Keith Sweat 1961(?)–

Vocalist

An Early Gift for Music

Received His Big Break

Continued Success

Sources

Keith Sweat is one of the earliest practitioners, and some would say the inventor, of “New Jack Swing” music, a style of rhythm and blues that fuses soul singing and hip-hop beats. It should come as no surprise that “New Jack Swing” music became extremely popular, or that Sweat has enjoyed considerable success. Financial success has always been one of the keystones in Sweat's life, from his days working at the New York Stock Exchange to his career in music.

Sweat was born in the early 1960s in Harlem, New York. His father Charles, a factory worker, died in 1973. His mother Juanita, a hairdresser, was forced to raise their five children alone. Sweat would later credit Juanita for his strong sense of values, telling People Weekly, “She pushed me hard. I knew I didn't want to be on the street selling drugs—or using them.”

An Early Gift for Music

Sweat learned early in life that he had a gift for music, and for affecting women with his voice. “When he was four years old, he'd go outside and sing to the girls,” Juanita told People Weekly “I'd say, ‘Stop that noise.’” Keith would later remark that he had dreams of performing in concert that often seemed like premonitions. He told Ebony, “People might think I'm lying about them, but as a kid I used to go to bed and dream I was onstage giving a concert. I could see myself singing and the people were screaming and the whole thing was so real to me I used to wake up and really believe I had done a show. You couldn’t tell me it didn’t happen.… I would get up in the morning and start looking in my pockets for all the money I’d made from my shows.”

Following his graduation from high school, Sweat enrolled in City College of New York to study communications. He worked as a stock boy at Macy’s on weeknights and sang with a band called Jamilah on weekends. After graduating from City College of New York, he went to work on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange, starting in the mailroom at Paine Webber, and working his way up to a lucrative brokerage assistant job in only four years. Although he had advanced quickly in his new career, he still wanted to become a musician.

At a Glance…

Born Keith Sweat circa 1961 in Harlem, New York; son of Charles (a factory worker) and Juanita (a hairdresser) Sweat; three children: Keisha, Keia, and Jordan. Education: City College of New York, bachelor’s degree in communications.

Career: Paine Webber, mailroom, brokerage assistant; singer for band Jamilah; solo albums, Make It Last Forever (1988), I’ll Give All My Love To You (1990), Keep It Comin’ (1991), Get Up On It (1994), Keith Sweat (1996); singles, “I Want Her,” “Make You Sweat,” “Merry Go Round,” “Just One of Them Thangs.”

Awards: Double platinum album, Make it Last Forever; No. 1 New Male Artist, Black Radio Exclusive, 1988.

Addresses: Singer, c/o Elektra Records, 75 Rockefeller Plaza, New York, New York, 10019.

Near the end of his tenure on Wall Street, Sweat became convinced that he was destined to become a songwriter, not a performer. He spent most of his salary recording demos of his songs, but no one wanted to buy them. “All of the recording companies turned me down flat,” he told Ebony. “Everybody said the same thing: ‘Thanks but no thanks. Your songs just aren’t hot enough for our artists to sing,”’ he continued.

Received His Big Break

Abandoning his plans to become a major songwriter, Sweat started performing his own material. He finally attracted the attention of Vincent Davis. Davis owned a record label, Vintertainment, and had recently signed a distribution deal with Elektra Records. Sweat soon signed with Vintertainment and recorded his debut album, Make It Last Forever, which was a commercial success. It featured the hit single, “I Want Her,” and was heavily influenced by a style Sweat called “go-go music,” a percussion-based sound which was popular on the East Coast. Much of the material on the album was contributed by the well-known New Jack Swing producer, Teddy Riley. Although the album’s credits listed Sweat as a producer, many listeners believed that the album was solely produced by Riley.

Sweat would later tell Ebony that the success of the first album could be attributed to his break-up with a longtime girlfriend. “That was a very tough time in my life,” he declared. “I was coming out of a relationship where I was hurt and I mean really hurt bad. It was a heartbreaking relationship for me—the kind where you are hurting so much you have to find someone to talk to or go crazy. I didn’t really have anyone to talk to so what I did was talk to my album.” Sweat also credits Vintertainment with the opportunity to release his debut album. “If I had taken my demo tape directly to Elektra I would have been turned down, I know it,” he told the Los Angeles Times. “Frankly, a lot of A&R guys can’t hear the music. They go home to their big houses in upstate New York and lose touch with what the folks on the street want to hear.” Sweat took a leave of absence from his Wall Street job while his debut album climbed the charts. When the album reached No. 1 on the charts, he quit his job on Wall Street. “That’s when I knew I could do this for a living,” he told Rolling Stone.

Continued Success

Sweat’s second album, produced without the assistance of Teddy Riley, established more of his individual style. I’ll Give All My Love to You featured a simpler, more traditional rhythm and blues sound. The album climbed the charts quickly, selling one million copies in less than two months. It produced two more hit singles, including the signature song “Make You Sweat.” Although Sweat was pleased that his albums were performing well on the R&B charts, he was disappointed that they were not successful on the pop charts. He told the Los Angeles Times, “I want pop fans to know who Keith Sweat is. It’s not about ego. It’s about selling records—which is what this business is all about. I’ve hit a stone wall in the black community. There’s only so much money there.”

Sweat’s third album, Keep It Comin’, offered more of the same style of music expected by his fans. He marked the success of this album by moving to Alpharetta, Georgia, a suburb of Atlanta, and building his dream home. He also concentrated on improving his abilities as a producer by working with other acts, most notably the R&B group Silk. Sweat produced their album, Lose Control, which climbed to the top of the R&B charts. That same year, Sweat’s music was also featured on the New Jack City movie soundtrack.

Sweat returned to the charts in 1994 with his fourth album, Get Up On It. This album resembled the musical style of Sweat’s other albums and produced another hit single, “How Do You Like It?” In addition to performing, he also pursued other business interests. He began his own record label, Keia Records, and opened a state-of-the-art recording studio called the Sweat Shop. He also produced a hit album for the group Kut Klose. In 1996 Sweat opened a new nightclub, Industry, in Atlanta’s Buckhead district. He explained the nightclub’s name to People Weekly, “This is a spot for people in ‘the industry.’ There’s no other place in Atlanta where celebrities can come and just be themselves. We’re people, too.”

A few months after opening his nightclub, Sweat released his fifth album entitled Keith Sweat. Two songs on the album, “Twisted” and “Nobody,” climbed into the top five on the pop charts. The following year, Sweat formed the musical group LSG with Gerald Levert and Johnny Gill. Their debut album produced the hit single “My Body.” In 1997 Sweat discovered the group 01’ Skool, which he considered a throwback to the 1960s and 1970s heyday of soul music. He told Jet that searching for talent for Keia Records was a full-time occupation, adding that he seeks “people who can sing and people who can put certain things together in terms of performance, stage presence and all of that, overall talent. I’m a hands-on person, so I still pay attention to what’s going on. I get demos; I listen to all kinds of music. Atlanta has certainly become a very important place within the music industry, but I search for talent from everywhere.”

Sweat believes that simplicity and honesty are the keys to his popularity. He remarked to People Weekly in 1997, “If I can’t feel it, I don’t want to write it. My music is true-to-life relationship music.” The consistency of Keith Sweat’s success suggests that he will continue to produce and sell hit records for many years to come.

Sources

Billboard, September 30, 1995, p. 22; October 25, 1997, p. 38-39.

Chicago Tribune, January 17, 1991, p. 3, section 5.

Ebony, September 1992, p. 82.

Jet, September 16, 1996, p. 30.

Los Angeles Times, March 20, 1988, p. C70; February 17, 1991, p. C64.

People Weekly, September 26, 1988, p. 115; January 27, 1997, p. 69.

Rolling Stone, November 15, 1990.

—Mike Eggert

KEITH SWEAT

Born: Keith "Sabu" Crier; New York, New York, 22 July 1961

Genre: R&B

Best-selling album since 1990: Keith Sweat (1996)

Hit songs since 1990: "Make You Sweat," "I'll Give All My Love to You," "Twisted"

Arhythm and blues singer who has proved his influence over the course of a long and durable career, Keith Sweat is a pioneer of the sound known as "New Jack Swing." Bouncy, danceable, and exuberant, New Jack Swing was a key development in late 1980s R&B, paving the way for the brash hip-hop music of the 1990s. Known for his whining vocals, Sweat imparts a sensuous, urgent feel to both up-tempo songs and ballads. A factor in his success has been his foresight in choosing not to flood the market with album releases. Rather, he issues albums at intervals of two to three years, a tactic that allows him to maintain quality, consistency, and popularity.

Raised around the corner from the famed Apollo Theatre in Harlem, New York, Sweat began his career in the mid-1980s by submitting self-financed demo recordings to various record labels. An executive at Elektra Records heard one of these demos and offered him a recording contract in 1987. Late that year Sweat released his first and most influential album, Make It Last Forever. Boasting the thumping, insistent rhythms of the hit, "I Want Her," the album was a crucial bridge between the romantic R&B vocalizing of the 1970s and the aggressive hip-hop style that would predominate in the 1990s. Sweat's soulful rendition of "In the Rain," a song originally recorded by 1970s R&B group the Dramatics, suggested his admiration for the vocal traditions of the past, while "I Want Her" helped define the burgeoning New Jack Swing sound.

Sweat maintained his winning streak throughout the 1990s, delivering a solid follow-up to "I Want Her" with the driving hit, "Make You Sweat" (1990). Keith Sweat (1996) was a career peak; the success of its hit single "Twisted" propelled the album to the upper reaches of both the pop and R&B charts. Sweat's singing is distinctive and memorable, setting the trend for the nasal style favored by younger R&B artists such as Usher. The pleading quality of his voice gives his music a seductive undercurrent and erotic edge, although, unlike contemporaries such as D'Angelo and Next, Sweat rarely ventures into sexual explicitness. On Keith Sweat, he again displays his proficiency on dance tracks and slow love ballads, his assured phrasing adapting well to both formats. Although he failed to revisit the album's strong crossover success, Sweat continued to release quality recordings during the late 1990s and early 2000s, maintaining his professionalism and steady sense of groove. On Rebirth (2002), he proves that his voice is still strong, with the power to make a boasting track such as "100% All Man" believable. By this point in his career, Sweat had relocated to the R&B industry nexus of Atlanta, Georgia, where he established his own management agency and recording studio.

One of the few 1980s R&B performers who maintained a viable career into the 2000s, Sweat brandishes his unique, insistent voice on free-spirited dance music and intimate ballads, rarely deviating from his successful formula. Retaining a sense of youth and vitality into his forties, Sweat is acknowledged by fans as a father of hip-hop and a leader in contemporary R&B.

SELECTIVE DISCOGRAPHY:

Make It Last Forever (Elektra, 1987); I'll Give All My Love to You (Elektra, 1990); Keith Sweat (Elektra, 1996); Didn't See Me Coming (Elektra, 2000); Rebirth (Elektra, 2002); Keith Sweat Live (Elektra, 2003).

david freeland