Downtown Records, the independent label behind 2006’s album of the year, Gnarls Barkley – St. Elsewhere, is proud to present Kevin Michael. Kevin, a 22 year old vocal prodigy with an incredible voice and persona, is from Chester, just outside Philadelphia. Kevin’s influences include Michael Jackson, Stevie Wonder and Prince. He has previously recorded and performed with the Roots. While Kevin has a unique voice and style in a world all his own, fans of artists like Jon Legend, D’Angleo, Justin Timberlake, Akon, Black Eyed Peas and Usher will love Kevin Michael. The album features top urban producers including: Wyclef Jean (Fugees, Shakira), JR (Dr. Dre), The Clutch (Usher, Mary J. Blige, Omarion), Brian Kidd (T.I., Nappy Roots), Shea Taylor (Ne-Yo, Jay-Z), L-Rock (Lil John, Usher, Mariah Carey), Mike McHenry (Will I.Am, Fergie) and Bloodshy (Madonna, Britney Spears). Kevin Michael’s debut album is available Spring 2007 on Downtown/Atlantic Records.

In September 2006 at the CTIA Wireless IT and Entertainment Conference, Kevin Michael played a stripped down set for select new media and mobile company representatives, who were blown away by Kevin’s performance. They view Kevin and his music as something very universal and multi-platform in the way that Gnarls Barkley is. Kevin was accompanied by Akil, a BET freestyle champion who beatboxes, plays acoustic guitar and raps.

Following up on the incredible response Kevin Michael received from all the mobile and online companies, Downtown took him to northern California where he met and performed for YouTube, Second Life, iTunes, Sugar Publishing and several key off line partners (The Gap, Old Navy ect).

The plan that has emerged from these meetings was designed to take advantage for new models of media consumption. Downtown is archiving as much content as possible (audio and video) in order to serve it to media and social networking communities in a way that is consistent with how they are consuming music – a deliberately Long Tail approach to creating a stockpile of Kevin content.

Forty songs have been recorded for Kevin’s album, most of which are published by Downtown. In addition, six acoustic versions of Kevin’s key songs backed by Akil on acoustic guitar and beatbox were recorded.

Kevin Michael’s image will be introduced through a series of inexpensive yet real, raw, and compelling viral videos to the Youtube audience, building up his own site and blowing up his MySpace page etc a la Gnarls. Initial videos will include in-world performances in Second Life and Doppelganger (in which Downtown has an equity investment); as well as series of live action video shorts including Kevin Michael busking Philadelphia, performing in his bedroom and singing to the ladies at Victoria’s Secret.

These videos will be distributed everywhere – You Tube, a Downtown Brightcove channel (in which Downtown has an equity investment via Allen & Co.), Revver – even experimenting with some ad-supported digital distribution platforms like intent to tap into Gnarls’ audience, create new fans, build awareness and capture all the data – without giving avay final versions of the songs (i.e. The Wyclef & Jerry Wonder produced single and video for “It Don’t Make Any Difference To Me”).

These events will all be news stories. Fortune ran a piece in their December 11th, 2006 issue on Downtown and how aggressively the label is contextualizing Kevin. Downtown will continue to take advantage of all the interest in Second Life and community-based consumption to connect the dots between the organic Gnarls Barkley on line experience and the more strategic way Downtown is creating the awareness for Kevin, utilizing these sites’ need for content.

At the same time as Downtown is building an on line community for Kevin Michael, a range of strategic on line partnerships are being pursued. These including Karmaloop (#1 urban online retailer), VW, The Gap/Old Navy, John Varvatos, Amp’d mobile, Nike, Oxygen and major ad agencies, including Crispin Porter, Wieden & Kennedy, Ogilvy etc.

Downtown will also develop Kevin Michael regionally in the Philadelphia market. Kevin Michael and his song “Philadelphia” are the stars of a million dollar campaign in January 2007 promoting Philadelphia and The Philadelphia Enquirer’s Phillycars.com.

All of this activity builds towards Kevin Michael’s single and album release, post Entourage. Fully produced songs and broadcast TV-ready videos will be monetized in traditional and non-traditional ways. The second layer of content rolled out via conventional radio and video outlets will capitalize on a pre-existing community of Kevin fans created with layer one of video and audio content. Setting up Kevin Michael prior to release in the digital, strategic and regional realms will give the context for his record to reach a significant audience and have traction.

AIM DJBIGSTEPH
djbigsteph@sbcglobal.net
NastyMixx Productions/Marketing/Promotions
WWW.MYSPACE.COM/DJBIGSTEPH
WWW.MYSPACE.COM/KEVINMICHAELSMUSIC
WWW.DOWNTOWNRECORDINGS.COM
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