Michael Bivins has a big day planned before his group, Bell Biv Devoe, takes the stage at Foxwoods Resort Casino‘s Premier Theater on Nov. 23.
At 10:30 a.m., the singer’s BivFam Foundation, along with his wife’s real estate business, Coldwell Banker Bivins Realty, and Sam’s Club will be distributing 100 Thanksgiving turkeys at the Cardinal Shehan Center in Bridgeport to needy families before his legendary R&B group plays at Foxwoods at 8 p.m.
“It’s our fifth annual turkey giveaway with the Shehan Center,” Bivins said. “I’ll be there for a couple of hours before I drive up to the casino.”
Bivins, who has a home in Connecticut, began his career as a child living in the Orchard Park housing projects in Roxbury, Massachusetts. He and the two other members of Bell Biv Devoe, Ricky Bell and Ronnie DeVoe, were members of the influential boy band New Edition, which was initially active from 1978 to 1991 and has reunited and toured numerous times since then. Bell Biv Devoe’s debut album “Poison” was released in 1990 and went multi-platinum due to two huge hit singles, the title song and “Do Me!”
Chris Pizzello / Invision/Associated Press
Ricky Bell, left, Ronnie DeVoe and Michael Bivins of Bell Biv DeVoe.
Bell Biv Devoe is known as one of the architects of the New Jack Swing sound which merged dance pop and contemporary R&B sounds with hip-hop rhythms and styles. Bivins said he and his childhood friends in New Edition grew up listening to “Jackson 5, George Clinton and Parliament, The Whispers, The Temptations, a lot of the old school R&B. It wasn’t what we chose to listen to, it’s what our parents were playing. The record player on Saturday and Sunday was our mothers’ records, so we’d have to put on a radio station to hear other people’s music. So we were brought up on the R&B classical sounds of music until rap came to life.”
A pop star for 46 of his 56 years, Bivins said his groups “never really experienced a dip. We’ve been working forever. I think that’s why our audience is the way it is because we stay consistently working. It depends on what you’re trying to accomplish. You may want to do a small run at the House of Blues and make it intimate. If you want to do a theater run, around a 3,000 seater sort of like at the Foxwoods you do that, or if you want to do something big some of the time you can play an amphitheater or a big arena.
“The audience is different ages. It can be 13-year-olds to 80-year-olds. It can be different nationalities. Because the music is timeless and the songs touch so many people,” he added. “Bell Biv Devoe’s music has been around for over 30 years, New Edition has been around for over 40. So you never know who’s going to come to a Bell Biv Devoe concert. And in this case, there’s also 98 Degrees.”
Bell Biv Devoe continues to keep the shows fresh. “We all have our creative input,” said Bivin, who also active with multiple other acts as a manager, producer and developer of new talent. “We all do a little bit of everything: Arranging, coordinating with the music director, coming up with ideas. Even though we’re three members in the group we’re only one voice.”
Robb Cohen/Associated Press archives
Connecticut is a second home for Michael Bivins, shown performing with New Edition in Atlanta in 2022. (Robb Cohen/Associated Press archives)
Asked if the shows can change based on the make-up of the audience or the type of bill they’re on, Bivins insisted that “We continue to be us no matter who’s in the room. If it’s a corporate gig and there’s words like ‘smack it up, flip it, rub it down’ or ‘the low pro ho she be cut like an Afro,’ we won’t say those lines at a corporate gig but even the executives still say the lines because they know the words to the songs, so it’s kind of funny.”
Bell Biv Devoe set lists aren’t confined to the hits. “We got album fillers, we got records that were released that weren’t hits, we do a wide range of everything,” Bivins said. Despite being together for decades, the group has only released four full albums — in 1990, 1993, 2001 and 2017 — but that still gives them dozens of songs to draw from, plus New Edition material when they feel like it. For his other musical projects, “I still record a lot on my downtime, Bivins said. “I have a soundtrack coming out that’s part of my documentary that came out last year. We record all the time.”
Bivins was a consulting producer on the documentary “Larger Than Life: Reign of the Boy Bands,” which features commentary not just from New Edition and fellow Bostonians New Kids on the Block but also NSYNC, Hanson and even Donny Osmond.
New Jack Swing wasn’t just a sound but a look. So how does Bell Biv Devoe look today? “We look prestigiously fly,” Bivins said with a laugh. “We are the epitome of hip-hop dressed up, going on the town to a five-star dinner, looking like Steven Tyler from Aerosmith.”
The Foxwoods shows are special to him.
“Connecticut is our second home. It’s a close show to home. My family from Boston comes, my family from Connecticut, my wife and kids — we raised our kids in the state of Connecticut.
“The audiences here are all so good. People love to get out and have a good time,” he said. “The Connecticut audience is hype. It’s pretty cool. You get that good energy.”
Bell Biv Devoe performs on Nov. 23 at 8 p.m. at Foxwoods Premier Theater, 350 Trolley Line Blvd., Mashantucket. $61.65-$757.55. foxwoods.com.
