In the beginning when Ricky told Gary "We're RnB artist who happen to like Hip-Hop" they were low-key foreshadowing to their pioneering and transitioning into New Jack Swing, with Jimmy Jam And Terry. Janet Jackson's 1986 Control album was one of the pioneering albums of the New Jack Swing genre. There are actually clips from a 1988 Minneapolis Music documentary of New Edition recording their 1987 album in Jimmy Jams studio in Minneapolis. It's at the beginning of this clip:
^^^I posted this documentary in my thread about "Black neighborhoods/culture in non-black cities" thread to highlight Black culture in cities not known for having a Black population (cities like Minneapolis and Boston)