|
Adam Richard Wiles (born 17 January 1984), better known by his stage name Calvin Harris, is a Scottish DJ, singer, songwriter, and record producer. His gold-selling debut album, I Created Disco, was released in 2007 and contained the top-ten singles "Acceptable in the 80s" and "The Girls". His second studio album, Ready for the Weekend (2009), reached number one on the UK Album Chart and includes the chart-topper "I'm Not Alone", the UK top-five hit "Ready for the Weekend", and the singles "Flashback" and "You Used to Hold Me".
A remix album titled L.E.D. Festival was released in July 2010 as a free album in the August issue of Mixmag. Harris released his third studio album, 18 Months in October 2012, which contained the singles "Bounce", "Feel So Close", "Let's Go", "We'll Be Coming Back", "Sweet Nothing", "Drinking from the Bottle" and "I Need Your Love". He has written and produced records for other recording artists including Kylie Minogue, Sophie Ellis-Bextor, Dizzee Rascal, Cheryl Cole, Example and Rihanna (on the international chart-topper "We Found Love").
Harris holds the record for the most UK top 10 hits from a studio album with eight top 10 hits.
Harris was born Adam Richard Wiles on 17 January 1984 in Dumfries, Scotland. He states that he was a fan of football and aspired to be like Steve McManaman. "But I never had curly hair, so I got into music. If I'd had curly hair, things would've been different." He was first attracted to electronic music in his teens and was recording bedroom demos by 1999. According to an interview with News of the World, all the while he created music, he started becoming an antisocial person, which affected his personality. His earliest success was when he was twenty-one: the songs "Da Bongos" and "Brighter Days" were released as a 12" club single and CD-EP by the Prima Facie label in early 2002 under the name Stouffer. He released one song in 2004, "Let Me Know", with artist Ayah Marar. The song appears on The Unabombers' Electric Soul 2.
In 2007, Harris caught the attention of Australian pop singer Kylie Minogue after his recordings had been passed on to her by another record producer. This led to him co-writing and producing two songs on her 2007 album X—"Heart Beat Rock" and "In My Arms", the latter a top ten hit in the UK. Harris said that working with Minogue was "surreal, but fun" although he admitted to Mixmag in 2007 to "needing a few drinks before meeting her". Harris returned to work with Minogue on her album Aphrodite (2010), co-producing the track "Too Much".
In 2008, Harris collaborated with rapper Dizzee Rascal on his single "Dance wiv Me", producing the track and singing the hook. The single reached number one in the UK and has been certified platinum by the BPI, selling 300,000 copies. It was shortlisted for the 2008 Popjustice £20 Music Prize and, in 2009, received a BRIT Award nomination for British Single and an Ivor Novello Award nomination for Best Contemporary Song. In 2009, he produced Dizzee Rascal's next single titled "Holiday", which also reached number one. He was supposed to make an appearance in its music video, but objected to dancing along in some scenes, wearing a certain shirt for the video and not wearing his "fly eye" glasses. Also in 2009, Harris made a guest appearance on Tiësto's song "Century" on the Dutch producer's album Kaleidoscope. Harris produced a track for English singer/rapper Example for his second album Won't Go Quietly (2010), "Time Machine", and mixed The Ting Tings' UK top forty single "Hands", having previously remixed the duo's singles "Great DJ" (2008) and "We Walk" (2009).
In 2011, Harris featured on LMFAO's album Sorry for Party Rocking, appearing on the track "Reminds Me of You" which is based on Harris's own song "Awooga". Harris produced Tinchy Stryder's second single, "Off the Record" from his fourth studio album, Full Tank. The track had its première on 15 September 2011, and was released in the UK on 6 November 2011.
Following a stint as her support act on the Australian leg of her tour, Harris produced "We Found Love" and "Where Have You Been" for Barbadian singer Rihanna. The former is the lead single from her sixth studio album, Talk That Talk, and was premiered in September 2011. It has reached number one in countries such as the UK and the United States, becoming Harris's first charting appearance on the Billboard Hot 100. In an interview for Q magazine, Harris said of the lyric "We found love in a hopeless place": "It could have been Jumpin Jaks in Dumfries (Harris' home town), I don't know exactly what I was thinking about." He co-wrote and co-produced the bonus track "One Life" for R&B singer Mary J. Blige's album My Life II... The Journey Continues (Act 1) (2011).
Harris worked with American pop band Scissor Sisters on the single "Only the Horses" from their fourth studio album, Magic Hour. He wrote and produced Cheryl Cole's single "Call My Name", the lead single from her third album A Million Lights. He won an Ivor Novello Award for "Songwriter of the Year" in 2013.
|
