Usher

Usher Raymond was born October 18, 1978 in Dallas, Texas. At an early age his family moved to Chattanooga, Tenn. He is oldest son of Usher Raymond III and Jonetta Patton and has a young brother named James. His stepfather was Terry Patton. Jonetta divorce when Terry told her to choose him or Usher's career. Jonetta still praises Terry and views the marriage as a good one. The family moved to Atlanta when he was 12 years old and that is where he started entering talent shows. Eventually he made it on Star Search and was discovered by Laface Records.

For his first album, he work with Sean "Puffy" Combs and the album was considered a failure by industry standards. It produced the hit Think Of You. Usher soon worked with Puffy and Dallas Austin on a second album that was completed and never released. Puffy turned his back on Usher to produce the highly regarded but poorly promoted Back to the World album by Tevin Campbell. Tevin Campbell is a person that Usher hates being compared to at all times. Many view the Puffy/Usher relationship a failure since Puffy attempted to turn him into something that he wasn't-a street player (mack). (sound familiar Tevin fans?)
"Puffy tried to help Usher but he also made Usher into someone he wanted him to be, something from the street. Usher's not from the street Usher's mom (source Request mag)


"I wasn' t as hard a cat as the image they were trying to portray me. So, I mean, I lived up to it, but Puff Daddy sort of split, he got occupied with other things, the East Coast/West Coast war was kind of the thing, and I sort of fell back in the cut."-Usher (Request mag.)


Usher attempted to start his acting career by trying out for the WB/ABC sitcom Sister, Sister and never got the role. It's unknown what role he tried out for. He started suffering from acne and really felt sorry for himself. It wasn't until he met Jermaine Dupree that his life started to change.

Jermaine informed him not to worry about his acne and focus on his music. Jermaine listened to Usher something that many people didn't do in the past. Usher did what he said and returned with his second (third) album-My Way. It produced 4 hit songs and allowed his to crossover into mainstream media. He released 8701 as his third (fourth) album. All about U was released in limited numbers overseas with Pop Your Collar & Party being the only songs not on 8701.

However another version of 8701 was released overseas with theses songs. He wrote a movie script called Farscade. He calls it another version of Purple Rain. He was considered for the role of Marvin Gaye after he played him on NBC's American Dreams in a movie about the late singer. Another possible role was starring in Singing in The Rain remake. He completed a new album called Confessions for March 2004 release. He went on tour and promoting the best selling album of his career.

Confessions proved to such a hit that he released it again with four new songs in November 2004. On New Year's Eve Usher's mini movie featuring the four new songs (videos) will air during Dick Clark's New Years Eve Special. The mini movie featured Clifton Powell, Joy Bryant and Outkast.