Kamaljit Singh Jhooti (born 26 March 1981), better known by his stage name Jay Sean, is a British singer-songwriter, rapper, beatboxer and record producer. He debuted in the Asian underground scene as a member of the Rishi Rich Project with "Dance with You", which reached #12 on the UK Singles Chart in 2003. This led to him being signed to Virgin Records and having two UK top 10 hits as a solo artist in 2004: "Eyes On You" at #6 and "Stolen" at #4. They were included in his critically-acclaimed debut album Me Against Myself which, though only moderately successful in the UK, sold more than two million copies across Asia and remains his most successful album to date. Alongside the Rishi Rich Project, Sean was a pioneer of Bhangra-R&B fusion, which his debut album helped popularize among the worldwide South Asian diaspora. He eventually left Virgin in 2006 and founded his own independent label, Jayded Records. After a gap of nearly four years, he returned in 2008 with "Ride It", which reached #11 in the UK and topped the charts in several Eastern European countries, including Romania where it was one of the best-selling singles of the year. It was followed by hits such as "Maybe", which reached #7 on the Japan Hot 100, and "Tonight". They were included in his second album, My Own Way, which became his most successful album on the UK Albums Chart, reaching #6, and topped the UK R&B Chart. Since the end of 2008, has he been signed to Cash Money Records. In 2009, his American debut single "Down" topped the Billboard Hot 100, making him the first solo artist of South Asian origin and first UK urban act to top the Hot 100. It was the seventh-best selling song of 2009, having sold more than three million digital copies in the United States, and six million copies worldwide, making him the most successful British/European male urban artist in US chart history. It was soon followed by another hit, "Do You Remember", which has sold more than a million copies in the US, and entered the top ten on the Hot 100, making him the first male act since Chingy in 2003 to "simultaneously appear in the Hot 100 top 10 with his first two charting singles." They were included in his American-debut album All or Nothing, which debuted at #37 on the US Billboard 200 and reached #11 on the Japan Oricon Albums Chart. Sean is sometimes referred to as a "one-man boy band" and was ranked #35 in Billboard's Hot 100 Artists of 2009.
Jay Sean was born as Kamaljeet Singh Jhooti in Harlesden, Northwest London to Sharan and Bindi Jhooti, Punjabi Sikh immigrants. His year of birth is uncertain, with different sources giving dates ranging from 1979 to 1983. He was raised in Southall, and displayed musical talent at an early age. At age 11, he and his cousin Pritpal Rupra formed a hip hop duo named "Compulsive Disorder". His stage name at the time was MC "Nicky J", with the "J" being derived from the first letter of his last name "Jhooti". He eventually came to be known by the nickname "Jay" among his friends. He was a student at Latymer Upper School, the same private school that Hugh Grant, Heston Blumenthal and Lily Cole had attended. He left the school in 1997. He finished his GCSEs as a "straight-A student" and then completed his A Levels with an A grade in Biology and B grades in Mathematics and Chemistry. He later enrolled in Barts and The London School of Medicine and Dentistry at Queen Mary, University of London, to study Medicine before he dropped out in 2003 to pursue a singing career. For his music career, he chose the stage name Jay Sean; "Jay" was the nickname his friends knew him as (derived from his previous stage name "Nicky J"), while "Sean" is derived from "Shaan"—a nickname he was called at home by his grandmother—which means "shining star" or "pride" in Punjabi. After Sean's track "One Minute" fell into the hands of producer Rishi Rich, the Rishi Rich Project was formed (consisting of Rich, Sean and Juggy D) in 2003. Their first taste of UK chart success was the Asian underground song, "Dance with You (Nachna Tere Naal)", which became a Top 20 hit, peaking at #12. This led to Sean signing a £1m deal with Virgin Records, under their label Relentless Records. His second single, "Eyes on You," was his first solo effort and became a Top 10 hit, peaking at #6. His third single, "Stolen," peaked at #4, with Bollywood actress Bipasha Basu making an appearance in the video. His debut album, Me Against Myself, was released in 2004 and received much critical praise and acclaim. Sean was referred to as an "Asian sensation" and was praised for his experimental, creative fusion of contemporary R&B, British hip hop and Indian music. Despite initially failing to reach the top 20 on the UK Albums Chart (where it peaked at #29), the album gradually managed to sell 100,000 copies in the UK and went on to become a substantial hit in India, selling over two million copies there. He made a brief appearance in the 2005 Bollywood film Kyaa Kool Hai Hum, providing the song "Dil Mera (My Heart)" to the soundtrack, based on "One Night" from his own debut album. Beyond India, the album sold over 300,000 copies across other parts of the world, including Europe, the Middle East, Southeast Asia, and Hong Kong. His performance of tracks from Me Against Myself on MTV Asia (alongside the Rishi Rich Project) had a television audience as large as 165 million viewers. It helped establish Sean as a major recognized artist across Asia and among the worldwide Desi diaspora, and remains his most successful album to date. With his debut album, Sean was influential in popularizing Indian-R&B fusion sounds in Asian underground and Indian pop music. He recorded a 16 track album which was scrapped because Virgin felt the market had changed to where it was all about Pop music. In February 2006, after several delays of his second album, he left Virgin Records.
After parting ways with Virgin Records, Jay Sean continued to work on his second album, which was initially named after the title track "Deal With It," but the song ended up being given to Corbin Bleu. Sean's background vocals remain on Bleu's version of the track. The song "Deal With It" earned Sean a BMI Songwriter Award[50] and later inspired the 2009 single "Juliette" by South Korean band Shinee. Jay Sean returned in late 2007 with the new single "Ride It", which was the first single from his second album My Own Way. It was to be the first album released as a joint-venture between his own label Jayded and 2Point9 Records. The video for "Ride It", released in early 2008, featured Jay Sean with a new style after being out of the limelight for nearly three and a half years. My Own Way debuted at #6 in the official UK Albums Chart and generated two more UK top 20 singles, "Ride It" and "Maybe". On the back of this Jay received two MOBO Award nominations, for Best UK Male (alongside Dizzee Rascal, Taio Cruz, Wiley and Sway) and Best R'n'B/Soul (alongside Usher, Estelle, Ne-Yo and Chris Brown). "Ride It" was successful in Eastern Europe, especially in Russia, Turkey and Romania, where it became one of the three best-selling singles of the year. "Maybe" was his most successful single in Japan, where it reached #7 on the Japan Hot 100 Singles. A Mandarin Chinese cover version of "Maybe" by Coco Lee has been released in China. Sean sang a Hindi version of the album My Own Way for release in India. The album sold more than 350,000 copies across the world. Touch Magazine in the U.K. described him as "the U.K.'s answer to Ne-Yo," while The Independent called him "...an urban legend in the making." In August 2008, Jay Sean co-hosted London radio station Choice FM's Breakfast show a week in which he only performed previously unheard tracks, including a song whose title was left to the listeners to decide. The unknown track was later confirmed to be called "Tonight" and is included in My Own Way: Deluxe Edition. Jay Sean was confirmed for the third series of Celebrity Scissorhands in October 2008 but he withdrew before the show was aired for unclear reasons. On 15 October 2008 during the MOBO Awards, Jay Sean announced that he had signed with the American hip-hop oriented record label Cash Money Records distributed via Universal Republic Records making him the first male British Asian singer to sign with an American label. His American-debut single was "Down" featuring American rapper and label mate Lil Wayne. It topped the Billboard Hot 100, replacing Black Eyed Peas. This makes him the first British artist to top the Hot 100 since Freddie Mercury of Queen in 1980, and the first solo artist of Asian descent to do so. "Down" has sold more than six million copies worldwide, and three million digital copies in the US, making the song the best-selling single by a British/European male artist in North America since Elton John's "Candle in the Wind" in 1997. In addition, "Down" has received a large airplay of two billion listener impressions on radio worldwide. In November 2009, Sean's next single from his album, "Do You Remember", was released and featured Jamaican dancehall superstar Sean Paul plus US Southern crunk rapper Lil Jon. It entered the Hot 100 top ten on the week of 9 January 2009, breaking "a three-week streak of no titles moving into the top 10" since December 2009. Like its predecessor, it has sold more than a million copies in the United States. At the 2009 UK Asian Music Awards (AMA), Jay Sean won three awards, including "Best Male", "Best Urban Act" and "Best Album", the latter for his second album, My Own Way. He met with Rishi Rich, Juggy D and H-Dhami during the ceremony. After the award, he was in America for the first time since signing with Cash Money, he announced through a interview with MTV IGGY that he was recording five new songs for his album, then titled My Own Way (U.S. edition), one of which was his American-debut single with Lil Wayne, later titled "Down". Sean discussed a collaboration with Akon at the 2009 Grammy Awards, in addition to recording a song with Nadine Coyle and told viewers that the album will be released in third quarter of 2009. The album title was later changed to All or Nothing, and featured brand new songs and some of the songs from My Own Way. Despite success with two singles from the album, the album itself only debuted at #37 on the US Billboard 200. It was his lowest-charting entry on the UK Albums Chart, debuting there at #62. Despite this, it has become his highest-charting album in Japan, reaching #11 on the Oricon Albums Chart. Sean was featured on a song called "Written on Her" alongside Birdman for the CEO’s project, released on 23 June 2009 on iTunes. This song was played during an interview on Westwood Radio 1 with Birdman and Jay Sean. Jay Sean has featured on Skepta's single "Lush" released on 10 June 2009 on iTunes. On 2 February 2010, Kevin Rudolf's single "I Made It (Cash Money Heroes)", featured Jay Sean alongside Birdman and Lil Wayne, was released. In early December 2009, it was confirmed that he has collaborated with Justin Timberlake and Esmée Denters on a song, "Love Dealer". There have been talks of collaborations with other American artists such as Ashley Tisdale, Taylor Swift, Nicole Scherzinger, Rihanna, Usher, and Jay-Z & Beyoncé. Jay Sean was in early September 2009 nominated for the 30 Under 30 award. At the 2009 UK Urban Music Awards, he won the Best Collaboration award for "Down" alongside Lil Wayne. In early December 2009, he was ranked #35 in Billboard's Hot 100 Artists of the year. On 11 December 2009, he became the first South Asian origin artist since Freddie Mercury to perform at Madison Square Garden, as part of the Jingle Ball concert, alongside beatboxer MC Zani. Sean's performance "had the entire crowd – parents and children, teens and twenty-somethings – dancing."
Early in May, Usher was asked about what he thought of the Stateside success of British R&B artists like Jay Sean and Taio Cruz. "Sustaining longevity is all about time. They have a lot to prove." Usher said. While Sean could have responded aggressively to the comments, he went a different route. "He's been in the game for, what, 17 years? I completely agree with what he says. Longevity trumps everything. America has only heard one album." "I'm so new to America. I've got so much more to show them, so much more to give them." Sean said. Jay Sean has confirmed he is working on a new album, with a tentative release date of 2 November 2010. He has stated that he has completed roughly 75 percent of the album and that guests so far include Lil Wayne, Pitbull, Nicki Minaj and Mary J. Blige. Other possible collaboration for the album include Akon, Rihanna and Drake. "2012 (It Ain't the End)" was released to U.S. radio stations and as a digital download to iTunes on 3 August 2010, as the lead single of the album. The video leaked on 14 August 2010, but Jay Sean confirmed that the leaked version of the video wasn't the final version. The final version of the video premiered on 24 August 2010. In October 2010, it was announced that the album got pushed back to 22 February 2011. Sean will be part of the Summerbeatz tour held in Australia alongside, Flo Rida, Soulja Boy and Travie McCoy in November 2010. Jay Sean is known for community work. He has worked with BBC Blast doing Q&A's on tour events in an effort to "give something back". He has supported the Aga Khan Foundation (AKF) in the charity event Partnership Walk and Run by performing in Regent's Park in 2004 and 2009. In 2009, Sean performed in Justin Timberlake's charity concert to raise funds for the Shriners Hospital for Children, alongside artists such as MC Zani, Taylor Swift and Alicia Keys. It became one of the highest-earning charity events of the year, raising more than $9 million.