Toby Love

Growing up in The Bronx surrounded by a noisy, vibrant Puerto Rican family, Toby Love spent his childhood watching his father perform salsa music, his mother filling the house with Merengue records and his step-father playing traditional Bachata music from the Dominican Republic. It inspired him to form groups with his cousins, eventually befriending boy band Aventura who lived in his neighbourhood, and they recruited him as a backing singer when he was just 16-years-old. The group merged Latin styles with the R&B, hip-hop and pop culture of the 1990s, and Love featured on albums Love & Hate and God's Project and appeared at their sold out show at Madison Square Garden. Leaving the group to work on a solo career in 2006, he recorded parts of his self-titled debut album in Miami, where he mixed the crunk style of woozy hip-hop that he'd heard pouring out of local clubs with his roots in Bachata dance music to create what he called 'crunkchata'. His suave, ladies-man style, smooth voice and the strutting, funky romance of his sound, helped him become a fixture in the Latin pop charts and the albums Love Is Back and Amor Total brought further success. He released his sixth studio album Bachata Nation in 2016, which continued to pursue his love of tropical, soulful pop music.