Born Harrison McQueeney, the 26-year-old got his start performing basement shows at his friends’ colleges, penning songs like “robot snakes” and posting clips to social media.

“I had been previewing all of my music on Twitter, getting some traction, and the first track to really pop off was ‘deja vu’,” Had says. “It had 8,000 plays in the first few hours, basically off of Twitter self-promo. That next morning I called both my parents and let them know I wasn’t going to class that day so I could work on more music, and I ended up never going back.”

Soon, Souly Had was attracting the praise of Darkchild and recording in the same building as Alicia Keys. As he geared up for the summer release of his EP "DRUGS", it is evident that he made the right choice in pursuing his artistry full-time.

“It just felt insane to have people actually caring about my music and vibing,” Had says. “I’m with them in what they’re going through, and they’re with me.” Read more on Last.fm. User-contributed text is available under the Creative Commons By-SA License; additional terms may apply.