Before Jessie Reyez would team up with 6Lack (black) for their hit single Imported
Before Jessie Reyez would help write the hit songs One Kiss and Promises by Calvin Harris
and be featured on two songs with Eminem
Before Jessie Reyez would literally be at the right place, at the right time, which
would lead to her working with King Louie
Before Jessie Reyez would win the Juno Award for RnB/Soul Recording of the Year
Jessie Reyez is taking the music world by storm.
With her unique sound and music writing ability, Reyez is finally starting to see the success
which seems to be long overdue.
Helping write for popular Calvin Harris songs such as One Kiss and Promises, Reyez talent
really shines when she picks up her guitar and sings from the heart, something she’s
been doing since her youth.
After moving from Toronto, to Florida, then back to Toronto, Reyez has had quite the journey
leading up to her success in the industry, which includes a Juno for RnB/Soul Recording
of the Year.
We’re going to tell you all about Jessie Reyez rise to fame here for you on Before
They Were Famous.
Whats popping guys Jarred Bronstein here today for you on Before They Were Famous.
If this is your first time here, welcome, we make videos on celebrities, athletes, musicians
and more on their rise to success and fame.
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who you’d like us to document next.
A handful of you guys have asked for this one, but before we jump in, today’s trivia
question is what team did Reyez cheerlead for before becoming such a successful musician?
Let me know in the comments below and find out at the end of our video.
Jessie Reyez was born on June 12th, 1991 in Toronto, Canada.
Both of her parents moved to Toronto from Columbia, where her Mother was a pre school
teacher, before becoming a baby sitter in the 6ix.
Reyez Dad would play guitar which Jessie would eventually steal after finding her passion
and love for music.
Jessie also has an older brother, who she credits bringing Reggae into her life.
But Jessie’s love for music all started when she used to sit in front of her tv singing
along to opera.
Jessies earliest memory is when she would reenact performances by Celia Cruz for her
family, getting dressed up and putting fruit in her hair to try to resemble the Latina
sensation.
She would also play on what she called a shitty little piano, but studied hip hop dance throughout
school before realizing she was destined to entertain the world with her musical talents.
Jessies family would move from Toronto to Brampton, a city just 20 minutes northwest
of Toronto, where she would spend most of her child and teenage years.
She claimed while in high school, her passion for dancing would take her away from her academic
studies.
After finishing school around 3PM, Jessie would go to dance practice for 6 30 until
about 9, return home at midnight and try to finish her homework before having to get back
up the next morning at 7 am.
Throughout her high school years, she fell in love with her boyfriend that would eventually
encourage her to start writing about real pain, according to her.
At 17 Reyez would find out her boyfriend would be continuing his education in another country,
ultimately leading to the end of their relationship.
She told Vice “Me and him got together and fell in love, and when it went to shit when
I was 17, it hit me hard as fuck.
That’s when I started to write about, real pain, I guess.”
While pursuing music, she’d work odd jobs such as baby sitting, teaching dance, and
working at Pizza Pizza.
But this girl would be straight hustling, while working her odd jobs she’d be thinking
about music and even carry around her mixtapes in a bag just in case the opportunity would
arise.
She’d begin performing her music in local toronto clubs and around the streets of the
city, but would soon find out her family was making their move the Florida, which was their
goal from the get go.
Unfortunately it’s not easy to get into the US as an immigrant, so Toronto was just
a layover, albeit for 18 years, for Jessie and her family until they could legally move
down south.
This would give Jessie an ultimatum, move down south with the family or stay in Canada
living alone.
She decided she was sticking with the fam jam.
Eventually she would move back to Toronto, but while in Florida she came to the realization
that she had stopped focusing on her music.
While down south she picked up a job bartending and was making pretty good money.
But she came to the realization, she couldn’t live this way forever.
She said “I ended up moving to Miami and bartending, but the party atmosphere is a
black hole down there.
People party all the time, and if you’re working in the industry, you’re sleeping
all day and at the club all night, day after day.
I did that for a year, I completely neglected my music.
The only musical thing I did was playing the guitar at the beach when everyone was coming
down after a long night.”
She would also work busking on the beach, but her breakthrough as a musician wouldnt
come until she got a friend in Miami to help her shoot a music video for one of her songs
she recorded while still living in Toronto.
Out of fear that it would take someone too long to edit her video, she took it upon herself
to get it done.
Keep in mind, she never had any experience editing so she explains how it took her 48
hours to edit a 3 minute video.
But it could’ve been the best possible choice she ever made.
After finishing her edits, Reyez sent the final cut to everyone on her Facebook friends
list, and one of the people she sent it to encouraged Jessie to apply to Toronto’s
remix project, a program that was “created in order to help level the playing field for
young people from marginalized and under served communities.
Our programs and services serve youth who are trying to enter into the creative industries
or further their formal education.
The Remix Project provides top-notch alternative, creative, educational programs, facilitators
and facilities.
Our mission is to help refine the raw talents of young people in order to help them find
success as participants define it and on their own terms.”
This would be the real start of her career.
After being accepted into the remix project, Jessie came back to Toronto to really pursue
music full time.
This is where she would be mentored by tons of musicians, including Daniel Daley, who
is one half of the OVO signed duo, Division.
King Louie, a Chicago rapper, was also mentoring while Jessie was attending.
It was there that he heard some of her music, thanks to Gavin Sheppard, co founder of the
Remix Project and founder of Public Records, who is in partnership with Universal Music.
It just so happened that Jessie was walking by while they were listening to her track.
This would eventually lead to Louie wanting to work on a track with Jessie, which would
end up happening at a local condo, more specifically, on the condo’s balcony.
This would eventually turn into the track Living in the Sky, which would put Reyez on
the map in the music scene.
Reyez would then drop her second single, It Hurts (selena) in 2015, then in early 2017
she’d drop the song Shutter Island.
Following Shutter Island, Toronto rapper PartyNextDoor would announce his European tour and his opening
act, Jessie Reyez.
After the tour, Reyez would drop her hit single, Figures, which premiered on Beats 1 Radio.
Figures peaked at number 58 on the Canadian Hot 100 and has since been certified double
platinum.
At the time of this recording, the figures music video has 47 million views, Jessie has
1.3 million followers on instagram and just under 100 thousand twitter followers.
In April of 2017, Jessie would release her debut EP, Kiddo and a short film to the song
Gatekeeper, which Reyez would later explain was inspired by traumatic night she experienced
with Noel Detail Fisher, a success producer in the music industry.
She tweeted “One night, over 6 years ago Noel ‘Detail’ Fisher tried this on me.
I was lucky and I got out before it got to this.
I didn’t know what to say or who to tell.
I was scared.
Fear is a real thing.
The girls that came out are brave as hell.”
accompanied by a TMZ article headlined Music producer Detail accused of raping, abusing
2 female artists.
Billboard would name Reyez one of the top 10 hip hop and r and b artists to watch in
2018 and for good reason.
She would win Breakthrough artist of the year at the juno award, and be nominated for Rnb/Soul
recording of the year, video of the year for gatekeeper and Juno Fan choice award.
Although she’d only win the one Juno, this momentum would help Reyez release her second
EP, Being Human in Public and spawn a tour across North America.
Reyez would come out strong in 2019, winning the Juno for RnB/Soul Recording of the year,
collaborating with Eminem on the songs Nice Guy and Good Guy from his album Kamikaze,
and appear in the soundtrack for the movie Fifty Shades Freed.
She’d most recently drop a single with Black, titled Imported and has a cameo in the Netflix
film, Someone Great.
Reyez credits her parents as inspiration for encouraging her music career, and one day
hopes to work with the likes of Kid Cudi and Frank Ocean.
We’ll just have to wait and see if her dreams of working with Cudi and Ocean ever come true,
but I wouldnt doubt it.
Still very early on in her career Reyez has worked with the likes of Calvin Harris, Eminem,
and Black.
It seems year after year her talents continue to shine, and although it didn’t come easy,
it seems Reyez is going to have many more successful years ahead of her.
Now to answer our trivia question, which team did Reyez cheerlead for before she became
the star she is today?
Well it was none other than our Toronto Argos.
That’s all for today’s video, check out some of our other videos, we recently covered
the Migos and Miley Cyrus not too long ago.
As always drop a comment below with who you’d like to see next, or DM me on instagram or
twitter @bronst7.
My name is Jarred Bronstein and we’ll see you in the next one.