Craig David, courtesy.

More than two decades after his breakout debut album, Craig David still holds dear his role in taking the underground genre of U.K. garage and bringing it to the masses, not only in his native England but also to the U.S., where it fits right in alongside the American soul, pop and hip-hop music that influenced his own.

The artist behind love-making jams like “7 Days,” “Fill Me In,” “Rewind” and “Walking Away” took the subgenre of twitchy house music but combined it with American hip-hop beats and soulful crooning. He was one of numerous artists working within this U.K. garage framework, but with 2000’s Born To Do It, the sound was everywhere.

Inspired by the likes of Dru Hill, Timbaland, Missy Elliott and Ginuwine, David, then 19, was suddenly sharing airtime with them. In the U.S., where he was nominated for two Grammys, his music was often lumped in with R&B. But there was one key difference.

“The tempo made you feel like you could dance, as opposed to this is only saved for in the bedroom,” David said in a video call a couple of weeks ahead of a U.S. tour that will see him playing the Masonic in San Francisco on May 6.

But David, who turns 43 the day before his San Francisco show, said that even U.K. listeners didn’t know what to make of him at first. He wasn’t from London, the home of U.K. garage music, but from Southampton, a south coastal city in England. Nor did his songs fit squarely in the U.K. garage box.

“‘Fill Me In’ is a bit of a hybrid of R&B and garage, and then there’s ‘7 Days,’ which is an R&B/pop song. Then there’s ‘Walking Away,’ which is more of a rock/pop song, and it was like, ‘What’s this?’” he said. “I think it was because the consistency of the songs that came one after another, it became a bit undeniable. … That’s what any artist wishes for. … I’m just really grateful for the privilege of being able to fly the flag for U.K. garage music, but then also get the love and appraisal from America, which is very much the homage from that place which has such a rich R&B and hip-hop culture.”

And his love for the U.S. has remained. That’s why after getting an invite to perform at the soul and hip-hop-leaning Lovers & Friends Festival in Las Vegas, he decided to quickly book some more gigs for what will be his first North American full-band tour in nearly two decades. He’s also got new music completed and coming out around the same time.

Craig David points out he’s the only British artist on the lineup.

“Everyone R&B from ‘90s to 2000s being involved–I mean, Usher doing Confessions—is, I think, an iconic moment for anyone to see,” he said.

Even though he already had a longer U.K. tour scheduled, he decided to put together a short run of shows in his available time. He’ll be accompanied by his long-time band on all seven dates of the 7 Days Commitment Tour, led by guitarist and music director Kwame Yeboah, who’s been with David since the Born To Do It days.

David came up as a DJ and still enjoys a long-running summer DJ residency in Ibiza, Spain. Having the ability to perform both types of shows provides a happy balance for him.

He called his band a well-oiled machine that’s fully in tune with his experimentation on stage. U.S. fans can expect to hear some new material, including February single “Abracadabra,” a smooth banger with U.K. artist and reality TV (“Love Island”) star Wes Nelson.

“I just feel like I’m in my R&B bag again in a way that it feels similar to the first album,” David said. “That’s been a springboard for an album that’s been in the works for a moment. The ‘commitment’ part of this is actually leading into a song. … that could well have the ‘Commitment’ title that rolls with this tour, and it all lands at the same time.”

All these years later, Craig David is making music with the same intent as he did at the outset, by feel rather than with specific success goals. Rather than worrying about radio or streaming numbers, he’s after a particular vibe. That’s what helped him get back to the top of the charts in the U.K. with 2016’s Following My Intuition.

He recorded that album with producers in their late teens and early 20s, whose connection to his existing body of work came from older siblings. He needed to create new connections with them that looked ahead rather than to what he’d done in the early aughts. He accomplished this by freestyling over the music that they were playing. That’s when it clicked for them that he has more songs left in him.

“The one part that I’ve truly learned is that your relevancy is in being able to be playful and creative and fun with all of this,” he said. “Get out of your own way and let the universe, God—whatever your belief system—just do its thing, don’t over complicate with. … I’m not trying to be like Born to Do It time, because I’m much older now and had different stories to talk about. But the playfulness, the child in me, is very much back again.”

Something else Craig David has been passionate about lately is being more vulnerably open about his experiences. That largely informed his 2022 memoir, “What’s Your Vibe? Tuning Into Your Best Life,” on which he talks about facing depression, learning to find boundaries and when to say no. He’s also talked candidly about his body dysmorphia and going celibate to heal from a series of superficial non-relationships in his 20s.

“I’ve really hit a sweet spot in my life of realizing that it’s a bit like a lotus petal, where there’s different facets of who you are,” he said. “Experience leads to wisdom that at some point you hope you can bestow to anyone who wants to hear that and help people that’s not just through music.”

Craig David has seen how talking about his vulnerabilities has broken down the facade of his public image and let him communicate on a more personal level. The more people share, the more sharing feelings is normalized, particularly among men, as suicide statistics have shown male suicides skyrocketing.

“So we might need to just bring in some of that more feminine intuition. Share your feelings, a bit more emotion, just to balance this thing out,” he said. “And then we can go outside and chop wood and box and do crazy stuff.”

Follow editor Roman Gokhman at Twitter.com/RomiTheWriter.