Cody Simpson Page 3

  I asked my parents if I could post more videos on YouTube, and they were reluctant at first because of safety concerns. I was never allowed to have a MySpace page or even an email account. But after a few months of me bugging her, my mum started to come around. She let me sign up for MySpace and continue using my YouTube account as long as she was in control of them and could check any messages. Once she was satisfied that it was secure and safe for me to use, she even started to help me with filming and would get excited when people liked the videos.

  My second video was “Dream Catch Me” by Newton Faulkner. He’s a cool surfer dude with dreadlocks, and has a great laid-back sound. It was the kind of song we would all play at our family hangouts, and in the video I sang the laid-back, beachy tune while playing along on the guitar. Mum filmed me playing and together we uploaded it to YouTube. When I watch that video now, I can’t help thinking how young I look and sound!

  After that, I filmed a cover of Bon Jovi’s “Wanted Dead or Alive.” In this video, you can see I’m playing it up for the camera and performing more than in the first ones. But I still hadn’t had a vocal lesson at that point, and wasn’t taking it too seriously.

  I started to get a bit of a following – a few hundred views – and people began to ask me to put up more songs. Then my perfectionism kicked in – I had to make sure they were the best before I put them up online. I got the new guitar and I immediately recorded a new YouTube video with it: Justin Timberlake’s “Cry Me a River.” I took a singing lesson, and a month later I posted “I Want You Back” by the Jackson 5. This video was all about the vocals; I was standing at a microphone and didn’t play the guitar on it. Soon, I was getting hundreds and sometimes thousands of views. It was pretty incredible that so many people were watching my videos. I felt really flattered! Recording these videos and putting them on YouTube was something that I was doing for fun. Seeing people comment and ask for more was something I never expected!

  Soundchecking at Big Jingle.

  Backstage at Wango Tango at the Staples Center.

  With Alli and my cousins Rae and Charlie.

  At the time, I didn’t take it too seriously. I didn’t share much of this with my friends. I was pretty well liked in school for being an athlete – and few people even knew that I was a musician. I never liked the cliques at school. They never made sense to me, and I just sort of ignored those games. Even the music industry isn’t as cliquey as school!

  I worked hard on my schoolwork and I did well. Even so, the day felt very structured to me. I enjoy more creative activities, and my favorite subject was English. My parents always reminded me how important doing well in school was, so I never slacked off. My mum would drive me to school in the mornings, and sometimes I’d sing a little song that went, “I don’t want to go to school every day.”

  My hard work at school paid off and I won some academic achievement awards in elementary and middle school. The last year of junior high school, I won the junior high school “cup,” which is only given to one student in the whole grade. It’s for overall achievement in academics, citizenship, sports, and music. It was pretty rad to win that.

  That night, for the finale of the junior high award ceremony, I played the guitar and sang “Wish You Well” by Bernard Fanning, a well-known Australian musician. It’s a great, guitar-driven song. My mates came up to me afterwards and said it was awesome. That was one of the few times I played publicly in school. No one even knew about my writing or the videos. I just felt it was better to keep it all quiet. I’m not one to show off or brag to friends. So when I did this performance, it felt pretty cool to share this part of me with my friends.

  Around that time, my musical tastes continued to evolve and expand. I started to develop an appreciation of hip-hop, R&B, and rap, including Chris Brown and Jay-Z. I didn’t tell my family about my newfound enthusiasm. I just listened in my room or on headphones.

  But it became apparent at my eleventh birthday party. I usually didn’t have parties, but that year I had some friends over, from school and from swimming. We had this pool room in the house, and we blacked out the windows and got some strobe lights – corny, I know, but we were 11. I began playing some of my favorite songs by Michael Jackson and Justin Timberlake and, much to the surprise of my family, I started dancing. My mum saw it and noticed that I had what most people call rhythm. She – and I, for that matter – had no idea I could dance.

  There was always music around when I was growing up. We were always goofing off and dancing through the house. We would have big family dance-offs or team dances to a song. It’s fun to see my parents and grandparents acting silly and all doing it together.

  One time, we found ourselves in the upstairs bathroom dancing to “Marry You” by Bruno Mars. It was the whole bunch of us: my parents, me, and Alli, plus both sets of my grandparents. We were dancing in the mirror and watching ourselves. Alli and I would do a dance move and then my parents and grandparents would have to copy us. We were just looking in the mirror and laughing at ourselves. It was so funny. Alli was even videoing this, so the evidence exists somewhere. I’m scared to think about watching it now!

  That night sparked a few more dance parties. Our best friends would come around, and I would even find the guts to start dancing – as long as we turned all the lights off and I could sort of hide in the shadows a bit. That was only at first, though. Slowly, over the next few months, I gained a little more confidence. Everyone thought I was really good, but it took a while for me to warm up to that idea.

  I loved recording videos and posting covers of some of my favorite songs. And I looked forward to seeing if I could build up more and more views with each one. Reaching a thousand views seemed like a challenge! I loved the feeling of turning on the camera and performing for an audience, even a virtual one. But that was just for fun, like our dance parties. I was totally into swimming and becoming the best I could. And to get there, I had a pretty hectic schedule for a 12-year-old.

  I was training six or seven times a week in total. On some days I’d train twice a day – once in the morning and once in the evening – and on others I’d just do one session, depending on my school work. I’d get up at 4:30 a.m., and training would be from 5:30 to 7 a.m., then I’d get ready and go to school. Straight after school, I’d head to the pool to practice from 4 to 6:30 p.m., and then home to do school work. Practices were grueling: we’d start with a 30-minute gym workout and then get in the pool.

  Most of my closest friends were in my swimming club, so I liked spending time at practice. I only had a few good friends at school, but swimming mates understood the love of the sport. So it was fun, but hard – and that’s just the way I like it.

  THE MESSAGE OF A LIFETIME

  In May 2009, a music producer from America named Shawn Campbell found a couple of my videos on YouTube and sent me a message introducing himself. I was just surfing the internet one day and saw that I had a new notification on my MySpace page. Little did I know that this one message would soon change my entire life.

  When I told my mum about the message, she couldn’t believe her ears. I was thrilled and so flattered, but I really didn’t know what to think about it. I didn’t let myself fantasize that this would lead anywhere right off the bat, because Mum and Dad were skeptical. But after they Googled him, they felt a little more confident that he was legitimate. He wanted to call us to introduce himself. Mum gave him her mobile number so they could speak directly first. She says she gave him her mobile number instead of our home number so he couldn’t track down our house. It may seem extreme, but she was determined to keep us safe. Shawn and Mum had a short conversation and she learned more about his experience in the business. As it turned out, Shawn was a Grammy-nominated producer and songwriter who had worked with big artists like Missy Elliott, Jay-Z, Chris Brown, and others. It was pretty unbelievable that he was interested in me.

  Once Mum felt comfortable that he was for real, I started to get excited. This seemed like a big
deal! This wasn’t something I’d even considered when I posted my first video online. Mum and I began Skyping with Shawn, so we could see each other as well. I even played a few songs that I had written by myself, and he practically fell off his chair saying, “What the...? Did you knock a 30-year-old songwriter on his head and put him in your pocket?” This made me so proud.

  Shawn invited us to come over to the States for a meeting at his house and studio just outside Washington DC. He thought that if I recorded a couple of songs in his studio, we could then send them to a few record labels and see what happened. It felt so amazing to think about working in a studio and having a demo CD. I started to think about which songs I would want to record and how they would sound... That’s me – always thinking, always working!

  It was a big decision to make the trip at all. It meant flying to the other side of the world to meet someone I’d never met, without being sure how legitimate it all was. We just treated it as an experiment, initially, like a test to see if I had what it takes in the studio. My parents remained skeptical, which was good for me. If they’d allowed me to get ahead of myself and believe that this was the start of something big, I’d have been crushed if it didn’t work out. Alli thought it was very cool that an American record producer was calling me, and she wanted to come on the trip too, but my parents didn’t want to take her out of school.

  That was in September 2009. Dad and I flew from Brisbane to Los Angeles, then from LA to DC. It was my first trip out of the country. I had traveled a bit with my swimming club, and we’d flown a few times to different meets around Australia. But this was the furthest I’d ever been! We didn’t travel much or take a lot of family vacations when I was a kid. We couldn’t afford it. Instead, we would take cheaper holidays and we’d drive for a few hours to beach towns like Noosa and Kingscliff. In any case, why leave when you live in such an idyllic place?

  So overall we were pretty excited about the trip. I could hardly stand the anticipation as I counted down the days to our departure. In the last day or two I did my packing, with the help of Mum and Alli, of course. But I really had no idea what to expect. I certainly had never actually considered there being a real future in music for me, but at this point I was starting to dream that it was possible. Although I’m naturally skeptical, and it might have taken me a little longer than the next guy, now it was really starting to feel like this whole new world was opening up for me. And I was thrilled! I was 12 and about to see America for the first time – and setting off on a potentially life-changing journey.

  We landed at the airport in Washington DC and Shawn met us there. We went first to Shawn’s house in Maryland to record in his studio there. He had a cool house, in a nice neighborhood, and having a built-in studio struck me as pretty amazing. I brought some new songs I had written shortly before we left for the States, and some of the older ones I had been working on for a while. We also planned to write some new songs together. The studio was in his basement. I was stoked to get in front of the microphone and put on those big padded headphones for the first time.

  I could tell Dad was excited to see me in a professional studio setting. For the very first time it felt real. Shawn was great to work with, and it felt like a natural collaboration from the start. We wrote and recorded for only a few days, and got four pretty good songs from it to use for a demo. Shawn seemed to understand me and my music. He’s a really straight-forward guy, and when he said my songs spoke to him, I took it seriously. We posted one of the songs from the demo on YouTube – “One,” which Shawn and I wrote together.

  I think we were all surprised at how good the demo sounded! I was used to singing a cappella or just accompanying myself on the guitar. The sound from a proper studio was so much better. With full production my songs sounded like real songs; like ones you’d hear on the radio. And that’s when we started really believing that something might actually come out of this.

  That said, I tried not to get too far ahead of myself, so that I remained focused on swimming. We tried to fit in a few training sessions in Baltimore while I was over there. It was important to keep in touch with the water and stay in shape while I was away. My swimming coach even arranged for me to meet Michael Phelps. If nothing else were to happen as a result of that trip to the US, at least I got to meet one of my heroes! He was very friendly, and he’s such an inspiration – every bit the role model that I had hoped he would be. I’m still embarrassed about asking him to sign ten swimming caps for all my swimming friends back home – doing that during his designated training time must have been incredibly annoying. Sorry, mate!

  We planned to take advantage of being on the East Coast, and Shawn drove us up to New York City to introduce us to a few music executives. The meetings went well, but they were short meet-and-greets. I left them with my demo but never played them anything. I didn’t know what to expect from these meetings, so I was thrilled when they asked for my demo and seemed interested in meeting me.

  It was my first time in New York City. Shawn drove us into the city at night, right into Times Square. All lit up against the dark sky, it was very dreamlike! I was blown away by how many people there were in one place! It was a lot to take in: the massive buildings, the bright lights of the big city, the bright yellow taxis I’d seen only in films. Where I’m from is pretty much the exact opposite of Manhattan. There is nothing on the Gold Coast of Australia to prepare you for visiting New York. While we were there, Dad and I also went to a Yankees game. It was the first time I had ever seen baseball!

  The whole trip was incredible, and I knew that I wanted to make this opportunity happen. I just kind of fell in love with it – the recording process, the business meetings, the excitement. It wasn’t until it actually started happening that it really dawned on me that making music was what I wanted to do — and that I needed to work hard at it.

  Discussing strategy on the phone with my manager.

  THE WAITING GAME

  We went back to Australia – and waited. We were in the States for about two weeks, and the whole trip felt so surreal: recording in a real studio, seeing New York City, and taking meetings with music executives. I decided to record and post a new cover of “I’m Yours” by Jason Mraz on YouTube. So when I got home, I got to work and channeled all my energy into recording new videos, practicing, and writing new songs. The video got something like 200,000 views within the first few weeks. I was shocked! It wasn’t that different from any of my previous videos, so I’m not sure why this one went crazy, but it did! I couldn’t believe that so many people from around the world watched it. This video also got noticed by record labels, who started to contact me. They said that they loved the videos I posted and they wanted to know more. Even Mike Caren and Chris Morris from Atlantic Records, Jason Mraz’s label, contacted me on my YouTube page and asked my parents to contact them for a meeting! Mum also got messages from Sony at the same time! By then I think the record companies were scouting for new talent online because of Justin Bieber and how he was discovered.

  Offers from the labels started coming in, and one wanted to sign me on the spot. I was floored! That tiny dream I’d been secretly harboring since those nights singing along around the barbecue or seeing Keith Urban in concert for the first time could be coming true. But Mum and Dad were naturally wary. We didn’t want to rush into anything. And if these labels believed in me like they said they did, well, they would still be there when we were ready. I didn’t know what to expect or if anything would come from the trip and recording the demo. So after taking those few weeks off, I threw myself into catching up in school and swimming.

  At the same time I started getting serious with music. After all, a career in music wasn’t going to happen on its own. I wrote a couple more songs on my guitar and worked much harder at playing and practicing regularly, even though I was back at school and swimming training. Though we planned to go back to the States pretty quickly, about a month or two later, for now all we could do was wait.

  Kee
ping up with social media on the Paradise tour.

  REBEL WITH A CAUSE

  In junior high school, I developed a great relationship with the music teacher, whose name was Tim Brown. We had a cool connection, and he could see there was something musical in me, even though I never told him about my YouTube videos or the demo. He would sneak me in at lunchtime or before school to record some of my songs, or for extra guitar lessons, and would allow me to rehearse and record in his studio. And sometimes he would invite one of my mates, Lochie O’Keefe, who was a drummer. We played some good covers together, and performed some of them at school talent shows.

  The funny thing is that during my last year of school in Australia, I got a C in music. You would think that I could totally nail that class, since I play guitar and sing, and got along well with the music teacher. But because he knew what I was capable of, Mr. Brown was always very hard on me – harder than he was on the other students. The class was aimed at beginners, so he focused on the very basics of notes and chords, and general music knowledge. It really didn’t seem interesting or educational to me, and I wouldn’t always be listening.

  I’d always be great at actually doing the assignments and stuff, but in class I’d just sit in the corner and talk to my friends, because I didn’t feel like I had much to learn. So he gave me a C, just on effort, or lack thereof. Outside of class, I would be jamming with Mr. Brown, so he knew how passionate I was about music. My passion just didn’t translate into how I did in his class. I guess sometimes it’s not about what you do, but about what you’re capable of doing.