 There
may have been other "retro" rock acts before him, but Lenny Kravitz was
one of the first to not be pigeonholed to a single style as he's touched
upon such genres as soul, funk, reggae, hard rock, psychedelic, folk, and
ballads over the years. Born in New York on May 26, 1964 (his mother was
actress Roxie Roker, best-known for her role as Helen Willis on the
popular TV series The Jeffersons, and his father was a TV producer),
Kravitz was raised in Los Angeles, where he found himself around countless
musical giants as a youngster due to his parents friendships with the
likes of Duke Ellington, Sarah Vaughan, Count Basie, Ella Fitzgerald,
Bobby Short, and Miles Davis, among others. Kravitz was a member of the
California Boys Choir until his teenage years, when he decided to pursue
rock & roll while in high school and under the heavily influence of funk
rocker Prince. Kravitz's admiration of the Purple One was so great that he
at first patterned his style and approach directly after Prince and became
known as "Romeo Blue" (complete with blue contact lenses), but failed to
land a recording contract.In the late '80s, Kravitz relocated back to New York City, where one of his roommates turned out to be actress Lisa Bonet (who played the part of Denise Huxtable on The Cosby Show); they eventually got married. During this time, Kravitz wisely discarded his Prince-like approach and looked back to such '60s/'70s classic rockers as Led Zeppelin, Jimi Hendrix, Stevie Wonder, Curtis Mayfield, Bob Marley, and the Beatles for inspiration. Kravitz found a kindred spirit in engineer Henry Hirsch (who would stick by Kravitz throughout his career). With a back-to-basics approach, his style was quite refreshing in the humorously gaudy late '80s. He inked a recording contract with Virgin Records and issued his debut release, Let Love Rule, in 1989. Kravitz's debut proved to be a surprise hit due to the success of the title track, which became a hit single and oft-aired video. A few critics were quick to assume that Kravitz's retro look and sound were simply a shtick to get the public's attention, but come the '90s, it had become integrated into the mainstream (both musically and fashion-wise), proving that Kravitz was a bit of a trendsetter. It was around this time that Kravitz penned a major hit single, not for himself but for Madonna, who went to number one with the sultry track "Justify My Love." What should have been a time of 
happiness for Kravitz quickly turned sour as he and Bonet divorced by the
early '90s. Kravitz's heartbreak was very evident in his sophomore effort,
Mama Said, which was even stronger than its predecessor, highlighted by
the Led Zep-like funk rocker "Always on the Run" (a collaboration with
Guns N' Roses guitarist Slash), as well as the mega hit with the Curtis
Mayfield-esque soul ballad "It Ain't Over 'Til It's Over," which confirmed
that Kravitz's success was no fluke. But the best was yet to come for
Kravitz. His third release overall, 1993's Are You Gonna Go My Way, is
often considered to be the finest album front to back of his entire
career, and with good reason: Every single song was a winner, including
the up-tempo anthemic title track, which turned out to be one of MTV's
most played videos for that year. The album was a massive hit and Kravitz
became an arena headliner stateside, as well as being featured on
countless magazine covers. Despite an almost two-year gap between albums, Kravitz's fourth release, Circus, came off sounding unfocused and was a major letdown compared to his stellar previous few releases. Perhaps sensing that he needed to stir things up musically, Kravitz dabbled with electronics and trip-hop loops for his next album, 1998's 5. Although not a huge hit right off the bat, the album proved to have an incredibly long chart life, spawning the biggest hit of Kravitz's career, "Fly Away," almost a year after its original release. With the single's success, Virgin decided to cash in on the album's sudden rebirth by reissuing it around the same time with a pair of extra added bonus tracks, one of which became another sizeable hit single, a remake of the Guess Who's "American Woman" (which was used in the hit 1999 comedy movie Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me). Kravitz's first best-of set, the 15-track Greatest Hits, was issued as a stopgap release in 2000, while his sixh studio release overall, Lenny, was issued a year later. Baptism followed in 2004. In addition to his own albums, Kravitz continues to pen songs for other artists and his compositions have appeared on albums by such rock heavyweights as Aerosmith and Mick Jagger, while he produced and wrote the majority of Vanessa Paradis' obscure self-titled 1992 release. |