Platinum-selling and Grammy-nominated R&B artist Brian McKnight is slated to tour with Armed Forces Entertainment (AFE) this fall. The tour features six shows at bases across the Pacific and starts on November 3, culminating in a final show on Veterans Day.
Brian McKnight began his storied recording career in 1992 with his self-titled album. His firm sense of musical identity and knack for intimately engaging R&B drove his critically acclaimed debut on the Billboard Top 200 album chart and helped deliver his very first Top 20 single, “One Last Cry.” Since 1992, McKnight has charted dozens of albums and songs, including R&B classics “Anytime,” “Back at One,” “Shoulda, Woulda, Coulda,” and “Love Is.” On June 26th, 2020, his 20th album, “Exodus,” was released by the The SoNo Recording Group.
Over the course of 25 million albums sold worldwide, four Top Ten albums on the Billboard 200 album chart, 16 Grammy nominations, nine BET Awards nominations, American Music Awards and MTV Video Music Awards nominations, an NAACP Image Award ( named Outstanding Male Artist in 2000) and a Soul Train Music Award (Best R&B/Soul, Male, 1999), faithful fans and R&B music lovers have enjoyed a musical relationship with Brian McKnight that has resulted in platinum, double-platinum (“Anytime,” 1997) and triple-platinum ( “Back At One,” 1997) certifications and several Top 10 and Top 20 R&B/AC hits.
It was the music that shaped not only the artistic direction for his new album, EXODUS, but determined the path of McKnight’s career moving forward. After releasing several singles since his last album, McKnight had an epiphany fueled by his relationship with his wife Leilani. “When I released `When I’m Gone,’ I had a different idea of what the record was going to be,” Brian divulges. “That’s when I switched gears and came up with the idea of Exodus. Literally, I was sitting on the bed with my guitar, watching my wife doing her makeup about ten feet away from where I was sitting. I just look at her and I hear music playing. It may seem cliché, but clichés are clichés because they’re true. The sun shines a little brighter, the air is a little cleaner when she’s in my view . . . and since I met her it’s been that way.”
Summarizing his career, McKnight said, “I’ve never tried to follow a trend necessarily; I always wanted when my music came on that you knew exactly who it was. I think that’s what this is that I’m doing with Exodus. When you listen to it, the entire journey has to have a beginning and an end. I live my life kind of like average and I really try to do things on my own terms; I think I’ve done that almost since the beginning of my career. And I really want to get into this next chapter of my life, whatever that is in my life. So, I’m really looking forward to that.”
AFE has been committed to boosting the morale and well-being of service members and their families stationed overseas through world-class live events and performances since 1951.
