Jay Kay (born Jason Luís Cheetham; 30 December 1969) is an English singer-songwriter. He rose to international fame as one of the founding members of the funk and acid jazz band Jamiroquai.
Video Jay Kay
Early life
Jay Kay was born in Stretford, Greater Manchester, on 30 December 1969. His mother, Karen Kay, is a former cabaret singer and television personality. His biological father is Luís Saraiva, a Portuguese former guitarist, whom he did not meet until 2001. Kay's identical twin, David, died some weeks after they were born. Kay's mother raised him largely alone, which gave him "an itinerant childhood; half of it living in rural Suffolk and rural Devon", according to a 2010 interview in The Daily Telegraph interview and his 1990s' television interviews. He is also a former resident of Ealing, where he lived on Grange Road (W5) and played some of his first gigs in The Haven, a pub on Spring Bridge Road (now converted to offices) and Broadway Boulevard (now Club Karma). A 1997 article in the Lancashire Evening Telegraph explains that Kay "moved with his mother and step-father Mervyn Kay to Manchester as a youngster". James Royal--often misidentified as Kay's stepfather--is his mother's former manager with whom she had a relationship during Kay's childhood years. Royal had stated in his 2002 interview in News of the World that he never married Karen Kay but still regards Kay as his stepson.
Kay attended Oakham School in Rutland.
Maps Jay Kay
Career
Kay formed Jamiroquai in 1992. Band members include Toby Smith (keyboards), Stuart Zender (bass), Nick Van Gelder (drums, 1992-1993), Derrick McKenzie (drums 1994-present), Wallis Buchanan (didgeridoo). The band also featured guest appearances by Gavin Dodds (guitar), Maurizio Ravelico (percussion) and Johnny Thirkell (horns) on their debut album and on their first tour.
Jamiroquai has sold over thirty million albums, and spent a collective 162 weeks on the UK singles chart between 1992 and 2006.
After the success of Jamiroquai's first single, When You Gonna Learn, a US$1.9 million, eight-album deal was signed with Sony Music Entertainment. The band's first album was Emergency on Planet Earth. The relationship with Sony ended in 2007.
Jamiroquai's third album, Travelling Without Moving, received international attention with the music video of Virtual Insanity, which earned Jamiroquai four MTV Video Music Awards. Their fourth album, Synkronized, has received similar praise; it was recorded in Kay's home studio located in the garden of his 500-year-old, 11-bedroom Buckinghamshire mansion.
Kay is occasionally referred to as 'Jamiroquai', due to the misconception that the band is actually a solo artist.
Kay's personal wealth is reported to be around £40 million. He appeared on the Sunday Times Rich List 2004 at joint-950th. The Sunday Times Rich List 2008 has him tied for #1,794, with £40 million.
Headgear
Kay is well known for his array of elaborate hats and headgear. Professionally appearances for concerts, interviews and the like have prompted descriptions of Kay as "the mad hatter" for his love of headgear. In 2005 it was announced that Kay, often referred to as "the cat in the hat", was launching a range of distinctive clothing, including his trademark hats, on his new "Quai" label. The Indian Country Media Network has criticised him for wearing sacred regalia of the First Nations.
TV performances
Kay appeared in an episode of the BBC series The Naked Chef alongside chef Jamie Oliver. He has also performed on the series Strictly Come Dancing singing "Canned Heat". He also appeared four times in the BBC car show Top Gear. The first appearance was in series 1, episode 2, where he set a lap time of 1:48.1 for the show's "Star in a reasonably priced car", becoming (and remaining) the person with the fastest lap time for the rest of the first series and most of the next series. His second appearance was in series 3, episode 4, where Kay drove his Lamborghini Miura with Richard Hammond as a passenger. The third appearance was in series 11, episode 6, where he beat the top time held by Simon Cowell. He succeeded with a lap time of 1:45.8. Kay won Top Gear's "John Sergeant Award" for the best dance, after learning his time on the Top Gear test track was the fastest lap time in 2008.
The day before Jamiroquai performed their new single, "White Knuckle Ride", on The X Factor in October 2010, Kay was quoted by The Sun talking about Cheryl Cole and Dannii Minogue, two of the show's judges: "What are they going to tell me about fucking music? When have you ever done anything? You're useless. The pair of you. I mean, you look great, and I'd like to fucking shag you, but that's all." During his performance on the show, Cole and Minogue talked continuously and refused to applaud at the end or stand up.
Paparazzi confrontations
In April 2001 Kay was charged with assaulting a photographer and damaging his camera outside the Attica nightclub in London's West End. Kay pleaded not guilty, and the charges were later dropped due to lack of evidence.
In May 2002 Kay was questioned by police after allegedly being headbutted by a photographer he had allegedly earlier punched and accused of damaging his new £70,000 Bentley car, at a premiere party for Star Wars: Episode II - Attack of the Clones, in the St Martin's Lane Hotel. His nose bled, and he received a black eye, but no charges were brought.
Personal life
From 1998 to 2001, Kay dated Denise van Outen. They were engaged and reported to be on the verge of marriage, but split up in 2001; Jamiroquai's album A Funk Odyssey is mostly about their break-up. In a 2010 interview, Kay indicated that, at one time, he had a "substantial" cocaine habit. He has, however, been free of drugs since 2003. He has two children.
Kay supports the Burma Campaign UK. He is also a patron of the Captive Animals Protection Society and has spoken out against animal exploitation for entertainment.
Cars and vehicles
Kay has a strong interest in exotic cars, and by 2013 he had owned close to seventy luxury cars over his life, mainly sports cars. His love of cars was expressed with the release of the album Travelling Without Moving. The album's cover featured an adaptation of the "Buffalo Man" logo and the Ferrari crest. In 2011, he visited Maranello for an exclusive viewing of the then-new Ferrari 458 Spider. Three of his cars appeared in the video for the song "Cosmic Girl". In total, he owns over 100 vehicles, including what he calls "staff cars", and he owned a "one-off" 1965 Ferrari 330 GT Vignale Shooting Brake.
A combination of cars and music is also evident in the song "Black Devil Car" from the album Dynamite, which is a tribute to his black Ferrari Enzo. The Enzo suffered damage to the windows after an altercation with hotel chef Aaron Billington at the Brudenell Hotel in Aldeburgh, Suffolk.
He holds the record on the BBC show Top Gear for the fastest lap in the (now retired) Chevrolet Lacetti on the "Star in a Reasonably Priced Car" segment. His time of 1:45.83 was four-hundredths of a second ahead of Kevin McCloud, one-tenth of a second ahead of Brian Johnson, who was the lead singer of the rock band AC/DC at the time, and one tenth of a second above the then-leader, Simon Cowell. He was invited back because Cowell had been "on the top for long enough". Kay also competed in the Celebrity Challenge race at the 2012 Silverstone Classic, finishing third behind Brian Johnson and Kelvin Fletcher.
At the 2014 Goodwood Festival of Speed, Kay showed off his bright green Ferrari LaFerrari, which is currently the only one of its colour in the world.
See also
- List of number-one dance hits (United States)
- List of artists who reached number one on the US Dance chart
References
External links
- Jay Kay discography at Discogs
Source of the article : Wikipedia
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