Born and raised in the very un-soulful state of Indiana, Edmonds grew up with a deep love of the Motown sound and other classic soul music.  He attended Indiana University, where he teamed with his brother Melvin and college mate Keith Mitchell to form After 7 and played local gigs in the Bloomington area.  Meanwhile, his older brother Kenneth "Babyface" Edmonds became part of the funk group the Deele, and ultimately joined with bandmate L.A. Reid to become the top songwriting and production team in modern music, working with Boyz II Men, Toni Braxton, Whitney Houston and dozens of other top acts as well as forging a successful solo singing career.

In 1988 Babyface and Reid signed an artist development agreement with Virgin Records and approached After 7 about signing with the label. With some trepidation the trio signed, and the resulting self-titled debut recording became a smash on both Soul and Pop radio, yielding three hits including the chart topper "Ready or Not."  After 7 went on to become a consistent, if understated, charting act, scoring moderate hits with "Nights Like This" (from The Five Heartbeats soundtrack) and a nice cover of "Baby I'm For Real" before landing a major crossover hit in 1995 with the wonderful midtempo number "Til You Do Me Right."  And while After 7 boasted solid harmonies and generally strong material, the highlight of the group's recorded performances was Edmond's bright, upbeat vocals.

Edmonds was involved in a fair amount of session vocal work during the 90s, working on many of his brother's productions, and most importantly becoming part of the one-performance group Milestone (along with K-Ci and Jojo) on the smash hit "I Care About You" from the Soul Food soundtrack.

In 1999, Edmonds released his solo debut album, 24/7, on RCA Records.  It was a terrific spotlight for his exciting voice and was filled with strong material and classic arrangements (one of Babyface's better projects of that era) -- happily out of place in the hip-hop drenched world of that year.  It also included a top notch set of musicians and backing vocalists, including Tommy Sims, Daryl Simmons, Nathan East and Marc Nelson. The title cut hit both the Soul and Pop top 10, but is was Edmonds' performance of the consistently solid material on the disc, especially the big ballad "Baby Come To Me," the midtempo "Love Will Be Waiting" and the Babyface/Kevon duet "A Girl Like You," that made it one of the year's best discs. 

Edmonds has been quiet since 24/7, emerging occasionally for some studio vocal work on other artists' albums. Finally, in October 2009, Edmonds broke his decade-long silence and released the new album, Who Knew.

By Chris Rizik