Kane Brown Pairs With Amazon Music For Mini-Documentary, ‘Velocity’
Check out the new documentary now.
Kane Brown is all about family, and he wants fans who watch Velocity, his new mini-documentary with Amazon Music, to know that whether it is his wife Katelyn and daughter Kingsley, his band and road crew or the behind the scenes people working on his career, he sees all of them as part of one big family circle.
The 16-minute documentary covers Brown’s early years when he was posting videos on Facebook and Instagram through his amazing concert in January at the Staples Center in Los Angeles.
“I was just messing around, not thinking about a career in music,” the singer says in the documentary. “Music was always in my life, whether I was on the school bus with my earbuds in or at home filming those videos. I was just messing around with it, not thinking I’d get a career out of it.”
Brown said he would film the videos when he would get bored playing X-Box or working at two jobs to pay for his truck. “I would record covers, just hoping to get followers. I never thought a record company would hit me up or anything like that.”
Samples of his videos in the documentary include Billy Currington’s “Let Me Down Easy” and George Strait’s “Check Yes or No.” People who heard them immediately knew they were hearing an amazing voice. That was his barber’s reaction when he played a video for him one day.
“I didn’t believe it was him singing when he showed me the video. I just didn’t think a voice like that could come out of that body, and when I said that he just busted out singing for me,” recalls CT Kurtz. “When he did that, I told him, ‘You can sing your ass off kid. You’ve got something special.’”
Fans following him on Facebook and Instagram were realizing that too, but the real test, according to his manager Martha Earls, who was featured in the documentary, was would they buy tickets to see him? That answer was a resounding yes after they announced a concert at a 725-seat venue in Darlington, S.C. “It sold out in 20 minutes,” Earls says.
The documentary captures behind-the-scene video with band and friends, as well as meetings with fans and short clips of songs with Florida Georgia Line and Jason Aldean, both of whom brought Brown with them as opening act in his first year as a recording artist. He also traveled with Chris Young and Brad Paisley. Brown was quick to say how valuable those shows were for him in learning how to interact with the audience and how to treat his fans and the people around him.
The film also includes several interviews with his wife, Katelyn, who reveals that “Kane never missed a doctor’s appointment while I was pregnant with our daughter.”
The new dad, who was raised by his mother, says he will always be there for Kingsley. He also says he “feels like I’m more grown up now that I’m a dad. She is my life.”
Brown previewed the documentary for a group of invited friends and industry VIPs on Tuesday (2/18) before it debuted today (2/20). There were a few clips that Brown laughed about while doing a brief Question and Answer session, moderated by Amazon Music Country Curator Emily Cohen, after the preview.
“I thought my early performances were slick and amazing,” he said, pausing to laugh before continuing, “When I went back and looked at them and I was like, ‘What was I thinking?’ I was wearing plaid button-down shirts which I guess I thought were cool at the time.”
Once signed to a label, Brown’s career took off like a rocket, giving him the opportunity to travel around the country on tour and giving him simultaneous number ones on all five main Billboard charts with his single “What Ifs.”
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At the end of 2019, as he planned to close that tour with a show at the Staples Center in Los Angeles, tragedy struck. When the group came home from the next-to-the-last show of the year with Jason Aldean, drummer Kenny Dixon headed home to Chattanooga. On the drive down I-24 East, he was involved in a car accident that took his life. The Staples Center show was cancelled and everyone around Brown came even closer together as they recognized how this would affect their lives going forward.
The mini-documentary interviewed some of the people in that tight-knit family of band, crew and others involved in the singer’s career, and emotions were raw and tears were shed as they talked about what it was like to lose their friend.
Earls said she believes the accident pulled everyone even closer together, and “They feel like they are doing the shows for Kenny, and he will forever be a part of their lives.”
Clips of the Staples Center show in January 2020 showed how the band and crew have rallied and also gives a glimpse of Brown’s 2020 tour. “Fans saw the 2019 show with a preview of this year’s tour included,” Earls explained. It was a wonderful way to end the mini-documentary and let fans know Brown and his family are ready to come and visit them in their hometown with his 2020 Worldwide Beautiful Tour, with supporting acts Russell Dickerson and Chris Lane.
This tour was his first chance to meet his audience of international fans. The tour kicked off early in February in Dublin, Ireland and continued to London, Amsterdam, Paris and Berlin before returning to the states for the debut of the tour in North America in Atlantic City, NJ on February 29.
Amazon Music is offering its listeners the opportunity to stream an Amazon Original Live EP, Live From Los Angeles, which features songs from the Staples Center Show. Among them are “What Ifs,” “Homesick,” “Heaven” and “Lose It.” Fans can listen on Amazon or just ask Alexa to play the Amazon Original from Kane Brown in the Amazon Music mobile app.
Kane is the first country artist and the youngest artist to be featured in Amazon Music’s mini-documentary series. His is the fifth documentary, following Mariah Carey is Christmas: The Story of ‘All I Want For Christmas Is You,’ Still Ill: 25 Years of the Beastie Boys’ Ill Communication, The Birth of Biggie: 25 Years of Ready to Die and Departure, a detailed look at Sharon Van Ettens’ final days of living in New York City before her move to Los Angeles.
