Al B. Sure
AL B. SURE:
15 Years Later ‘Honey I’m Home
The sudden death of ‘Pop King’ Michael Jackson has created a gaping void in the music industry that no one individual could fill, but just two days before Jackson shockingly died at the age of 50 an oldie but goodie R&B friend had released his first album in more than 15 years.
Thus it was a rather ironic twist for the return of an all-time favorite Al B. Sure whose timeless hit such as “Nite and Day” that topped the R&B charts in 1988 and was No. 7 on the pop charts is back for love again.
Appearing as if he has been preserved in a time capsule, Sure graced our presence at Harold & Belle’s cuisine in West Los Angeles to discuss his return to the scene and why he stayed away for so long.
Tastefully dressed in a black sports coat revealing a studded Michael Jackson T-shirt, Sure just finishing a morning television show to promote his new joint ‘Honey I’m Home’ settled in to offer his new delicious menu.
The Boston born singer who claims Mount Vernon New York, felt right at home in the Southland.
He first began singing as a kid and as he would say, he did it because of the passion that he has for music, which is why it took him for so long to come back.
“Everywhere I would go people would always ask me when would I come back and I would always tell them when the time was right,” Sure stated candidly.
He says that he refused to put out something for the sake of just putting it out and based on his previous success with 1988 “In Effect Mode” (No. 1), and 1990s scores “Private Times…And the Whole 9!”, “Sexy versus” and ’90 R&B chart-topper “The Secret Garden” that included Quincy Jones on cameo.
The success that he’s achieved he credits with that passionate desire to always put his music before anything else in his life.
“This is my first and only love,” he says.
“It’s really an obsession. I go to sleep dreaming about music and awake thinking about notes. [Music] Is that marriage, its that woman.
What changed throughout the years was not his passion, but the industry itself, which began to experience high turnover rates from the executive level and not having the ability of developing and maintaining relationships with individuals who would allow for his creativity to flow.
“This is a business that is not built for a human being, you have to have really thick skin. You really have to be focused and in it for the right reason and I respect it, love it and I appreciate it.”
Which is one of the primary reasons that 23 years from the moment he burst out onto the scene, he can return as if he was never really gone in the first place.
Sure is an individual who shares the passion that Jackson had, he will spend as much time as possible to sign autographs and be among his fans even if it means he has to be late for an appointment.
“If I’m in the street and people want to talk to me I stop because that’s my job. It isn’t that I have to do it, but because I love people and everywhere I go people stop me and share their life stories with me,” he added.
He remembers being at Mount Vernon High School scribbling a song on the back of a wrinkled lunch back and later singing that same song to 10,000 spectators at a concert in Japan who could recall every note.
“Now how did something like that happen? It could only be God, there is no other way to explain it,” Sure said.
Sure says don’t let anybody tell you that God is good. “He’s Amazing!”
He explains of his new CD, “It’s like momma’s cooking. You can’t get it until it’s ready.”
Thus, Sure is blessed to now serve up another potion of his love songs that debuted at No. 16 on Billboard’s Top R&B/Hip Hop Albums chart.
One of the singles is a tribute to Jackson, a remake of “Lady In My Life” and a dozen others that are Sure to keep you clamoring for him and demand that he doesn’t leave another void in our heart for …um 15 years.
