Jessie Reyez

Jessie Reyez (1991) is a Canadian singer and songwriter. Her 2016 single "Figures" peaked at number 58 on the Canadian Hot 100 in 2017 and was certified 2× Platinum by Music Canada. Reyez was born in Toronto, to Colombian parents. Her family later moved to Brampton. She played guitar as a child and began writing her own music in high school. Her roots brought her back to Toronto during her sophomore year but after graduating she opted out of college and instead chose to pursue her music while doing other odd jobs on the side. She moved to Florida, where she was primarily bartending and busking on the beach but returned to Toronto in 2014 after being accepted to The Remix Project's Academy of Recording Arts. In 2014, she and King Louie released a joint single titled "Living in the Sky". In 2016, she released the singles "Shutter Island" and "Figures". In April 2017, Reyez released her debut EP, Kiddo as well as her short film Gatekeeper. The latter was based on her experience with music producer Noel "Detail" Fisher, who was accused of sexual misconduct by multiple women, including artist Bebe Rexha. It was nominated to the Long List of the 2017 Polaris Music Prize. She received two 2017 iHeartRadio Much Music Video Awards nominations for Best New Canadian Artist and Fan Fave Video for "Shutter Island". She performed "Figures" at the 2017 BET Awards on June 25, 2017 and on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon on August 8, 2017. "Figures" received over 20 million streams on Spotify. In August 2017, at a concert in Tøyenparken in Oslo, Norway, Reyez played an unreleased single called "Mama," which she has since performed live at three other shows. She won the Juno Award for Breakthrough Artist of the Year at the Juno Awards of 2018. Later the same year, she received a Socan Songwriting Prize nomination for the song "Cotton Candy". In August 2018, she collaborated with Eminem on "Nice Guy" and "Good Guy", from the album Kamikaze. She also received two 2018 MTV Video Music Award nominations for Push Artist of the Year and Video With a Message for the song "Gatekeeper".