Lady Sovereign Biography

news-details Ready to plant her mark deeper on U.S music scene, Lady Sovereign has really put full force in working on her way to reach the goal. Even before the release of her debut LP, �Public Warning�, on October 31, 2006, this energetic British grime MC already commenced her North American tour, starting from October 23 the same year in Montreal, Canada. As for November only, she tirelessly sets to perform at a number of venues in cities like Minneapolis, Vancouver, Los Angeles, Houston, and Miami, in between being slated to deliver a live performance on ABC's �Jimmy Kimmel Live� on date 9 before closing the month with a gig at State Theatre in St. Petersburg, Florida.

One of the U.K's very few white female rappers known for her unique style and brash charisma, Lady Sovereign was born Louise Amanda Harman in the northwest London neighborhood of Wembley in 1985 and grew up in a public housing project of Chalkhill Estate. Exposed to a wide array of urban music by her parents who both were punk-rock fans since a young age, she gradually developed a growing fondness for the field, particularly in rap, which then prompted her to begin rhyming her own songs under the moniker she later became widely recognized of. The rapping skills was further enhanced when the girl decided to form garage-grime act Heavy Like Dat Family with DJ Frampster after meeting him on an online forum despite its short-lived existence.

Things started to run differently for Sovereign by the time she dropped her high school study at the age of 16. With no formal qualification, it was hard for the teen to find proper job yet this condition in contrast unexpectedly proved to be the very beginning of her involvement in music industry. Heeded a suggestion from her father to try her luck at acting as a last resort, she delightfully found herself landing a role in an educational film about the life of an up-and-coming MC and more importantly, gaining a chance to record for the soundtrack. Through a friend of a friend, the demo finally ended up in the hands of an east London producer named Medasyn who instantly spotted her talent thus enticed the tomboy to participate in his rap compilation project �The Battle.�

Much to Sovereign's joy, the collaborative work turned out to be quite a success in the U.K not long after its release in 2003 via Casual Records and so, provided her an opportunity to have a single of her own, "Little Bit of Shhh!", in 2004 followed by another entitled "Ch Ching." Both wonderfully received favorable response from the underground circuit despite their limited release, building up her confidence to launch full single �Random� in 2005. The first effort of her to enter the top 75 of U.K music chart, it surprisingly managed to draw the attention of Island Def Jam that later eagerly signed her in by fall the same year, during which her �Vertically Challenged [EP]� struck the U.S market.

Getting full support from the label, Sovereign then confidently came up with one more single called �Love Me or Hate Me� in August 2006. An open expression of disgruntlement in pop culture, the tune has resulted fairly well in U.S, leaping to the 66th rank of The Billboard Hot 100 in its second week on the chart while making its way to enter the top 30 of Billboard's Hot Digital Song. Furthermore, it even soared to number one on MTV's TRL thereby establishing her as the first British rap artist to reach such achievement. Following this initial success, debut album �Public Warning� was subsequently released on October 31, 2006 after being pushed back for several times by Island Records.