Scott Helman

Early life

Born and raised in Toronto, Helman graduated in 2013 from Earl Haig Secondary School. He got his guitar for his 10th birthday and by the time he was 14 he knew he wanted to be a professional musician. At 15 years old, he signed a development deal with Warner Music Canada where he began writing sessions with writers such as Simon Wilcox and Thomas "Tawgs" Salter. On April 6, 2014, he began putting his music on YouTube. He attended Camp White Pine in Haliburton, Ontario and Camp Manitou in McKellar, Ontario as a camper.

Career

“Bungalow,” the first single from Helman’s debut EP Augusta, was nominated for best Pop Video at the 2015 MuchMusic Video awards. Helman and his band performed a dynamic version of the song live on the awards show broadcast across Canada. On July 11, 2015, "Bungalow" reached #31 on the Billboard Canadian Hot 100 chart and was on this chart for 22 weeks. By August the single was certified gold and, in December, the track was certified for over 50,000 spins on radio by Nielsen BDS. It reached #25 on the Billboard Canadian Digital Song Sales chart.

In the Fall, Helman was named the 2015 and first-ever winner of Spotify’s Emerge program, a 13-week contest with 12 other young Canadian artists.

Helman spent most of 2015 on tour. He made his U.S. debut opening for Walk Off The Earth on their month-long tour of the U.S. in the summer that included dates in New York, Boston, Chicago, Los Angeles and San Francisco. Helman made his European debut in the Fall as the opening act on Walk Off The Earth’s month-long tour covering 25 shows in over ten countries including performances in London, Paris, Milan, Vienna and Berlin. He finished off the year with seven weeks of dates across Canada opening for Matthew Good.

In December 2015 Helman topped the Teen Vogue list of “14 Singers Who Are Going To Dominate In 2016.” Also on the list are other breakout stars such as Elle King, Melanie Martinez and Halsey. The story describes Helman’s music as “so supremely catchy, you’ll feel like you’ve heard them before.”

In US Weekly Magazine, Shawn Mendes named Helman’s track “That Sweater” as one of his current favourite acoustic tracks alongside those of Ed Sheeran, Plain White T’s and Adele.

In February 2016, Helman received his first two Juno Award nominations – Breakthrough Artist of the Year and Pop Album of the Year. He performed the song “Bungalow” on the live national broadcast of the Juno awards on April 3, 2016. In May, Helman won a best new artist award at the 2016 Canadian Radio Music Awards (CRMA) for "Bungalow". He performed as a featured artist at the Canadian National Exhibition in Toronto on August 30, 2016.

Helman rang in 2017 with a raucous tribute to Leonard Cohen, performing "Bird On a Wire" in front of 50,000 people in Cohen's hometown of Montreal, Quebec and live on CBC TV across Canada.. His first full length album "Hotel de Ville" was released on May 12, 2017. It reached #45 on the Billboard Canadian Albums Chart on June 3, 2017. Lead singles "21 Days" and "Kinda Complicated" were released earlier in 2017. "Kinda Complicated" reached #85 on the Billboard Canadian Hot 100 chart. The music video for "Kinda Complicated", directed by Ben Knechtel, was filmed at Slab City, located in the Sonoran Desert of the California Badlands (USA).

Helman lists his main influences as Bob Dylan, Neil Young, Ray LaMontagne, Damian Rice, The Cure and Pink Floyd.

Singles

Other