Jodie Abacus is an English musician from

Lewisham Lewisham () is an area of southeast London, England, south of Charing Cross. It is the principal area of the London Borough of Lewisham, and was within the Historic counties of England, historic county of Kent until 1889. It is identified i ...

in South East London. His musical styles include R&B, soul, electronic and funk.

Career

Jodie wrote "I’ll Be That Friend" in 2013 and uploaded it to his SoundCloud channel where it topped the

Hype Machine Hype Machine is a music blog aggregator created by Anthony Volodkin. History Hype Machine was originally a music database created in 2005 by Anthony Volodkin, then a sophomore computer science major at Hunter College.Heilemann, JohCapturing the ...

charts and amassed over 100,000 plays. It was written while Jodie was in a dark point in his life, having caught life-threatening pneumonia and broken up with his long-term girlfriend at the same time. He subsequently signed a five-single deal with Household Records /

Ministry Of Sound Ministry of Sound or Ministry of Sound Group is a multimedia entertainment business based in London with a nightclub, shared workspace and private members' club, worldwide events operation, music publishing business and fitness studio. James ...

in early 2015. Follow-up single "Good Feeling" was premiered by

MistaJam Peter Dalton (born 19 January 1983), known professionally as MistaJam, is a British DJ and radio presenter. He is known for presenting radio shows on BBC Radio 1 and BBC Radio 1Xtra from 2005 to 2020; since 2020 he has presented on Capital and C ...

BBC Radio 1Xtra BBC Radio 1Xtra is a British digital radio station owned and operated by the BBC. It broadcasts black music and urban music, including hip hop and R&B and is a sister station to Radio 1. Launching at 18:00 on 16 August 2002, it had been cod ...

on 28 July 2015 and released on the same day. It was named Best of British Record of the Week on the BBC Radio 1Xtra Breakfast Show. It also received plays from

Clara Amfo Clara Amfo (born 22 May 1984) is a British radio broadcaster, television presenter, podcast host and voice-over artist. She is known for presenting her shows on BBC Radio 1. Early life and education Amfo was born in Kingston upon Thames in Lo ...

and

DJ Target Darren Joseph, known professionally as DJ Target, is a British DJ. Career Joseph is a former member of Roll Deep. Joseph began hosting part of the 1Xtra Takeover, a simulcast across BBC Radio 1 and Radio 1Xtra, in September 2013. In 2018, Josep ...

BBC Radio 1 BBC Radio 1 is a British national radio station owned and operated by the BBC. It specialises in modern popular music and current chart hits throughout the day. The station provides alternative genres at night, including electronica, dance, ...

Tom Ravenscroft Thomas James Dalglish Ravenscroft (born 6 February 1980) is a British radio presenter and disc jockey. He currently hosts a BBC Radio 6 Music show featuring new and unsigned music. He is the son of DJ John Peel. Career Working initially in TV ...

BBC Radio 6 Music BBC Radio 6 Music is a British digital radio station owned and operated by the BBC, specialising primarily in alternative music. BBC 6 Music was the first national music radio station to be launched by the BBC in 32 years. It is available onl ...

, and

Trevor Nelson Trevor Ricardo Nelson, MBE (born 7 January 1964) is an English DJ and presenter. Early life Born in the London Borough of Hackney to a family of St Lucian heritage, Nelson attended Central Foundation Boys' Grammar School (now known as Central ...

BBC Radio 2 BBC Radio 2 is a British national radio station owned and operated by the BBC. It is the most popular station in the United Kingdom with over 15 million weekly listeners. Since launching in 1967, the station broadcasts a wide range of content. ...

. His debut EP, titled "For Real Life And Not Pretend", was released on 26 February 2016. The single "She’s In Love With The Weekend" was released on 11 April 2016 and made it to the A-List on BBC Radio 2 Abacus supported

Jamie Woon Jamie Woon (born 29 March 1983) is a British singer, songwriter, and record producer signed to PMR Records. He gained widespread acclaim in 2010 for his single "Night Air", which was co-produced by Burial, following his previous independent rel ...

on his European tour in April 2016 and

Laura Mvula Laura Mvula ( Douglas; born 23 April 1986) is a British singer. A native of Birmingham, England, Mvula has gained experience as a young member or leader of a cappella, jazz/neo-soul and gospel groups and choirs. She was classically trained. In ...

on three dates of her UK tour in May 2016. He followed these with a run of UK summer festivals including

Glastonbury Glastonbury (, ) is a town and civil parish in Somerset, England, situated at a dry point on the low-lying Somerset Levels, south of Bristol. The town, which is in the Mendip district, had a population of 8,932 in the 2011 census. Glastonbury ...

, Lovebox,

Parklife ''Parklife'' is the third studio album by the English rock band Blur, released on 25 April 1994 on Food Records. After disappointing sales for their previous album ''Modern Life Is Rubbish'' (1993), ''Parklife'' returned Blur to prominence in ...

, The Great Escape, V Festival,

Secret Garden Party The Secret Garden Party, often colloquially shortened to the SGP, is an independent arts and music festival which takes place in Abbots Ripton near Huntingdon in England. This location is on part of the grounds of a Georgian farmhouse and has its ...

, and

Y Not ''Y Not'' is the 16th studio album by Ringo Starr, released on 12 January 2010 on the UMe and Hip-O Records labels. Music, lyrics and recording "Peace Dream" features former Beatle Paul McCartney on bass; another Beatle, John Lennon is re ...

. His performance at The Great Escape was filmed by

Vevo Vevo ( , an abbreviation for "Video Evolution", stylized as VEVO until 2013) is an American multinational video hosting service, best known for providing music videos to YouTube. The service is also available as an app on selected smart TVs, di ...

for their Vevo DSCVR series. He also performed at the main stage of the 9th Annual

Roots Picnic The Roots Picnic is an annual music festival created and hosted by hip hop group, The Roots. Co-founder, Shawn Gee, and manager of The Roots serves as executive producer of the festival. The festival is held in Philadelphia, their hometown at the ...

Philadelphia Philadelphia, often called Philly, is the largest city in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, the sixth-largest city in the U.S., the second-largest city in both the Northeast megalopolis and Mid-Atlantic regions after New York City. Sinc ...

, opening for

The Roots The Roots are an American hip hop band formed in 1987 by Tariq "Black Thought" Trotter and Ahmir "Questlove" Thompson in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States. The Roots serve as the house band on NBC's ''The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy F ...

Usher Usher may refer to: Several jobs which originally involved directing people and ensuring people are in the correct place: * Usher (occupation) ** Church usher ** Wedding usher, one of the male attendants to the groom in a wedding ceremony ** Fiel ...

, and

Anderson Paak Brandon Paak Anderson (born February 8, 1986), better known by his stage name Anderson .Paak (), is an American rapper, singer, songwriter, record producer, and drummer. He released his debut mixtape, ''O.B.E. Vol. 1,'' in 2012 and went on to rel ...

. The video for "I’ll Be That Friend" was released on 6 July 2016. It was shot in Los Angeles and was inspired by the video "People React To Being Called Beautiful" by Shea Glover Films. On 4 September 2016, Jodie Abacus was the musical guest on the

Channel 4 Channel 4 is a British free-to-air public broadcast television network operated by the state-owned enterprise, state-owned Channel Four Television Corporation. It began its transmission on 2 November 1982 and was established to provide a four ...

show

Sunday Brunch ''Sunday Brunch'' is a British television programme presented by Tim Lovejoy and Simon Rimmer. It is broadcast live on Channel 4 on Sunday mornings and features cookery and interviews with celebrity guests. Format The programme began on 25 Ma ...

. He supported

Corinne Bailey Rae Corinne Jacqueline Bailey Rae (; born 26 February 1979) is an English singer and songwriter. She is best known for her 2006 single "Put Your Records On". Bailey Rae was named the number-one predicted breakthrough act of 2006 in an annual BBC po ...

on her UK tour in October/November 2016. He recorded a live session for

YouTube YouTube is a global online video platform, online video sharing and social media, social media platform headquartered in San Bruno, California. It was launched on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim. It is owned by ...

Music Foundry, where he performed "Keep Your Head Down", inspired by the Syrian refugee crisis. The song was released as a single on 9 December 2016.

Discography

Albums

Extended plays

Singles

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Abacus, Jodie Living people British electronic musicians Year of birth missing (living people)