Khalid
Your wait to watch Khalid live ends soon. Yes, Khalid, who gave us all those funky tracks like Location, Talk and his latest Eleven after Up all Night, among many others, is coming to India next month. Here’s a lowdown on the global star who has an ever-growing fan following all over the world and many in India who are eagerly waiting to see him in person.
Khalid is unique, unlike other singers we see today. He’s a beautiful writer with the ability to take human concepts and make you understand and feel them deep down inside of you with his full, powerful, and mature voice.
Khalid Donnel Robinson is a native of Fort Stewart, Georgia, U.S. As a young boy, he spent his time moving around the U.S. due to his parents’ numerous military postings. Khalid completed his schooling in Carthage Senior High School in New York City. The family took a transfer to Europe where a young Khalid spent six years in Heidelberg, Germany. While in school there, he took part in singing and did a bit of theatre with his friends. He had no goal as to what he really wanted to be, but singing and the arts fascinated him. The family finally moved back to the U.S. and over to El Paso, Texas where Khalid got a chance to finish high school.
In 2015, while still in school and in his late teens, he began writing songs and recording them from the halls of the high school. His music then was full of youthful innocence and poetic passion. He posted his early works to SoundCloud and by 2016 he found his music reaching an audience who loved it. His single Location began charting, which led to his being featured in many U.S. publications and instant recognition for his work. With production from top music producers like Syk Sense, Tunji Ige and Smash David, things moved. The song received great critical acclaim and praise, for his soulful, gentle and mellifluous voice is perfectly suited for a retro soul style. Location finished the year 2016 at No. 20 on the U.S. mainstream R&B/hip-hop airplay chart and reached the Top 10 on the U.S. Hot R&B songs chart in early January 2017.
His second song, Young, Dumb & Broke, was a slow burner, but nevertheless it got noticed everywhere it was played, moving to radio airplay and climbing the charts.
Khalid took off on a 21-city tour between January-February 2017 titled Location Tour, also playing in his hometown at the 1,500-capacity Tricky Falls in El Paso.
Back from the whirlwind tour, Khalid released his debut album American Teen in March 2017 which featured previously released singles. The album’s title is possibly related to the artist himself who is teen material and from America, which labels him as an American teen star.
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Verus Ferreira is a music journalist for over three decades. He is the author of The Great Music Quiz Book and The Great Rock Music Quiz Book and the founder of Musicunplugged.in