Alex Clare

British singer-songwriter Alex Clare fuses his soulful singing with Major Lazer’s dubstep production on his 2011 breakthrough hit “Too Close,” a Top 10 smash on both sides of the Atlantic. • Clare grew up listening to his parents’ vintage soul, blues, and jazz records. He learned to play drums and kicked around the mid-2000s Camden Town music scene, briefly dating Amy Winehouse. • He signed with Island Records in 2010 and released his debut album, The Lateness of the Hour, the following year. Due to poor sales, he was dropped months later. • In March 2012, the single “Too Close”—produced by Diplo, Switch, and Mike Spencer—appeared in a popular software commercial. Given a second life, the song reached No. 4 in the UK and No. 7 in the US. It was nominated for British Single of the Year at the 2013 BRIT Awards. • Island re-signed Clare for his 2014 sophomore effort, Three Hearts, but dropped him again that same year. • He recorded his third album, 2017’s Tail of Lions, on a boat in East London. • Clare became an Orthodox Jew in his early 20s. He lives with his family in Jerusalem and puts his religious beliefs ahead of the trappings of the music industry.