Kevin Rosaire Bellemare (born c. 1978), known professionally as Roz Bell, is a Canadian singer-songwriter

Singer-songwriter

Singer-songwriters are musicians who write, compose and sing their own musical material including lyrics and melodies. As opposed to contemporary popular music singers who write their own songs, the term singer-songwriter describes a distinct form of artistry, closely associated with the...

, best known for his single "Yesterday Man".

Biography

Roz Bell was raised in Holland Landing, Ontario

Ontario

Ontario is a province of Canada, located in east-central Canada. It is Canada's most populous province and second largest in total area. It is home to the nation's most populous city, Toronto, and the nation's capital, Ottawa....

, Canada, a small farming community north of Toronto

Toronto

Toronto is the provincial capital of Ontario and the largest city in Canada. It is located in Southern Ontario on the northwestern shore of Lake Ontario. A relatively modern city, Toronto's history dates back to the late-18th century, when its land was first purchased by the British monarchy from...

. Bell grew up listening to a wide variety of music which influenced him, from the country music

Country music

Country music is a popular American musical style that began in the rural Southern United States in the 1920s. It takes its roots from Western cowboy and folk music...

 favored by his parents to pop

Pop music

Pop music is usually understood to be commercially recorded music, often oriented toward a youth market, usually consisting of relatively short, simple songs utilizing technological innovations to produce new variations on existing themes.- Definitions :David Hatch and Stephen Millward define pop...

 hits of the 1980s. In the late 1980s Bell discovered hip-hop, and started writing rap songs at age 13, along with a schoolyard pal, Luis 'Louwop' Segura. The two friends recorded more than an album's worth of songs produced by friend and mentor, Tallis 'Tallisman' Newkirk (nelstar*, Plains of Fascination, unit-e). The album, 'Telescopic Encounters' (download | stream) was never released. He became interested in rock music

Rock music

Rock music is a genre of popular music that developed during and after the 1960s, particularly in the United Kingdom and the United States. It has its roots in 1940s and 1950s rock and roll, itself heavily influenced by rhythm and blues and country music...

 early in high school, and bought his first guitar

Guitar

The guitar is a plucked string instrument, usually played with fingers or a pick. The guitar consists of a body with a rigid neck to which the strings, generally six in number, are attached. Guitars are traditionally constructed of various woods and strung with animal gut or, more recently, with...

 at the age of 14. In 1998, at age 20, Bell moved to Toronto

Toronto

Toronto is the provincial capital of Ontario and the largest city in Canada. It is located in Southern Ontario on the northwestern shore of Lake Ontario. A relatively modern city, Toronto's history dates back to the late-18th century, when its land was first purchased by the British monarchy from...

, where he immersed himself in the city's diverse music scene. Under the alias 'Troubadour,' Roz Bell was an integral member of the Toronto based hip-hop collective unit-e, and recorded numerous tracks with the crew including the underground classics Planet of the Apes and One Emcee. Composing music while living in various basements and trying to sign a record deal, fourteen of his own songs eventually came together on his first album, The First Sunbeams, released on Universal Records

Universal Records

Universal Records was a record label owned by Universal Music Group, and it is now owned by Manny Patino and Michael Jackson, and operated as part of the Universal Motown Republic Group.-History:...

 on September 25, 2007. The album was produced almost entirely by James Robertson (Esthero

Esthero

Esthero ,born Jenny-Bea Englishman, is a Canadian singer-songwriter who currently lives in Los Angeles, California. The name Esthero refers both to the singer and formerly to the two-person team of herself and producer Doc McKinney...

, Skye Sweetnam

Skye Sweetnam

Skye Alexandra Sweetnam is a Canadian singer-songwriter, actress, and music video director. Skye first entered the mainstream in 2003 with the release of her debut single "Billy S." Over a year later, her debut album, Noise from the Basement, was released including the singles "Tangled Up in Me"...

) and was mixed by Neal Pogue (Outkast

OutKast

Outkast is an American hip hop duo based in East Point, Georgia, consisting of Atlanta native André "André 3000" Benjamin and Savannah, Georgia-born Antwan "Big Boi" Patton. They were originally known as Two Shades Deep but later changed the group's name to OutKast...

, Citizen Cope

Citizen Cope

Clarence Greenwood is an American songwriter and producer. His eclectic mix of blues, laid-back rock, soul, and folk has a large and profoundly dedicated following, built over the past decade of touring due to solid word of mouth....

, Transplants).

Track listing

1. "Yesterday Man" (Album Version)
2. "Papercut" (Album Version)
3. "I Used to Love Her" (Album Version)
4. "Cali Cry" (Acoustic Version)
5. "We'll Always Have the Rain" (Acoustic Version)
6. "Becoming Strangers" (Acoustic Version)

Track listing

1. "Cali Cry"
2. "Yesterday Man (I'm So Lonely)"
3. "The First Sunbeams (interlude)"
4. "Love in the Back"
5. "Papercut"
6. "I Used to Love Her"
7. "A Girl Named Crush"
8. "Fly on a Feelin' (interlude)"
9. "In the Bathroom"
10. "Jesus Janey"
11. "Feels like Love"
12. "She's So Excitable"
13. "We'll Always Have the Rain"
14. "The Greatest Tragedy"

Track listing

1. "Becoming Strangers"
2. "Night To End"
3. "Heart Attack"
4. "Sleep On It"
5. "Break Of Night"
6. "How Will I Get By"
7. "The Robinsons"
8. "When I Com Around"
9. "Back 2 U"

External links

• Roz Bell official site
• Roz Bell webisodes at Dose.ca
• Roz Bell on MySpace
  MySpace
  Myspace is a social networking service owned by Specific Media LLC and pop star Justin Timberlake. Myspace launched in August 2003 and is headquartered in Beverly Hills, California. In August 2011, Myspace had 33.1 million unique U.S. visitors....
  
  
• Roz Bell on CBC Radio 3
  CBC Radio 3
  CBC Radio 3 is a radio station that consists of two parts devoted to Canadian arts and music: a radio service which is available on Sirius Satellite Radio and streaming audio, and several daily and weekly podcasts from the CBC Radio 3 website...
  
  
• Roz Bell at Virb