Mayor Kevin White’s city-sponsored concert series, Summerthing, was still around, and a fresh pair of Adidas Superstars-known as Shelltoes-would make any kid the envy of the neighborhood.īrown, Bell, and Bivins were about 10 years old when the idea of forming New Edition came to them. There were no boutique coffee spots, such as Dudley Café, to grab a latte the elevated tracks of the Orange Line still cast a shadow on the streets of Dudley Square and you could hear the wail of trains turning into the station from just about anywhere in the projects. Roxbury today is very different from when New Edition started coming together. Bostonians love to fawn over the city’s illustrious rock ’n’ roll history, but how many know that New Edition changed the face of pop music, launched a thousand boy bands, and might just be Boston’s most important pop export of all time? It’s about time these hometown heroes got their due.Ī young New Edition, of the “Candy Girl” era: Ronnie DeVoe, Bobby Brown, and Ricky Bell (top), with Ralph Tresvant and Michael Bivins (front). But while they remain national icons, they seem to consistently get low billing in their hometown. A few years ago, Vibe recounted the reasons why New Edition should be inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame. The cable network is following it up with The Bobby Brown Story, coming in September. Last year, the lauded BET miniseries The New Edition Story rehashed the band’s breakups, makeups, and on-stage fisticuffs. Lately, there’s been a bloom of new appreciation for New Edition across the country. And they did it all with some of the crispiest choreography this side of Motown. Once the Roxbury kids grew older, they led R & B into the hip-hop era and helped define new jack swing, which mixed R & B, jazz, electronica, and hip-hop. They were the band that Starr then modeled his next group after, shaping Boston heartthrobs New Kids on the Block in the image of New Edition (though their pipes and their moves weren’t quite as good). Now, 40 years after their careers began, I’d argue that the members of New Edition had as much influence on pop music as any act in Boston. When the group won a record deal from producer and local celebrity Maurice Starr, who wrote hits including “Candy Girl” and “Popcorn Love” for them, they became superstars but remained Boston to the core. They played school auditoriums and talent shows at Uphams Corner’s Strand Theatre-I’d see the posters for their performances on my walk to school. There, Bobby Brown, Michael Bivins, and Ricky Bell-later joined by Ralph Tresvant and Ronnie DeVoe-honed their act during daily rehearsals. In the late ’70s, the 350-unit cement public housing complex was one of the toughest spots in the city-an honor it would lose only when it was torn down in 1998. The first incarnation of the group came together in 1978 in Roxbury’s Orchard Park Projects, just a few miles from my home in Dorchester. When I was growing up, New Edition was a kind of fantasy story come true. But lately, I’ve started to wonder whether the people who live here now-and even some who’ve lived here as long as I have-know the talent and the impact they truly had.
In the years since New Edition rode their sweet harmonies and slick dance moves to fame-and sometimes infamy-there’s always been a part of Boston that remembers These are our guys.
Whatever it is, I have a healthy dash of hometown pride for the band, which was cranking out chart-toppers before they could shave. It’s almost a ’hood requirement that the summer soundtrack include at least a few of the group’s classic hits.Ĭall it nostalgia, maybe. And to me, one of the essential sounds of summer has always been New Edition-made up of five local guys from Roxbury. In Dorchester, Mattapan, and Roxbury-the neighborhoods where I grew up-it’s the hum of mopeds and minibikes weaving through traffic like Grand Prix racers, the colorful costumes and thumping rhythms of the Caribbean Carnival, and the sounds of backyard barbecues, complete with a DJ set, that mark the change of seasons.
For others, it’s navigating Friday-evening traffic for a trip down the Cape, or sprawling on the Esplanade and listening to the Boston Pops unleash their incendiary finale on the Fourth of July.
RALPH TRESVANT WEDDING PICTURES CRACK
Photo via Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Imagesįor many Bostonians, hearing the crack of the bat and enjoying a hot dog at Fenway is the ultimate sign of summer. A snapshot of the original Roxbury group in the early ’80s.
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