Dwele

West side

Andwele Gardner was born on February 14, 1978, in Detroit and grew up on the west side in a musical family. He started piano at six and picked up trumpet, bass and guitar. When he was ten his father was shot and killed outside the family home, and he has said music became the way he worked through it. He grew up on Stevie Wonder, Donny Hathaway, Roy Ayers, Miles Davis and Freddie Hubbard, and A Tribe Called Quest turned him into an MC before he was known as a singer.

The Rize and “Tainted”

He cut a demo in his bedroom, Rize (2000), and sold about a hundred copies out of his trunk in a week. It got to Slum Village and J Dilla. Slum Village put him on the hook of “Tainted” from Trinity (Past, Present and Future) (2002), which led to work with Bahamadia and Lucy Pearl. He was on Slum Village’s Detroit Deli, Phat Kat’s The Undeniable, Elzhi’s Witness My Growth and Dilla’s The Shining, and played the flugelhorn solo on Black Milk’s “Long Story Short.”

Solo albums

Virgin signed him in 2001 and released Subject in 2003, neo soul with a hip hop spine, with the single “Find a Way.” Some Kinda... (2005) had “I Think I Love U.” He moved to Koch and RT Music Group for Sketches of a Man (2008), then to E1 for W.ants W.orld W.omen (2010) and Greater Than One (2012). Most of his singles were produced by Mike City.

The Kanye records

Dwele sang on Kanye West’s “Flashing Lights” from Graduation (2007) and, mostly uncredited, on “Power” (2010). Both went top 30 on the Hot 100. He also sang on Common’s “The People” (2007).

Still in the D

He kept showing up on Detroit records: Marv Won’s Wayne Fontes Music, Hush’s “Bad Boys,” Big Sean’s “Celebrity” (2011) and “Everything That’s Missing” (2020), and Black Milk’s “2 Would Try” (2018). He also worked with DJ Quik, Robert Glasper and the late Phife Dawg.