International Artist- Iggy Azalea

Amethyst Amelia Kelly (born 7 June 1990), known professionally as Iggy Azalea (/əˈzeɪliə/), is an Australian rapper, songwriter, model, and music video director. At the age of 16, Azalea moved to the United States to pursue a career in music. Azalea earned public recognition after releasing the viral music videos for her songs “Pussy” and “Two Times” on YouTube. Azalea signed a recording contract with American rapper T.I.’s label Grand Hustle shortly afterwards and released her debut mixtape, Ignorant Art (2011).

Azalea’s debut studio album, The New Classic (2014), peaked among the top five of several charts worldwide and received generally mixed reviews. It topped the Billboard Top R&B/Hip-Hop Albums making Azalea the first non-American female rapper to reach the top of the chart. The album was preceded by her debut single “Work”, and generated the US Billboard Hot 100 chart-topping single “Fancy”. Azalea was featured on Ariana Grande’s single “Problem”, which peaked at No. 2 while “Fancy” was No. 1. Azalea joined The Beatles as the only acts to rank at numbers one and two simultaneously with their first two Hot 100 entries. She achieved three top-ten hits simultaneously on the Hot 100 with the aforementioned songs along with the album’s fifth single, “Black Widow”, later that year.

After her debut album, Azalea released a slew of moderately successful singles to build anticipation for her intended second album, Digital Distortion, though a series of label conflicts and personal conflicts saw the project being scrapped. After switching labels again, Azalea released the EP Survive the Summer (2018) under Island Records. Continued disagreements lead to Azalea becoming an independent artist signed to her label, Bad Dreams, through a distribution deal with Empire. Her second album, In My Defense, was released on 19 July 2019.

Since her debut, Azalea has sold 48 million records worldwide, with 22 million singles in the United States alone. Azalea’s accolades include two American Music Awards, three Billboard Music Awards, an MTV Video Music Award, a People’s Choice Award, four Teen Choice Awards, and four Grammy Award nominations. Azalea’s official YouTube channel has accumulated 2.6 billion views, while she has had 13 music videos receive over 100 million views on Vevo.

Career

2016–2018: Career setbacks and Survive the Summer

In October 2015, Azalea revealed the initial title of her second album to be Digital Distortion. A buzz track off the album, “Azillion”, was made available for free streaming on SoundCloud on 9 January 2016. The project’s lead single “Team” was released on 18 March 2016 along with a dance video. An accompanying music video premiered on 31 March. In March 2016, Azalea revealed she had started a production company, having “bought the rights to a couple of books that I really like, and also some television shows from Australia that I really believed in and was a fan of when I was a kid, and I had some ideas to rework [them].” In July 2016, she announced that her company, Azalea Street Productions, had signed a deal to create original content for NBCUniversal.

On 12 June 2016, Seven Network revealed that Azalea had signed on to be a judge on The X Factor Australia for its eighth season, broadcast from October to November 2016. In September 2016, Azalea explained she was delaying the release of her album to 2017, despite it initially being set for July 2016, after ending the relationship with her fiancé, ” just needed to have some me time to get my life in order and process the changes that are happening in my private life,” and wanting to record new songs that reflected her mindset: “when I wrote [my album] I was about to get married … I don’t want to go and promote my album and get asked about my relationship that has just crumbled.” Azalea released two singles, “Mo Bounce” and “Switch”, on 24 March 2017 and 19 May 2017 respectively. The latter track features Brazilian singer Anitta. Azalea promoted “Switch” through a performance on the 2017 iHeartRadio Much Music Video Awards.

On 7 November 2017, Azalea stated that she wasn’t allowed to release music until January 2018, as she signed with a new label. She additionally announced the new title of her second album, Surviving the Summer, and released four new tracks for free download via WeTransfer. The media has dubbed the songs as a four-track mixtape or EP called 4 My Ratz. In January 2018, Azalea announced the title of the lead single from Surviving the Summer, “Savior” featuring Quavo, which was released on 2 February 2018.

On 8 June 2018, the rapper revealed that Survive the Summer would be an EP. She also stated that the reason behind the postponed release date—originally for 2 June, then 30 June release—was the change of president of her record label, Island Records. On 5 July, Azalea released two tracks from the EP: “Tokyo Snow Trip” and “Kream”, the latter featuring Tyga. Survive the Summer was released on 3 August 2018, and it debuted at number 144 on the Billboard 200.

2019: Departure from label and In My Defense

On 3 November 2018, Azalea tweeted that she had left her record label, Island Records, which she had signed to in 2017, and established her own record label, which was then named New Classic Records. Two weeks later, she announced she had signed a $2.7 million dollar distribution deal with an unidentified company. She stated that she would be an independent artist, be able to sign other artists, and own all her masters, with the exception of her music licensed under Universal. On 20 November 2018, it was announced that she had signed a partnership deal with Empire Distribution. She would later rename her record label Bad Dreams in January 2019.

Azalea announced in early February 2019 that she had completed work on her second studio album, In My Defense. She further stated her plans to release it in spring of that year. On 27 February Azalea announced that “Sally Walker” would be the first single off the album. On the same day, her previous single, “Kream”, was certified gold for selling 500,000 copies in the US. At the end of March 2019, 14 days after Azalea’s new single was released, “Sally Walker” had accumulated over 38 million views on YouTube, had a combined total sales of over 82,000 copies sold on all platforms and had debuted on Billboard’s Hot 100 Chart at number 62, making it the highest charting single from Azalea on the Billboard charts since “Team”, released in 2016, which had charted at number 42. Azalea promoted the song with a performance on Jimmy Kimmel Live! during his Las Vegas shows. On 3 May 2019, Azalea released the album’s official second single, “Started”, along with its official music video. Shortly afterwards, a collaboration with VVAVES titled “Boys Like You” was released. On 24 June 2019, Azalea announced via Twitter that her album In My Defense would be released on 19 July 2019. Pre-orders for the album began on 28 June 2019. Azalea appeared on the cover of Cosmopolitan in August.

In an interview with Entertainment Weekly, Azalea stated she was not sure if she would tour to promote the record but that she plans to begin recording a new record in September, with hopes of putting it out next year.