Taio Cruz: Breaking charts as well as hearts

20th Nov 2009

Taio Cruz has only had one number one hit, 'Break Your Heart', which reached the top of the UK singles chart in September. That is, however, the only one under his own name.

2009 has seen a veritable assault on the charts from the 24-year-old producer, singer and songwriter. Back in January he was the guest star and producer on Tinchy Stryder's breakthrough record 'Take Me Back', and as the year has progressed his track 'Never Leave You', again recorded by Tinchy, this time featuring Sugababes singer Amelle Berrabah, made it to number one.

Taio has had one of his tracks included on Girls Aloud singer Cheryl Cole's debut album, 'Stand Up', easily coming shoulder-to-shoulder with cuts from Black Eyed Peas singer Will.i.am, who helmed much of the album.

Taio's songwriting talents were also leant to the self-titled debut album from boyband JLS, and he has also previously written tracks for Leona Lewis. In 2006 he also achieved a BRIT award for Best British Single as co-writer of 'Your Game', which was a huge hit for Will Young.

While the UK pop market is obviously enraptured with Taio's grooves, he is also a big hitter in the US - in fact he cut his teeth Stateside, working for Red Zone, the writing team behind some of pop's biggest hits in recent years.

After being spotted at a young age by US producer Dallas Austin and recruited to work with the production team, Taio became witness to a number of pop landmarks, including when Rihanna's huge hit 'Umbrella' was written - a song he later divulged was originally aimed at Britney Spears.

While he was hanging out with the biggest names in pop and R and B, Taio was happy with his lot as a producer, and it looked like a career crafting songs in the US lay ahead of him. But after being urged by friends, he speculatively released a single on his own, 'I Just Wanna Know' - which was written and produced by Taio, and released through his own, newly established label Rokstarr Music.

To his surprise the song took off, gaining major radio airplay in both the UK and the US and leading a longer term record deal. This saw a dramatic change of career for Taio, who at this point found himself back in his native London, and fronting his music rather than simply writing songs. The resulting album, 'Departure' - entirely produced and recorded by Taio himself - yielded two move massive singles, 'Come On Girl' and 'She's Like A Star', cementing his position as one of the smartest, most diverse and forward thinking young acts in the UK.

'Departure' had R n B influences, but married them with four to the floor dance beats - it didn't feel limited in scope or genre and the songs sat as comfortably in dance clubs as they did next to pure pop songs on the radio.

The strong reception his material received has only further fortified his confidence, and this is apparent on his second album 'Rokstarr' - leading off with the upbeat stomper 'Break Your Heart', it fully captured the mainstream's attention and held onto the number one spot for three weeks, beating even Madonna's 'Celebration' single.

This feat, more so than anything else, proves a new era in British pop has established itself in 2009, with groups like N-Dubz, MC Chipmunk and Tinchy Stryder spearheading it.

Behind it all, though, laid back and with a warm grin, is a calm and collected Taio Cruz, who we caught up with as he prepares for 'Rokstarr' to go stratospheric .



Q: You started out very young in the US, what was it like being 18 and working with people like Dallas Austin?

A: It was cool, a lot of people ask me if I get starstruck and how I feel when I meet famous people I'm always fine. It's kind of worked against me before, but now it's just part of my personality, that I am really laid back and chilled, it wasn't a humungous deal. I was just happy to be there and learning from these great people. I wasn't like, jumping up and down screaming, it was like 'This is cool' I want to know what drums you use, learning mix techniques. It was great schooling.

Q: What has really stayed with you since, and can be heard in your own music?

A: In terms of performance I wasn't affected so much, because i was really writing and producing in the US. For me it was all about knowing how to pick the right sounds from the get go which make your record sound good and I'm a musician first. I started out on the piano as a kid and then played the trombone and the guitar and moved on from there, and I started to understand the musicality and the musical history. It's just knowing which songs and melodies and chord progressions work. Then after that I kind of did the performance thing and emulated Michael Jackson and my heroes like that.

Q: Was there a point where you had to choose between being a successful producer in the US, joining Red Zone or taking a risk and becoming a performer instead?

A: I had technically made my choice. I was just going to be a producer, and I was in there with the big guys, Tricky, Dallas Austin - every other day someone like Janet Jackson would come through the door, I met Ciara and Usher and all those people were hanging out at the studio, but at the same time everybody was always asking me to put stuff out. So I thought I'd just put a song out with no expectations, I just thought it'd be kind f cool to know that I'd put something out and that people had heard my voice and stuff. And really the first thing I put out blew up and really became huge. I had record companies calling me up and it was on rotation on radio. It was mad, a huge jump, I never expected.

Q: Did it happen really fast from there?

A: Well it took two months or so - I put it out first and I have a ten to twelve week cycle of songs. The first four weeks it bubbles underground and the cool DJs are playing it, then it breaks through to the more mainstream DJs and then they start rocking it. It was getting absolutely rinsed on Kiss, then it started playing Capital then Sirius radio in LA and from there it was crazy hearing it in nightclubs etc. It was at that point I was getting calls from Universal music and stuff, and they were like 'we want to hire you because we like what you're doing. That sort of made the choice for me.

Q: Who've been the best people to work with in the studio?

A: OK, without being diplomatic, but sounding diplomatic, they're all really cool. And we all share the same dream and we've wanted to be musicians and artists from a very young age. There hasn't been anyone yet I've heard there are a few nightmare people but I've not worked with them.

Q: Would you consider working with someone even if they had a reputation as difficult?

A: It depends. If they're a musical genius but they're a nightmare then I'll deal with it. If they're just a nightmare, then no way.

Q: You have worked with some alumni of UK TV talent show 'The X Factor' - how did you become involved with that? Are you affiliated with Simon Cowell's record label, Syco, or Sony at all?

A: I really wish I were! Then I'd be extremely rich. But no, Simon seems to be a fan of my music which is good. Or a fan of my first album anyway, which is amazing. But also the guys at Syco are always calling up and telling me they want me to work on their new artists all the time. That's how I came to working on JLS, Cheryl Cole, Leona Lewis and that.

Q: Would you write for the winner of 'The X Factor' this year?

A: Assuming that they were good yeah. I watched it this week.

Q: What's it like working with Cheryl Cole?

A: Well I wrote a couple of songs and sent them over to her people - one of them was 'Break Your Heart', the other was stand up, and her record company heard it and I guess they were dilly dallying a little bit. Will.i.am is a really big name and I think is doing quite a lot of records for them, so they came back around too late and they were too late for 'Break Your Heart', so I had thought we've not heard anything back from them, so we put it out as me.

Q: Are you glad you kept hold of that one for yourself?

A: Yeah. I think I've got songs on the album that, fingers, crossed would have done just as well. And if not, I would have written something else. The song I wrote for Cheryl's album, 'Stand Up', I think could be a smash. I also liked the song I wrote for Tinchy and Amelle, I kept writing them and the record company kept shouting at me because I kept giving all the songs away.

Q: Do you get precious about your work, or are you always comfortable with writing songs and giving them to other people?

A: I'm not really precious like that. I started off as a songwriter and producer so I'm happy to write songs and happy for them to be out, whether it's me singing or somebody else, like - I want them to be hugely successful, so if that means that someone else has to sing it. If it's a case of shall I give it to Britney Spears or shall I do it myself, well I think to myself, at the moment, I'm big in the UK, Britney is big worldwide, so...

Q: Which of your songs are you most proud of?

A: The Will Young single 'Your Game', which I won the BRIT award for, then my first number one record, which is the one I wrote for Tinchy and Amelle, then my second number one record, 'Break Your Heart', my first number one album with Cheryl Cole then my second number one album with JLS.

Q: How did you get involved with Tinchy Stryder?

A: Literally, they just asked me from the record company. I am good friends with the president of Island, and he had a new artist, and he said, 'I have this beat but I don't like the chorus, could you write a new chorus for it?' I'm a bit against being 'urban', I don't like that tag. I just think it's a politically correct way of saying 'black'. I just don't like being put into a box, as I make pop music, even if I did a rock song people would call it 'urban rock', which just means 'black rock'. I was a bit iffy about doing too many things which are too 'urban', but I'm a fan of good music, and he sent me the record and I really liked it, and that kind of outweighs anything else.

By Andy Tillett