Fazer (rapper)

Early life

Rawson was brought up in Camden Town, London. Fazer first met Dappy when they started attending the same karate class, becoming best friends at school. They attended Haverstock School, with third member Tulisa Contostavlos (Dappy's cousin) attending the school for a while as well. It was at school that the trio became close friends and formed N-Dubz.

N-Dubz

Fazer has been a member of hip hop trio N-Dubz, from the age of 12. They released three platinum selling studio albums and won MOBO awards. N-Dubz released their first album, Uncle B in 2008 followed by Against All Odds and Love.Live.Life in 2009 and 2010, respectively. In 2011 the band announced a two-year hiatus to focus on solo projects. In September 2012 Tulisa confirmed on The X Factor that the group would reform, and later clarified that this would probably not happen until 2014.

Solo career, Sky's the Limit and name change

Fazer was said to have his first single be Marathon (feat. Mr. Hudson). But on 3 March 2012 he was featured on BBC1's show Urban Classics where he performed his version of his sampled song Englishman in New York originally by Sting. After performing his new song he said it would hit the stores soon. About two weeks later a new song was released called Somebody That I Used to Know, another remake of an older song. A fan on Twitter asked Fazer when his solo material would start to come out, Fazer then replied "As soon as the album is completed so hopefully 1st single end of May." Fazer shot a video for his debut single "Killer" on 29 May 2012, released on 26 August 2012. Then he later released 6 foot 8 (freestyle).

In 2013, Rawson and his production partner, Peter Ibsen, both announced the opening of their production company, Sky's The Limit Entertainment (STL). The pair produced songs for Rawson himself, Tulisa's songs from the album, The Female Boss: "Young", Live Your Life, Visa (feat. Wiley) and Magnetic by Jessie J as part of The Mortal Instruments: City of Bones (soundtrack) and her second studio album, Alive.

On 12 July 2013, Fazer headlined the Yahoo! stage at the Yahoo! Wireless Festival, and performed such songs as Killer, Fireflies, Planetary and many more including an N-Dubz medley. On 10 August 2013, Fazer performed at the BBC Urban Classics Prom alongside Wretch 32 and others. He performed Fireflies and Movie, both to be released from his debut album.

On 5 February 2014, he announced he will not be releasing any of his new music under his stage name 'Fazer' and would now be releasing it under his real name Richard Rawson.

Other ventures

Along with his N-Dubz colleagues, he appeared in the interactive series Dubplate Drama, as the character Flames, alongside Dappy as Sleazy and Tulisa's as Laurissa.

He has said before that his favourite group to collaborate with would be Outlandish. Fazer is a pianist and was seen briefly playing a piano solo in Dappy's song, "No Regrets". He plays the piano when writing songs as seen in Being...N-Dubz.

Personal life

Rawson apparently had a crush on Tulisa in school, until he realised that she was Dappy's cousin. The pair were in a relationship from mid-2010 until February 2012, when they broke up during a holiday together, after they fell apart.

In January 2010, police raided Rawson's flat in Chelsea, south-west London, looking for a gun that had been allegedly used in a nearby shooting. They also raided Sensible Studio, where N-Dubz have recorded a large amount of their material but detectives failed to find the weapon and no arrests were made. The same happened to Dappy, about a year earlier after someone had reported to Police that he had been making death threats with a firearm. Fazer was involved in controversy in January 2009 after he and Dappy were hauled off a flight to London, following their "disorderly behaviour".

In January 2013, it was announced he was dating model Ashley Emma, and that she was six months pregnant. On 20 February 2013 their daughter Ava Rose Rawson was born.

Albums

Singles