The soulful voice of vocalist/ songwriter/ producer N'Dea
Davenport first emerged in 1991 when she became the front
woman for the Acid Jazz British funk band, The Brand New
Heavies.
But long before worldwide notoriety was present, she fell
in love with music, dance, performing and the arts. "I
think I got involved in almost everything creatively I
could do when I was in school, to keep my mind busy to try
and stay out of trouble. From sports to theater, you name
it. I probably did it." A regular routine of piano and
dance studies were the core of her development. Ironic as
it is, singing would later be the focus of her affections.
As soon as it was possible to "break out" as she calls it,
she left her home town of Atlanta, with little more than
300 dollars on route to Los Angeles with the primary goal
of just going somewhere she had never been to alone.
Little did she know, that early sense of adventure would
begin a chain-of-events that would change her life
forever.
After landing in Los Angeles, she became inspired and
apart of the burgeoning underground "club warehouse
scene." Within the flourishing community of artists,
fashion designers and musical talents, it was such as
celebration of funk, hip-hop, rock, punk, graffiti,
performance art and everything between. Meeting the late
Keith Herring, Jean-Michel Basquiat and the very much
alive Fab Five Freddy, was really special." And after a
reluctant impromptu song for Fred, he quickly got word to
his dj-club owner friend that happened to be one-half of
the newly formed record label, Delicious Vinyl. Soon
after, she found herself recording and planning for her
debut CD.
As fate would have it, a British group called The Brand
New Heavies, were signed to the label shortly after. With
no lead vocalist, and N'Dea's love of collaborating, the
tone was set for a magical combination. She relocated to
London with the Heavies, where they gave birth to an
international movement known as Acid Jazz. Fusing funk,
soul and RnB, the term Acid Jazz has also been known as
"The second coming of soul" re-establishing legacy, and
opening the doors to Neo-classical soul.
In 1995, after years and at the height of their commercial
success, N'Dea simply packed up heading back to the U.S.
leaving London and her former bandmates. After returning,
she continued to develop her solo cd, and collaborate with
various artists including, Mos Def, Everlast, DJ Krush,
Dallas Austin, Guru (Jazzmatazz), Natalie Merchant and
Daniel Lanois to name a few. Her self-titled debut, the
effort she put on the back burner for several years, was
released on V2 Records in 1998, boasting the funky flavor
that listeners have come to expect from her. It takes you
back to the day when music wasn't lumped into
preconceived, easy to digest categories. And personally
leading her on to the experience of musical freedoms and
self-exploration producing and orchestrating the mass
majority of her projects. Her songs are often laced with
social commentaries meant, not to provoke, but to trigger
thought and inspire dialogue. She is continuing that
process, by developing, and performing new material for a
forth-coming