Al B. Is Sure! Showing ‘Em

Michael Jackson! George Michael! Bruce Springsteen! U2! Run-D.M.C.! Madonna!

These superstars all have a right to exclamation points after their names. However, they haven’t bothered with such presumptuous punctuation.

But Al B. Sure! sure did.

Don’t check the superstar roster for his name. This 20-year-old upstart R&B; singer/songwriter doesn’t have a string of credits--just one album, “In Effect Mode” (on Warner Bros.), and two singles, “Nite and Day” and “Off on Your Own (Girl).”

Isn’t that exclamation point a bit much?

“Naww,” replied Sure recently, a few hours before catching a plane back home to Mt. Vernon, N.Y.

Isn’t it hard to living up to an exclamation point?

“It hasn’t been a problem,” he replied.

People tend not to like artists--or anybody for that matter--given to such flagrant displays of arrogance. But Sure has surely shown ‘em!

Though not a superstar yet, this newcomer, who was unknown a few months ago, is far from a flop. In fact, that exclamation point may be warranted one day soon.

“In Effect Mode” has sold 975,000 copies, buoyed by his first single, “Nite and Day,” which made the pop Top 10. Not many artists--particularly young black artists--start out with this kind of success.

But despite the exclamation point, this is no smug, swaggering, self-absorbed dude with a blimp-sized ego. Surprisingly, Sure is a genuinely shy guy.

When confronted with reports of his arrogance Sure seemed shocked.

“Me, arrogant? No way. You’ve got the wrong guy. Do I seem arrogant to you?”

Actually that afternoon during a restaurant interview he came across as an affable, likeable young gentleman. That reputation for arrogance probably comes from people who make assumptions about him based on that exclamation point. Sure offered another reason:

“If someone speaks to me I may just nod or say, ‘Hi.’ I don’t say, ‘Hi, what’s happening? How’s the family?’ I’m not outgoing. Some people may assume I think I’m too good to talk to them. That’s not it. I’m just a shy kid trying to get by.”

That exclamation point, by the way, was not his idea. Warner Bros. executive Karen Jones dreamed it up. “The point was to make a statement--to stand out,” he said.

Nor is Al B. Sure his real name. That, he said, is a secret.

Sure, who mostly sings in a wispy falsetto, has cornered the market on gently romantic soul music. Most R&B; records are dominated by rhythm sections. Even on ballads, the bass and drums are pounding away. But Sure’s sound, which sets women swooning, is ohhh-sooo soft.

One reason he’s making it big is because it’s a refreshing sound--different from the booming music on the black market. It’s serene, sexy, soul music--almost a male equivalent of Sade’s sound. Even Sure’s up-tempo songs are loping and low-key.

“I like to call it progressive R&B;,” Sure explained. “The music is hip-hop dance, with hip-hop beats and nice melodies. It’s warm, soothing kind of music, a little bit more up-tempo than ballads.”

To some degree, he’s a modern-day Marvin Gaye, the Motown singer who turned women on in the ‘60s and ‘70s with his sultry falsetto. “When they hear the falsetto, people do say I sound like Marvin,” Sure said. “But I didn’t try to copy him. When I first tried singing, I tried falsetto. Later on, I worked on the falsetto with a voice teacher. It’s an R&B; way to sing. Girls like that high, soft sound. They think it’s very romantic.”

Sure, a Boston native who grew up middle-class in Mt. Vernon, didn’t start out as a singer. “I was a rapper,” he said proudly. “Like every black kid I was attracted to rapping. I wanted to be like L.L. Cool J and those guys. If you’re young and can’t sing the first thing you think about is rapping.

“I did it in high school, at parties. I never made a rap album. But I went to high school with the guys from (rap group) Heavy-D & the Boyz. They got a deal on MCA Records. My first project as a singer was singing background on a song on their album.”

But Sure was smart enough to see he had no future as a rapper. Singing intrigued him more. “I found myself incorporating singing into my raps,” he said. “After a while I decided to concentrate on singing.”

Eddie F., of Heavy-D & the Boyz, is responsible for Sure’s big break. Sure recorded demos with his cousin, keyboardist Kyle West. Eddie F. got those demos to Andre Harrell, who wound up managing Sure and, through label talent scout Benny Medina, helped him get a deal at Warner Bros. Sure wrote the lyrics and melodies for the songs on the first album while West composed most of the music.

Sure, who recently completed a tour headlining small theaters, is about to go on the road as a support act for New Edition. That’s bound to increase the percentage of females in the audience.

The tall, handsome Sure said, somewhat sheepishly, “My audience is mainly women in their teens, 20s and 30s. They get out of hand sometimes. I’ve had my clothes ripped off a few times. I have to have bodyguards. That’s strange for me.

“You don’t know what it’s like the first time girls start screaming and yelling over you. It does something to you. It’s good and it’s bad. You like it, but it puts your head in a place that’s weird.”

Though he looks the part, Sure said he wasn’t a teen-age Romeo: “I wasn’t a ladies’ man in high school. I was too shy.”

Sure is one of those artists who assume a whole new personality on stage.

“I get intense and forget everything else, I forget about being shy,” he said. “When you’re up there on stage it’s an incredible feeling. You’re up there on the mountain. Then you get off stage and you’re back to being yourself very quickly.

“But you can’t wait to get back on stage to experience that feeling again. You live for it.”