Bruno Mars |

Bruno Mars

November 10th, 2011 koolahmed1 Posted in Celebrity | No Comments »

Bruno Mars

Earlier Life

Singer, songwriter. Born as Peter Gene Hernandez on October 8, 1985, in Honolulu, Hawaii. Bruno Mars grew up in a very musical family. His father, Pete, was a Latin percussionist from Brooklyn, and his mother, Bernadette (“Bernie”), was a singer. Mars received his nickname, Bruno, while he was still a baby. “

The name Bruno came from baby times,” older sister Jamie explains. “Bruno was always so confident, independent, really strong-willed and kind of a brute — hence the name Bruno, and it kind of just stuck.”

In Waikiki Beach, Mars’ family performed a Las Vegas-style revue that included Motown hits, doo-wop melodies and celebrity impersonations. Growing up around entertainers, Mars began picking up musical instruments from early childhood. “I’ve always had a drum set, a piano, a guitar… and never got trained to play. It was just always there, he recalls. That’s just how I learned, just being surrounded by it my whole life.” At the age of four, he joined the family musical act as an Elvis impersonator and quickly become one of the stars of the show. He continued to perform with his family throughout his childhood, and as he approached adolescence he added Michael Jackson to his impersonation repertoire.

Mars attended Roosevelt High School, where he and several friends formed a band, The School Boys, performing classic oldie hits alongside his family’s act at the Ilikai Hotel in Honolulu. Mars credits his fearless stage presence to his unusual childhood. “Performing from such a young age just got me so comfortable on stage,” he says. “Growing up performing — that was normal for me. Everyone in my family sings, plays instruments. It’s what we do.”

After graduating from high school in 2002, Mars decided to leave Hawaii for Los Angeles at age 17. During his first few years in California, he struggled to make a breakthrough in the music industry. And especially because he had performed so frequently while growing up in Honolulu, Mars grew frustrated with waiting for his career to move forward. It was during this period that Mars first turned to songwriting. “I only started writing songs when I moved up to L.A., because when I was in Hawaii I never really needed to,” he recalls. “But it stemmed from just learning that you have to do everything by yourself. It’s not like what you see in movies, where you walk into a record company and you’re given all these great songs to sing. You have to write the song the world is going to want to hear and play it over and over again. I learned that the hard way here in L.A.”

Career Breakthrough

A friend introduced Mars to songwriter Phillip Lawrence, who agreed to help Mars compose material. They presented a song they had written and recorded to a record label, who liked it but wanted one of their own artists to perform it. Mars recalls, “We were so broke and struggling, we had to do what we had to do, so we ended up selling the song.” Initially Mars was disappointed, but he says, “The light bulb went off. I decided to push the artist thing aside and get into the business this way. We can write songs and produce songs, so we just really focused our energy into writing for other artists. That’s how it all began.” By the late 2000s, Mars started finding success by writing songs for other popular artists such as Flo Rida’s smash hit “Right ‘Round,” Brandy’s “Long Distance,” Travie McCoy’s “Billionaire” and K’Naan’s “Wavin’ Flag,” the theme song for the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics.

After several years as one of the pop music industry’s premier songwriters, Mars finally broke out as a singer in his own right with the 2010 hit “Nothin’ on You.” The song was written for the Atlantic Records rapper B.o.B., but the record label decided to enlist Mars himself to croon the heartfelt chorus. The track proved an enormous hit, skyrocketing to No. 1 on the Billboard singles chart, instantly transforming Bruno Mars from a behind-the-scenes composer into a pop performer. Several months later, Mars released his first solo single, “Just the Way You Are,” another single that landed the artist on top of the Billboard singles chart. The track served as the lead single for Mars’ debut studio album, Doo-Wops & Hooligans, released in October 2010. The album reached No. 3 on Billboard’s album charts, and its second single,

2009–present: Commercial success and Doo-Wops & Hooligans

Before becoming a successful solo artist, Hernandez was an acknowledged music producer, writing songs for Alexandra Burke, Travie McCoy, Adam Levine, Brandy, Sean Kingston, and Flo Rida. He also co-wrote the Sugababes’ hit song “Get Sexy” and provided backing vocals on their album Sweet 7. His first musical appearance as a singer was in Far East Movement’s second studio album Animal, featured on the track “3D”.He was also featured on pastor and hip hop artist Jaeson Ma‘s debut single “Love” in August 2009. He reached prominence as a solo artist after being featured on and co-writing B.o.B’s “Nothin’ on You” and Travie McCoy’s “Billionaire“; both songs peaked within the top ten of many charts worldwide. He said of them, “I think those songs weren’t meant to be full-sung songs. If I’d sung all of “Nothin’ on You”, it might’ve sounded like some ’90s R&B.” Following this success, Mars released his debut extended play (EP), titled It’s Better If You Don’t Understand, on May 11, 2010^. The EP peaked at the 99th position on the Billboard 200 and produced one single, “The Other Side”, featuring singers Cee Lo Green and B.o.B. Mars collaborated with Green once more in August 2010 by co-writing his single “Fuck You!“. He performed a medley of “Nothin’ on You” and “Airplanes” with B.o.B and Hayley Williams at the 2010 MTV Video Music Awards on September 12, 2010.

Mars’ debut album, Doo-Wops & Hooligans, was released digitally on October 4, and saw its physical release on October 5, 2010. The lead single, “Just the Way You Are“, was released on July 19, 2010, and has reached the top of the Billboard Hot 100 as well as several other charts worldwide. The music video was released on September 8, 2010. The second single, “Grenade”, was released September 28, 2010, and has also seen successful international chart performance, In the United States, Doo-Wops & Hooligans debuted at number three on the Billboard 200 for the week of October 13, 2010, selling 55,000 copies^. The album also received generally positive reviews from critics. Entertainment Weekly‘s Leah Greenblatt praised Mars for his “instant-access melodies” and “sly snatches of dance-floor swagger”, but noted weaknesses in songs deviant from his conventional pop and soul genres^.He opened for Maroon on the fall leg of the Hands All Over Tour starting October 6, 2010 and co-headlined with McCoy on a European tour starting October 18, 2010.

On September 19, 2010, Mars was arrested in Las Vegas for possession of cocaine. When talking to a police officer, Mars reportedly stated that what he did was “foolish” and that “he has never used drugs before”.Mars pled guilty to felony drug possession, and in return for his plea, he was told that the charges would be erased from his criminal record as long as he stayed out of trouble for a year, paid a $2,000 fine, did 200 hours of community service and completed a drug counseling course.^[

On September 16, 2011, Bad Meets Evil released their single, "Lighters", which featured Mars in the song. The song was met with mixed reviews from critics and many criticized Mars for doing this type of song. On September 22, 2011, it was announced on Mars' website that his new song "It Will Rain" will appear on The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn - Part 1 Original Motion Picture Soundtrack which will be released on November 8th. On October 30, 2011, Mars gave an exclusive performance of "Runaway Baby" on the results show of The X Factor UK.