opening salvo in a campaign to sear Chester’s Kevin Michael Seward onto the consciousness of the fourth-largest media marketplace — and eventually, the world’s! It’s the sort of campaign that, as the music industry moves into the digital age, we may see a lot more of, at least if what Downtown Records calls “the Kevin Michael Project” is as successful as they say it will be. And there are an awful lot of people watching to see if they’re right.
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