A Polydor spokesman declined to comment on Raye’s description of her time with the company, and said, “We’ve loved seeing Raye having all of this well-deserved success and wish her the very best.”
Raye was determined to carry on. Last year, she signed a deal with the distribution service Human Re Sources. Its founder and chief executive, J. Erving, who is also an executive vice president at Sony, said in a video interview that Raye could have gotten more money upfront — “the bag, so to speak” — if she had signed with a traditional label. But instead she “bet on herself,” choosing to release her album as an independent artist who owns her masters.
For Raye, creative control was the key to continuing in an industry that had nearly broken her down. “I’m not interested in being a ‘singles’ girl, it’s the last thing I ever wanted to be,” she said. For her, the album format is not about “selling records” but telling stories.
Raye (born Rachel Keen) has known what kind of artist she wanted to be from a young age. At 10, she was determined to attend the BRIT School, the performing arts institution known for famous alumni, including Amy Winehouse and Adele. Four years later, she won a place at the school, which is near the home in south London she shared with her parents and three younger sisters.
Raye said she was so devoted to her budding career, she gave up her social life to write music after school and on weekends with professionals she met through her guitar teacher: “I’d get the train up to whatever address in my calendar and I would go into a room full of middle-aged men and be like ‘Hey, I’m going to write a song.’”
Growing up, her Ghanaian-Swiss mother and English father “worked stupidly, exceptionally hard,” she said, as a nurse and in insurance. Church, where her father played piano and her mother sang in the choir, was a big part of family life.
Simran Hans
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