James Blake

Crafting homemade electronic rhythms into soulful ballads, James Blake was dubbed the boy wonder of dubstep and acclaimed as one of the most innovative young producers around. He was born on September 26, 1988, in London, England. A classically trained pianist, he studied popular music at the University of London and worked as a DJ before his track "Air & Lack Thereof" became a hit on BBC radio. The song was followed by his cover of Feist's "Limit to Your Love," a tear-jerking anthem that earned him a second-place finish on the BBC's Sound of 2011 poll. His Mercury Music Prize-nominated debut, James Blake, was released in 2011 and became one of the highlights of the year, reaching Number 9 on the UK charts and earning Blake his first BRIT Award nomination. He released Overgrown, his second full-length album, in 2013, with the single "Retrograde" receiving the Ivor Novello Award for Best Contemporary Song and the album itself winning the Mercury Prize. He followed this success with The Colour in Anything in 2016 and Assume Form in 2019, with both albums debuting in the Top 20 in the UK. That same year, he won his first Grammy Award (Best Rap Performance) for the "King's Dead" collaboration with Jay Rock, Kendrick Lamar, and Future. Friends That Break Your Heart appeared in 2021 and marked the highest charting debut of James Blake's career, peaking at Number 4 in the UK. He ventured into AI-assisted waters the following year with Wind Down, an ambient sleep record created for Endel and won a Latin Grammy at the 2022 awards ceremony for his work as a songwriter and producer on Rosalía's 2022 album Motomami. The following year, he circled back to the club for his sixth studio album, Playing Robots Into Heaven, which was released in September 2023 and reached Number 4 on the UK Dance Albums chart.