Compton, CA · house · West Coast rap

Channel Tres

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Compton house music — baritone talk-sung cool over four-on-the-floor bounce, G-funk swagger walked straight onto the dancefloor.

Channel Tres was born Sheldon Jerome Young in 1991 and grew up in southern Los Angeles, between Compton and Lynwood, raised by his great-grandparents. Church filled much of his childhood; he played drums for the choir there before leaving Los Angeles to study music at Oral Roberts University, a Christian college in Tulsa, Oklahoma.

Back in Los Angeles, a childhood friend, the artist August 08, brought him along to studio sessions, and he began making beats for other artists, including Duckwrth, Wale and Kehlani, before stepping out as a performer himself.

He came to attention in the late 2010s pairing four-on-the-floor house rhythms with a low, conversational vocal delivery closer to rap than singing, drawing on Detroit and Chicago dance traditions alongside West Coast hip-hop. "Controller," released in 2018, picked up airplay on BBC Radio 1 and an Essential New Tune tag from Pete Tong, plus A-list rotation on Australia's Triple J.

A self-titled EP followed later that year, along with further singles including "Black Moses," featuring JPEGMAFIA. He played his first headline shows in the United States in 2019, since building a run of EPs and albums, collaborations across dance and pop, and a live show built heavily around choreography.

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houseWest Coast rap