Jamaican-American singer Omar Samuel Pasley, known by his stage name Omi, was born in September 1986 in Clarendon, Jamaica and relocated to Rochester, New York at the age of 15. Four years later, following the death of his aunt who he lived with in the US, Omi returned to Jamaica where his musical talent was discovered by dance hall impresario Clifton Dillon, who promptly signed him to independent Jamaican record label Oufah.
The first single Omi recorded was Standing On All Threes, which he released alongside a music video. This was followed by the song Cheerleader, which was released in 2012 and became a low grade hit in Jamaica and also in Hawaii and Dubai. He followed this with several other songs including Fireworks and Take It Easy, both of which found a certain level of popularity in his home country.
Fast forward to 2014 and the president of dance record label Ultra Music – which is part-owned by Sony Music – heard the track Cheerleader and commissioned two remixes for it, one by Ricky Blaze and the other by young German producer Felix Jaehn. The song spread like wildfire across Europe, topping the UK Singles Chart for a fourth week in a row in May 2015, marking the longest consecutive period a Jamaican artist had held that position. The track made it onto the US Billboard Hot 100 the same month and reached the top spot 12 weeks later, gaining Omi global recognition, which he cemented with another popular track, Hula Hoop, which he released in August 2015. He release his debut studio album Me 4 U towards the end of 2015.
