Jared Evan Siegel grew up in Great Neck, New York. He started out by playing the drums, dreaming to one day become the next Keith Moon. Initially wanting to be a professional drummer, Jared eventually began taking on several other talents. He later became heavily influenced by seminal hip hop artists such as the Wu-Tang Clan, Mos Def, Kool G Rap, and A Tribe Called Quest. He studied early hip hop while also taking musical cues from his alternative and r&b/soul influences such as Thom Yorke, Cream, Bradley Nowell, The Beatles, Stevie Wonder, Al Green, James Brown and others. His early years were troubled and music provided a therapeutic outlet for him. Later, Jared focused more on producing and songwriting. He started to incorporate raps, while introducing melodic undertones over his own production. In 2008 at the age of 18, Jared won the Brooklyn Hip Hop Festival's Spit 16 competition curated by The Source. It was around this time where Jared started interning at The FADER in New York City. He gave his then mixtape Radio In My Head to friend and acclaimed Hip Hop director Rik Cordero. Rik and Jared started creating visually stunning music videos to complement Jared's sound. These videos were then circulated to the top music executives and within weeks Jared had several major label offers.
Career
In June 2009, Jared decided to sign with Zone 4/Interscope with the support of Jimmy Iovine. In October 2009, Jared was featured in Billboard as an "Under the radar artist with the potential to break into the big time." In August 2010, Interscope released the single, "In Love with You." In March 2011, the song was aired on the Greek television show Radio Arvyla and because of this, it met great success, reaching No. 1 overall on the Greek iTunes charts. During this time, he had also worked with some of his musical heroes such as The Neptunes, Dr. Dre and Mike Elizondo. In the Spring of 2011, Jared joined OneRepublic on a nationwide tour. At the end of 2011, Jared opted out of his contract with Interscope. He split ways with the label expressing that they were not supporting his true vision thoroughly. After leaving and going independent, Jared formed a passionate cult fan base. In 2012, Jared released his debut project entitled The 4th Chapter. It was released to fans for free online. He then helped write and produce a large portion of Hoodie Allen's mixtape Crew Cuts, before releasing his collaboration album with Statik Selektah entitled Boom Bap & Blues on February 26, 2013. It features artists like Joey Badass and Action Bronson, amongst several others. It was originally released as a free album through Jared's website, although days later the album debuted at No. 29 on the iTunes R&B/Soul charts. Within a couple of hours it shot to No. 8. Boom Bap & Blues is said to be some of Jared's best work and has become critically acclaimed. In 2014, Jared produced a large portion of Hoodie Allen's debut album People Keep Talking. One of the songs, "Numbers," which Evan produced and co-wrote, met great success reaching No. 5 overall on the iTunes charts. In November 2016, Jared released his first solo full-length album "The Blanket Truth". It peaked at No. 30 on the iTunes pop charts. In January 2018 Jared signed with EP Entertainment. In the spring of 2019, Jared started releasing a slew of new singles. He released the first single "Permanent Damage" in March of 2019. He later released another single entitled "Dark Days" in July of 2019, a third single "Perfect Strangers" in September of 2019 and a fourth single "Sabotage" in December of 2019.
Musical style
Evan's musical style combines soul, hip-hop, and pop with alternative rock and alternative R&B influences. He is known for an introspective style of songwriting, often citing Bradley Nowell, The Beatles, Radiohead, Method Man, Mos Def, Al Green, Rza, DJ Premier, Stevie Wonder and early Coldplay as his main influences.
