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Charles City native poised for pop success; Next Town Down could be on the brink of stardom

  • Members of Next Town Down are, from left, Malik Knighten, 18, Charles City; Christopher Louis, 20, Sarasota, Fla.; Tre'von Waters, 21, Lancaster, Virg.; Terence Thomas, 22, Hollandale, Miss.; and Leon Outlaw Jr., 15, Brooklyn, N.Y. Courtesy photo.

  • Malik Knighten performs with his R&B musical group Next Town Down.

  • Malik Knighten, from Charles City, Christopher Louis from Sarasota, Fla., Terence Thomas from Hollandale, Miss., Tre’von Waters from Lancaster, Va. and Leon Outlaw, Jr., from Brooklyn, N.Y. make up the musical group Next Town Down. (Photo submitted.)

  • Members of Next Town Down are, from left, Christopher Louis, Leon Outlaw Jr., Terence Thomas, Malik Knighten of Charles City, and Tre'Von Waters.

By James Grob, jgrob@charlescitypress.com

The last year and a half has been a whirlwind for Charles City native Malik Knighten.

There’s a chance those winds are about to spin even faster.

“It’s crazy, to look back and think about where I was then and where I am now,” Knighten said. “At the end of the day, it’s a blessing.”

Two years ago, Knighten was just another typical high school kid in small-town Iowa, going to school, hanging with friends, catching and defending passes on the football team — as well as singing and recording music, mostly then to get the attention of girls.

Now, he’s back in Los Angeles, after a recent show at a Texas festival and a “meet and greet” at Madison Square Garden in New York.

His musical group, Next Town Down, also recently performed at the Staples Center in LA, and has received rave reviews from fans and critics alike. One of those critics called Next Town Down “the next big boy band,” and the group can include pop icons such as Mariah Carey and NSYNC among its fans.

And the girls? Well, Malik and his bandmates have their full attention.

“Everyone has been supporting me to follow my dreams, and I can see where it’s going now,” Knighten said. “This is what I wanted, and it’s actually going on.”

The group, which is under contract with Sony, has received a lot of attention over the last year performing some cover songs and shooting some videos, and this past May, Next Town Down dropped two singles — original songs — that are getting substantial airplay. The group is currently working on getting a full-length album released by fall.

It all started with a social media message that Knighten received out of the blue.

In Knighten’s senior year of high school, a producer and manager saw and heard some of Knighten’s musical work and contacted him on Instagram.

“He told me about a big opportunity that they’re doing, and he wanted to reach out to me,” Knighten said. “We ended up Skyping and I sang for him, and they really liked it, so they decided they were going to fly me out and meet me in person.”

Long story short, by Christmas, Knighten had signed a contract with Sony Music.

With the help of a tutor, Knighten took the remainder of his senior year classes online through Charles City High School, and received a Charles City diploma with the Class of 2017.

Since then, when he isn’t on a promotional tour, he’s been living, learning and singing in LA with the rest of his group.

Other band members are Christopher Louis from Sarasota, Florida, Terence Thomas from Hollandale, Mississippi, Tre’von Waters from Lancaster, Virginia, and Leon Outlaw, Jr., from Brooklyn, New York.

Knighten said that they all just knew they had something great the first time they sang together.

“We knew from the day we met, that first night, we sang together and we knew it was one of those things,” Knighten said. “It’s a different experience, singing with these guys. It’s so perfect, everything about it is perfect. We want to use our voices to make the world a better place at the end of the day.”

The group released two singles, entitled “Rock” and ‘Easy,” on May 11. They are available for download on Apple Music and elsewhere, and the group has a six-song EP and five other singles.

“The singles have been doing great,” Knighten said. “I’m excited.”

The group also released a cover of a Drake song, “Nice for What,” in April, available to see on YouTube.

The R&B trade website, thisisrnb.com, has given Next Town Down positive reviews. The site says, “if gifted voices come together and know how to perfectly accompany each other in harmony, they can still garner the deserving attention. The latest emerging group to do so is Los Angeles-based Next Town Down.”

The site also says that the group is “building a solid following through their viral cover videos on YouTube. With over 300K subscribers on their channel to date, they’ve already made some really famous fans, including Mariah Carey and fellow boy bands, Boys II Men and NSYNC.”

The site rates the song “Easy” as “exactly the smooth slow jam, with classic R&B elements, that proves Next Town Down has a real shot at R&B boy band success.”

“All of us guys in the group feel like there’s just something missing in music right now,” Knighten said when the group was forming. “Something that kids can’t relate or old people can’t relate, so we want to make music that everyone can relate to, not just people who like certain genres.”

Some of the group’s first professional work together did just that. One of the group’s most popular YouTube videos is entitled, “Evolution of Boybands,” in which the quintet performs a medley-montage of about 50 years of R&B songs — from The Temptations, to the Jackson 5, to New Kids on the Block, to Bell Biv DeVoe, Backstreet Boys, One Direction and many more. Songs that several generations can relate to. Throughout the medley, each of the members of Next Town Down gets the opportunity to step up front and sing lead.

At the time the video was recorded, Knighten was still working on finishing high school, so he was going through a lot of back-and-forth between Charles City and Los Angeles.

“That was crazy,” he said.

The video has received more than 2 million likes on YouTube and more than 22 million hits on Facebook.

Knighten said that now the group is looking ahead to a lot of studio work, through the summer and into the fall, and hopes to be releasing a full-length album then.

“We keep working on finding our sound,” he said. “In the next month, we’ll be in the studio a lot more, and working on getting more music.”

All the musical work can be prohibitive to having a normal social life. Knighten just recently turned 19 years old, and said he does not currently have a girlfriend.

“My girlfriend is all the Townies,” he said.

“Townies” are what the fans of Next Town Down are called. Many of them are young women, and many of these young women are not shy about approaching the band members on Twitter, sending their photos, and expressing their love for the group’s music.

“It’s definitely cool,” said Knighten. “When I started singing, back when I was 15 years old, and I started making videos of my music, it was for the girls.”

Before he connected with Next Town Down, Knighten was promoting his own music. His first single, “Take My Stress,” was recorded in Waterloo.

“More and more girls connect with how our voices blend together,” Knighten said. “It’s constant now, but I don’t mind, I’m just thankful. I still feel like a normal dude.”

Knighten said he wants the people back home in Charles City to know that he’s doing OK and not becoming a victim to all the trappings of fame and success in the entertainment world.

“I have good people around me,” he said. “There’s a lot of stuff happening, but things are going really well. Things are going in the right direction.”

He said he feels like Next Town Down is right on the brink of taking off into stardom.

“I definitely think it’s in the near future,” he said. “I’m hoping for the best.”

According to his bio on the Next Town Down website, Knighten “takes pride in his town’s good hospitality and tries to keep to his roots.” It adds that he draws inspiration from his community back at home.

It was hard to leave Iowa, Knighten said, but it’s a decision he had to make. His parents are in Charles City, and he has a brother who just graduated from Charles City High School, and more younger brothers and sisters still in school.

“I miss everyone, I do miss Charles City,” he said. “I can’t wait to make Charles City a place for everyone to visit.”

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