Plenty of people dream of stardom while singing along to their favorite songs in their bedroom. In most cases, that’s as far as it goes. Dan Talevski has a different story, one that found him parlaying his hobby of posting YouTube clips of himself singing into a worldwide Internet following (Talevski’s YouTube Channel has racked up 28.5 million views and over 103,000 subscribers) and a full-fledged career as a pop artist about to release his debut album on Zone4/Interscope Records.
The new album will be a hook-heavy blend of pop, R&B, electronic, rock, and hip-hop elements that showcases this exciting newcomer’s electrifying talent. His supple, soulful voice floats effortlessly atop a bed of futuristic-sounding, ultramodern beats crafted by music’s hottest hitmakers, including Polow Da Don (Fergie, Usher, Ludacris), the Black-Eyed Peas’ will.i.am. (who produced and raps on the sizzling first single “Do It Again”), and Timbaland (Justin Timberlake, Missy Elliott, Nelly Furtado). “Do It Again” features Soulja Boy and will be released to radio this summer and Talevski will hit the road for an arena tour of his native Canada with the Backstreet Boys in August — his first time ever performing on the big stage.
“I’m ready,” the 23-year-old says. “I’ve been wanting to do this my whole life, now that I’m here, nothing’s going to stop me. I started posting videos of myself singing online in the hopes that someone in the music industry would notice me and it has become so much bigger than I could ever have imagined. I still pinch myself to see if I'm dreaming because it’s all so surreal.”
The son of an auto mechanic and a nurse, Talevski was raised in the small, rural town of Georgetown, Ontario, where he had very little access to music beyond one CD store and the MuchMusic network. As a child, he loved to sing and dance. Home movies exist of Talevski and his twin brother dancing to “La Bamba” as toddlers, and, in later years, performing for friends and neighbors in the family’s garage. “The garage door would open and that was our curtain going up,” Talevski says with a laugh. After falling in love with the Beatles, Led Zeppelin, and Michael Jackson records his parents played in the house, Talevski began to seek out music on the Internet and writing his own songs at the age of 10. “I recently found lyrics I wrote back then and I had everything broken down — verse, pre-chorus, hook. I had it all lined up.”
After a summer spent working at McDonald’s when he was 14, Talevski took his first paycheck ($200) and bought a simple recording program for his computer and spent all his time writing lyrics and crafting melodies and beats. He worked long shifts at the drive-thru at Tim Horton’s (“Canada’s version of Dunkin’ Donuts”) to save money to move to California and launch his music career. When that effort stalled, Talevski enrolled in college to study broadcast journalism. “I would sit in class knowing it wasn’t what I wanted to do,” he says. “We’d have our laptops open to take notes in class and I’d be editing a song or researching the Billboard charts.”
In June of 2007, Talevski logged onto YouTube to search for a video of Justin Timberlake’s “What Goes Around” and discovered several clips of “regular people” singing the song. “A light bulb went off in my head, like ‘Why have I never thought of this? I’m doing this,’” he says. He created an account, sang a verse and the whole chorus, and uploaded the 47-second clip. Search for Talevski on YouTube and there he is: a fresh-faced kid in a baseball cap and hoodie singing an astonishing cover of Timberlake’s most sophisticated hit.
“Instantly, all these views and comments began popping up,” Talevski says. “People were really encouraging, so I posted a video of myself doing ‘Cry Me A River.’ Then I started getting requests for songs by Ne-Yo, John Legend, Sean Kingston — whatever was on the charts at the time. Every morning I would have dozens of emails from people saying they thought I could do something bigger with my voice than just sitting behind a camera. So I took advantage of the attention and kept posting videos of covers, as well as original songs I had written, to keep their interest.”
In October 2007, YouTube featured a video of Talevski performing an original song, called “Rocket and Go,” on its homepage where it racked up a million views in 24 hours. Offers from record producers around the country began rolling in. In March of 2008, Talevski received a message from Zone4 honcho Polow Da Don expressing an interest in speaking with him. “He said, ‘I think your music’s really great and I want to fly you to L.A. for a meeting tonight,’” Talevski says. Polow didn’t have to ask twice. When Talevski arrived in Los Angeles, he was picked up and driven straight to the famous Record Plant in West Hollywood. “So here I am in this huge studio playing music and beats I had recorded in my bedroom for Polow.” That meeting led to Talevski’s recording contract with Zone4/Interscope Records.
“Recording a debut album is something I have dreamed about my whole life,” Talevski says. “I want to show people that I’m more than just a small-town kid who was plucked from the Internet. I sing, I write, I dance, I produce, I make beats, and now I’ve been given this amazing opportunity to work with all these great people who are helping me put it all together.”
Talevski’s songwriters and producers — who include Polow Da Don, will.i.am, Timbaland, James Fauntleroy, Dre & Vidal, Hit Boy, BeMajor, Jackie Boys, and Andre Merritt — have helped Talevski deliver an eclectic pop album that lets his effortless vocal versatility shine. The songs range from the fun summer pop anthem “Do It Again” to the swaggering “Can’t Look Away” to the Prince-flavored “Nobody’s Business.” Digital-driven future R&B cuts like “Bigger Than That” and “Spotlight” give way to the soaring mid-tempo “One” and heartfelt ballads “Gone” and “Love You.”
The debut album is sure to be a hit with Talevski’s growing fan base, which he credits with encouraging him to follow his dream of being a performer. “The fans are a huge part of me,” he says. “They motivate me every day with their comments and messages. I want them to be able to escape their reality and enter mine when they listen to the album. I want it to come out and be their soundtrack to 2010.”
