she was born to sing all the practice she received during her childhood no doubt
also set her up for all the success she would inevitably achieve in the future however numerous
professional as well as personal setbacks in her life would send her on a downward spiral
to rock bottom that she thought she'd never recover from let's find out what happened
to american r b singer tweet charlene keys professionally known as tweet was born the
youngest of five in rochester new york not unlike many other future famous songstresses
she grew up singing in church with her family and later attended a performing arts school listening
to secular music was a big no-no but when tweet was able to get her hands on her own radio she
would end up falling in love with r b music after getting an earful from the likes of marvin gaye
and stevie wonder her life would take an unexpected turn when she became a teen mom
not surprisingly she was shunned by her church and no longer allowed to sing in the choir
she would made the tough decision to leave her daughter in the care of her parents
while she pursued her music career she auditioned and won a spot in a girl group called suga who
was part of the swing mob collective devante swing of r b quartet jodeci while in the group
she spent a lot of time around and formed fast friendships with other artists in the collective
such as missy elliott timbaland genuine playa and magoo unfortunately the group never released any
projects over the five years they were under devante's guidance tweet wasn't only starving
for success but also actual food things were so tight financially that she would often only
have a small bag of potato chips to eat for the entire day after everything was all said and done
tweet ended up depressed divorced from a short-lived marriage with her daughter's father
and back living with her parents in panama city florida while working odd jobs to support herself
and her daughter she felt so hopeless that she even contemplated taking her own life
then one day the phone rang it was missy her career was soaring she was working on her
third album at the time and wanted tweet to sing background vocals on some of the tracks
tweet jumped at the opportunity and ended up doing work on numerous tracks over several albums things
ended up snowballing for her and she would go on to work with many other artists such as madonna
whitney houston and monica her day would finally come after signing with missy's gold mine inc
label under electra records her debut single called oops oh my dropped in january 2002
the track written by tweet and missy and produced by timbaland rose to the number seven position on
the billboard hot 100 and number one on the r b chart in april her debut album titled southern
hummingbird was released and peaked at number three on the albums chart the follow-up single
call me also did well charting in the top 40 on the hot 100 and top 10 on the r b chart naturally
being as hot as she was at the time tinseltown came calling she would get the chance to make
cameos on some major projects like the hit upn sitcom the parkers as well as the dance film honey
a couple of years later tweet began work on her second album however some major changes behind the
scenes would slow everything down due to a merger deal tweet as well as all the other artists on
her label ended up moving to a new home after even more delays the lead single from her second album
called turn the lights off dropped in october 2004 it failed to get on the hot 100 at all and barely
crack the top 40 on the r b chart several months later the album titled it's me again was released
it didn't do anywhere near as well as her debut mainly because of the lack of promotion it was
a bitter pill to swallow since everyone that worked on her successful debut disappeared once
the merge happened she was then left with a new team that didn't know who she was and wasn't very
supportive now seemed a perfect time as any for tweet to take a bit of a break so she did when it
was time to get back to work she decided it was also time for new management so she left mona
young and violator and signed with matthew knowles aka beyonce's daddy and his music world management
by 2007 she would also sign a new label deal with umbrella recordings
and begin work on her third album a couple of singles were released
in anticipation of the new project however tweet would find herself in limbo once again
after the death of her label's founder tweet wasn't only dealing with professional drama
her personal life was in shambles as well alcohol and cigarettes had become her daily
vices to add insult to injury the man she was seeing at the time had a baby with someone else
tweet hit rock bottom fell into another deep depression
and believed her singing career was over in 2012 she took matters into her own hands and began
posting her unreleased work on soundcloud and her website the following year she released an ep
titled simply tweet after more than 10 years tweet's third studio album titles charlene would
finally be released in 2016. even though none of the album singles made any noise in the streets
rolling stone magazine did count it as one of the 20 best r b albums of that year while working on
the project she was also able to reunite once again with her guardian angel missy elliott
she gave the album the title of her birth name to signify getting back to her roots
and showcasing the music styles that inspired her before becoming tweet the album coming out
when it did and possibly at all is a testament to tweet's love and passion for music while she was
working on the project there was also an offer on the table for her to be on a reality tv show
that show was r b divas she had to make a decision since she couldn't do both so she chose music it
appeared that tweet was experiencing a successful peak in multiple areas of her life also at
this time she began dating pastor jamal bryan ex-husband of real housewives of potomac star
gisele bryant they crossed paths after she found her way back to church while on her healing
journey from her personal demons things seemed to be working out so well that during an appearance
on the tv series the preachers jamal proclaimed that he refers to tweet as his last lady
he was even there for her during a scary health crisis that put her in the hospital with blood
clots in both lungs and her right arm their relationship however would end two years later
but signify the beginning of other things tweet would remove from her life she went on to proclaim
she was done with organized religion completely because she believed that churches prioritize
attaining monetary and personal gain out of their congregation over anything else she laid
it all out in an instagram live video with her daughter i will not do church anymore i love god
i have a relationship with god but you won't see me in nobody's church house i'm not giving
nobody my tithes i'm not giving 10 to nobody period that's it sorry in june 2020
tweet revealed that she would be reuniting with her former group suga and they would be releasing
all the music they recorded years ago with swing mob collective they even reached out to devante
and he's on board with the project too 2020 is also the year tweet reappeared on the music scene
after charlene she did go back into the studio however she realized that she had
a lot of emotions to work through stemming from her recent breakup over the summer she released a
couple of promotional tracks for the fans before finally dropping the single never felt this way
which will serve as the lead song on her upcoming ep she had hoped to release later
that year tweet also took this time to speak out and share her disappointment
with the current state of the music industry and what women specifically are expected to do
to make it to the top i feel like female artists have to be over sexualized in order to win
in today's music era very over sexualized very naked all of those things which i'm not gonna do
so far an album hasn't dropped yet however in august 2021 she announced on her instagram
that another single was on the way in a few weeks called never gonna break my heart again tweet also
keeps busy touring and helping her adult daughter with her own singing career as well as being
a proud grandmother of two thanks for watching please like share and comment also don't forget
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