The Tevin Campbell Experience - A Video History

R&B has never been shy to promote incredible young talents. From the Jackson Five to New Edition, children are given the opportunity to showcase their great vocal abilities. In the early 90s, there were a lot of these artists. Another Bad Creation, The Boys, Perfect Gentlemen. One of our favorites that we wanted to reflect on here was the crazy vocalist Tevin Campbell.

Tevin Campbell wasted no time bursting onto the scene. His first mega hit came in 1989 when he partnered with Quincy Jones for the hit song "Tomorrow (A Better You, Better Me). The song topped the R&B charts in June 1990 when Campbell was just fourteen years old. Here"s a video of Tevin performing the track Tomorrow live, showing the crazy vocals he had from the start. The microphone is practically the same size as him.

Powered by his early success (and a subsequent hit "Round and Round" with Prince), Campbell released his platinum debut album T.E.V.I.N. in 1991. The album came out eight days after his fifteenth birthday and was brimming with singles. The album had four top 5 R&B hits, including the aforementioned Round & Round, Tell Me What You Want Me To Do, Alone With You, and Goodbye. You can see an interview with Tevin Campbell on Video Soul in 1991 where he reflects on this crazy period in his life.

After T.E.V.I.N."s success, Tevin Campbell had a string of successes that hit the peak of his career, with a string of wild successes. His follow-up album, I"m Ready went double platinum and featured the infectious track "Can We Talk" which topped the R&B charts and reached #9 on the Hot 100. Here"s the Can We Talk music video.

At this same time, Tevin Campbell also was a distinct presence in movie theaters. In 1995, he served as the voice for the character Powerline in the Disney movie A Goofy Movie. As this character, he performed two immensely popular tracks which were on the soundtrack from the movie. "I2I" and "Stand Out" were both great tracks that would have been amazing additions to his album. Even today, there"s still a lot of love for these as Tevin performed I2I in 2015 at the Disney Expo.

As Tevin Campbell got older and released his latter two albums, he struggled to find his niche in the R&B market. While his third album Back to the World went gold, he wasn"t able to reproduce his early success. His last album, the self-titled Tevin Campbell, featured a number of collaborations with big name artists and a shift into more Neo-soul sound but didn"t find a receptive market. His single "Another Way" was the biggest hit from the latter album, and definitely sounds like a more mature, mainstream Tevin but it just didn"t connect.

Tevin Campbell was arrested shortly after the fourth album"s release and it accelerated the shift in his career away from music and the public eye. He found a new home in theatre, as in 2005 he joined the Broadway show Hairspray. In the play, he performs as the character Seaweed J Stubbs, and stuck with the role in performances in Australia. You can watch some of his performance here.

In more recent years, he has begun easing back into music. There were rumblings of a potential fifth album by Tevin Campbell, and he even released a new single "Safer on the Ground." He still sounds incredible and is able to draw crowds to his performances. Here"s footage in 2017 of Tevin performing Dandelion and Superstitjon live.

Tevin Campbell was such a spark of talent when he came out in the early 1990s. Check out our page featuring all Tevin Campbell music videos. We have gathered everything available on him, featuring 18 music videos, and 29 interviews and live performances by Tevin Campbell. Let us know if there are any other artists you want to see us do a recap on.