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Joss Stone (born Joscelyn Eve Stoker on 11 April 1987) is an English soul, R&B, and blues singer, songwriter, and occasional actress who rose to fame in late 2003 with her debut album The Soul Sessions, which was certified triple Platinum by the BPI, and was announced as one of the twelve albums on the shortlist of Mercury Prize nominees. Her second album, the also-triple Platinum-selling Mind, Body & Soul, topped the albums chart in the United Kingdom for one week and spawned the hit single "You Had Me", which made the top ten of the UK Singles Chart. Both album and single each received a nomination for the Grammy Awards in 2005. Throughout her career, Stone has sold over ten million albums worldwide and won two BRIT Awards and one Grammy Award.
Stone was born in Dover, Kent, and spent her teenage years in Ashill, Devon. She is the third of four children born to Richard and Wendy Stoker. She made her first public appearance at the Uffculme Comprehensive School—which she attended—in Uffculme, Devon, with a cover of Jackie Wilson's 1957 "Reet Petite". Because of her dyslexia, Stone left school at age sixteen with just three GCSE qualifications. "It wasn't that I was stupid. I'm just a little bit dyslexic and I wasn't very academic. I'm more artistic", she says.
Stone grew up listening to a wide variety of music including American R&B and soul music performed by such artists as Dusty Springfield and Aretha Franklin; as a result, she developed a soulful style of singing like her idols. In 2001, at the age of thirteen, she appeared on the BBC Television's talent show Star for a Night singing Donna Summer's 1979 "On the Radio". She told MTV News, "I kind of clicked into soul music more than anything else because of the vocals. You've got to have good vocals to sing soul music and I always liked it ever since I was little".
In 2002, she decided to back her ability by flying out from England for an audition in New York City with S-Curve CEO Steve Greenberg. She also signed a global music publishing deal with BMG Music Publishing in the UK. Since then, she has performed with artists such as Blondie and Gladys Knight.
After being signed by S-Curve Records, Stone flew to Miami, Florida to start working on her debut album, The Soul Sessions, released on 16 September 2003. She collaborated with people with solid credentials in the Miami soul scene such as Betty Wright, Benny Latimore, Timmy Thomas, and Little Beaver. She also worked with contemporary acts Angie Stone and The Roots.
The album consists of little-known soul tracks by Wright, Franklin, Laura Lee, and Bettye Swann. Released in late 2003, it reached the top five on the UK Albums Chart, and also made the top forty of the U.S. Billboard 200 chart. The lead single, "Fell in Love with a Boy", which was a reworking of The White Stripes' 2001 "Fell in Love with a Girl", reached the top twenty of the UK Singles Chart, as did the second single, a cover version of Sugar Billy's 1974 "Super Duper Love".
After achieving critical acclaim with The Soul Sessions, Stone recorded her second album—this time made mostly of songs co-written by her—, Mind, Body & Soul, released on 28 September 2004. She was quoted to say this was her real debut. "I think my singing is so much better on this album", she says. It proved to be an even bigger success than her previous album, as it debuted at number one in the UK (breaking the record for the youngest female ever to top the UK Albums Chart, a record previously held by Avril Lavigne) and just missed the top ten of the U.S. Billboard 200, after peaking at number eleven. The lead single, "You Had Me", became her first top ten hit in the UK and was also a hit worldwide. Follow-up singles "Right to Be Wrong" and "Spoiled" both made the top forty, and "Don't Cha Wanna Ride", the top twenty. "Spoiled" landed just outside the top fifty of U.S. Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs, peaking at number fifty-four. "Less Is More" and "Security" were both released for airplay only, the former in Latin America and Australia and the latter in Europe.
Stone began working on her third studio album, Introducing Joss Stone, in Nassau, Bahamas, in May 2006. It was released on 12 March 2007 in the UK on Virgin Records, involving production by Raphael Saadiq and collaborations with Lauryn Hill, Common, and Joi. Virgin describes it as "an electrifying mix of warm vintage soul, '70s-style R&B, Motown girl-group harmonies, and hip hop grooves". Stone herself describes it as "truly me. That's why I'm calling it Introducing Joss Stone. These are my words, and this is who I am as an artist". She also revealed on The Tavis Smiley Show that her break-up with Beau Dozier was a source of inspiration while writing Introducing Joss Stone. The album debuted at number twelve on the UK Albums Chart. It also debuted at number two on the Billboard 200 selling 118,000 copies in its first week, becoming the highest debut for a British solo female artist on the U.S. charts, surpassing the record previously held by Amy Winehouse with Back to Black. It has sold 60,000 copies in the UK since its release, gaining Silver status on the charts.
"Tell Me 'Bout It", the album's lead single, debuted and peaked at number twenty-eight on the UK Singles Chart—where it stayed for three weeks only—and peaked at number eighty-three on the U.S Billboard Hot 100. The second single, "Tell Me What We're Gonna Do Now", a collaboration with rapper Common, made the top sixty-five of the U.S. Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs. Stone turned its music video to a Product Red—this means that the video is buyable online over iTunes and that the gains from these sellings revert to Product Red, an organisation which helps women and children in Africa affected by HIV and/or AIDS. Stone is the first artist to do this, entering the Guinness World Records.
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